“The first responsibility of any great restaurant is to keep you in the bubble, the soft-serve cocoon of illusion where you forget the world exists for anything but your pleasure,” wrote Jonathan Gold, the Pulitzer Prize-winning food writer who dedicated his career to Los Angeles restaurants and the people who keep them running. LA is home to fantastic food, found everywhere from romantic Old Hollywood watering holes to divine sushi hidden in strip malls to the many, many perfect tacos (if you’re visiting, the shrimp taco at Mariscos Jalisco might be out of your way, but it’s worth it). There is so much more to consume than a green juice—although here, those do go down quite smoothly.
Los Angeles, where the produce is so fresh and enticing as to induce tears and the reservation culture is not nearly as annoying as New York, is a sprawling city with a sprawling food scene. In this list, you’ll find places that span the palm tree-lined expanse, ranging from boundary-pushing fine dining to stalwarts that can make anybody smile. Writing it made me very hungry.
Antico Nuovo
Chad Colby’s Antico Nuovo, located in a strip mall on Beverly Boulevard on the edge of Koreatown, serves Los Angeles’s best pasta. My favorites are the foglie d’ulivo, where charmingly olive leaf-shaped pasta is served with deeply savory roasted squab and crispy cracklings, and the plin dell’ alta langa, where tiny agnolotti stuffed with ground beef cheeks, pancetta, and rabbit melt in a braise with butter and sage. There is steam coming off most tables from the restaurant’s famed fresh-baked focaccia, served with dips like a creamy whipped ricotta and briny anchovies in salsa verde; the bread carries across the menu, in items like chicken roasted over focaccia croutons and, ingeniously, in focaccia ice cream. Antico Nuovo is also one of the best restaurants in LA to have dinner by yourself—they thoughtfully offer half-portions of pastas to solo diners, so that you can try more than one.
The Apple Pan
The Apple Pan, with its adorable signage, U-shaped Formica counter, and cooks in paper caps, is a Los Angeles treasure. Open since 1947, the West LA diner is best known for its hickory burger, with a sweet and smoky barbecue sauce, and its pies (the banana cream is my favorite). But regulars know that one of the very best things at the Apple Pan is its technically off-menu tuna melt, which will convert even the most adamant of sweet relish haters.
A Tí
A Tí initially opened as a pop-up in Echo Park earlier this year, but, thankfully, they decided to stick around. Chef Andrew Ponce is a second-generation Mexican-American who was born and raised in LA, and his food honors it. I love the sweet potato and al pastor tacos, the rich crispy duck mole, sweetened with dates and cut through with a citrusy lime crema, and the tuna tostada with lemon aioli and salsa negra, which is so good that you might be tempted to order it again for dessert. There is a full bar (in this city where people are both healthy and have to drive, those are not the norm), the lighting is nice and low, the staffers are warm, and they managed to turn a hard-shell beef taco into something really special. It’s an ideal neighborhood restaurant.
Azizam
Azizam is a casual counter-service restaurant in Silver Lake, serving what its owners refer to as homestyle Iranian food that makes them nostalgic for their childhoods. And that food is so delicious, so warm and nourishing and layered, that it could make a visitor (me) nostalgic for a childhood they never had. Soft, seed-studded barbari bread gets dipped in seasonal vegetable yogurt, braised lamb neck falls apart with the touch of a fork, and the ash-e-jo, a soup of barley, beans, and mixed grains with fermented whey, mint oil, and fried onion, will make you feel so taken care of. There are beautiful pastries, too, like sweet saffron milk bread and a flaky seasonal Napoleon. It’s such a pleasure to watch someone’s face when they eat here for the first time.
Baby Bistro
Baby Bistro opened earlier this year in a little complex on the border of Echo Park and Chinatown (also home to Perilla, a really delicious lunch spot for takes on Korean banchan), and the restaurant is already swimming in much-deserved accolades. Chef Miles Thompson serves a menu of six dishes, changing regularly with the seasons, and you can and should order them all at once, to share. Mainstays like the caramelized onion bread pair with shifting dishes like mackerel salt-grilled over charcoal served alongside an underripe satsumas, or pork belly with pistachios and labneh, or wild Japanese surf clams with cool Weiser Farms melon. The restaurant is homey, set in a converted Craftsman, and just begging for a lingering dinner date.
Baroo
Baroo is a modern Korean restaurant in the Arts District, with a focus on fermentation. Chef Kwang Uh opened the restaurant’s first iteration in 2015 in Hollywood, serving intricate grain bowls and pastas at low prices for three years. And then in 2024, he opened a new Baroo with his wife, Mina Park, where they serve a high-minded but relaxed tasting menu. “Presentations are as beautiful and orderly as topiary, and often adorned with shatteringly thin chips for texture, but only the palate can divine the unseen depths,” wrote LA Times critic Bill Addison. There is so much artistry here, but eating in the restaurant is a comfortable pleasure, never stiff.
Bistro Na’s
The San Gabriel Valley—SGV—is an enclave for Asian immigrants in Los Angeles County, an area packed to the gills with incredible food (this guide is a great place to start). But Bistro Na’s still stands out, your favorite chef’s favorite place. The restaurant, opened in 2016, is the first in the US to serve Chinese imperial cuisine, and dishes are presented beautifully, as if for royalty—must-orders include the wok-fried crispy shrimp, the herbaceous chili tofu skin salad, and the Peking duck, by far the best in LA. The room is a jewel box with latticed wood panels beneath glowing red lanterns, completely transporting you from the California suburbs.
Bub and Grandma’s
Restaurants all across LA serve bread from Bub and Grandma’s wholesale bakery, and their Glassell Park restaurant in Northeast Los Angeles has quickly become a mainstay (they just opened a new pizzeria in Highland Park, too). Deceptively simple sandwiches like tuna or brisket with apple are packed with flavor, and the pastries—especially the donuts—can’t be beat.
Café 2001
Café 2001 is a weird, wonderful all-day café and bistro in the Arts District, with creative Japanese-inflected food. The airy two-story space, with its graffitied sign outside, is my favorite lunch spot, a place with the hushed air of a Tokyo kissaten and dishes that are light yet satisfying and sophisticated. There’s a juicy pork katsu sandwich; a plate of smoked trout with eggs, fried little latke nuggets, and huckleberry jam; a bruléed lemon tart that makes a crackling sound when you hit it with a spoon. I could eat there every single day.
Café Telegrama/Étra
In recent years, Western Avenue in Melrose Hill has become lined with galleries. And visitors to those galleries like to stop by Café Telegrama, a bright and lovely café with famous pancakes and crisp, crunchy salads. The café shares ownership and real estate with Ètra, a sexily lit Italian restaurant covered in beautiful wood paneling. Order the chicories and the spicy campanelle alla vodka, and take a good look at their minimal-intervention wine list.
Camélia
Camélia is a bistro in the Arts District where Japanese ingredients are integrated into French cuisine—think black sesame Parker House rolls with ikura on the side, a buttery abalone pot pie with a huge cloud of a crust, or a grilled loup de mer with sage and ponzu. Camélia was opened in 2024 by husband and wife restaurateurs Charles Namba and Courtney Kaplan, the same team behind the always-delicious Ototo and Tsubaki in Echo Park. The fluffy corn cheesecake is really spectacular.
Damian
Famed chef Enrique Olvera, of Pujol in Mexico City and Cosme in New York, opened Damian in October 2020—not the most auspicious time for restaurants. But Damian is so ridiculously, undeniably good that it really had no choice but to survive. A Mexican fine dining restaurant in the Arts District, Damian serves exquisitely presented food in an indoor/outdoor space (with a retractable roof), incorporating LA produce and ingredients into classical Mexican dishes. Don’t miss the tlayuda and the aguachile.
Firstborn
Chef Anthony Wang is the first of his family to be born in America—hence the name of his restaurant. And most of his inventive, addictive dishes are similarly personal; a mapo tofu tartare was inspired by his days as a line cook, when he would order the dish and then it eat cold the next day; deep fried Chonqing chicken harkens back to his childhood in Georgia; pavés of roasted cabbage pay tribute to his mother’s cooking. Wang may say the food is nostalgic, but it all feels so forward thinking. Firstborn opened this year in Mandarin Plaza in Chinatown, counting stores like James Veloria and Eckhaus Latta as its neighbors, and as such, it’s beautifully decorated, with deep jade-colored tiles and floral murals. The bathrooms also have excellent lighting.
Found Oyster
Just down the street from the colossal blue Scientology center (one of LA’s top locations for taking an ironic selfie) is Found Oyster, a delightful and perennially (pleasantly) crowded seafood restaurant inspired by clam shacks on the East Coast. Sip a crisp chilled natural wine and order anything from the raw bar menu (or better yet, a platter), the scallop tostada with a sweet touch of apple, and the silky lobster bisque roll.
Holbox
Holbox, a mariscos stall in Mercado La Paloma, tops every list of LA’s restaurants, has for years, and it does because it more than deserves to. There is a line—but do not fear, it moves fast. In a city mobbed by a culture of queuing (to the people outside that one coffee shop in West Hollywood, I humbly ask you: why?), this is the one that is the most worth the inconvenience, and it moves fast anyway. I dream of the uni tostada, the shrimp aguachile, the smoked kanpachi taco with peanut chili oil. It’s a real “run, don’t walk” situation.
Horses
Horses is a revitalized old Hollywood hangout with stiff martinis, gorgeous dining rooms (the back room features playful neoclassical paintings by Kacper Abolik), and tasty, satisfying food. It’s bustling, fun, and feels more like a restaurant in New York or London than LA. The menu features hit after hit—the salads are uniformly worth ordering, the burger is one of the best in the city, and I love the smoked salmon lavash and Cornish hen with panzanella, served in a jus dotted with currants. The bartenders are excellent, serving those delicious, icy martinis with a host of other great cocktails (I like the Horses’ Buck, with vodka, guava, and allspice). Horses works for a night out and for the resulting hangover; their brunch, served only on Sundays, features smart, comforting dishes like oatmeal brûlée and boudin blanc with applesauce and a fried egg.
Jitlada
There’s so much delicious Thai food in LA, both in and out of Thai Town (Miya, in Altadena, survived the fires, and is very much worth supporting). But Jitlada has been a beloved go-to since the 1970s. The colorful restaurant boasts a massive menu of bright, herbaceous Southern Thai cuisine—it’s hard to go wrong, but you can’t miss the crispy morning glory salad, and I am partial to the clams in lemongrass broth and crying tiger beef. After dinner, pop into Bhan Kanom Thai for dessert (the adventurous can follow that with a walk to the legendary go-go bar Jumbo’s Clown Room).
Musso Frank
Musso Frank, located smack dab on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, is the oldest restaurant in Hollywood, a legendary place with famed red-jacketed waiters, where they stir a martini like nowhere else. Since 1919, the restaurant has been frequented by everyone from Charlie Chaplin to Harrison Ford, Dorothy Parker to Marilyn Monroe. The food—oysters, steaks, spaghetti—is generally solid, but kind of besides the point. Locals and tourists alike just love to go and soak it all in.
Mori Nozomi
Mori Nozomi is a serene, eight-seat sushi counter in the Sawtelle neighborhood in West LA, where the interior (blonde wood, ikebana flower arrangements, handmade ceramics from Japan) soothes and the food, a 26-course omakase, stands out even in LA’s highly saturated sushi scene. Ms. Mori is famous for employing an all-female team, an incredible rarity in the still-male dominated world of sushi, but her beautifully composed plates would make an impact no matter who served them.
RVR
RVR, on Abbot Kinney in Venice, is a California-inspired izakaya from chef Travis Lett, the founder of the sensations Gjusta and Gjelina (here working with executive chef Ian Robinson). Vegetables are the stars here—the house pickles are a must—and there are no wrong turns you can take with more substantial plates, like the lacey pork rib gyoza and duck meatball skewers with hot mustard. RVR opened just last year, and is still, deservedly, one of the hardest tables to book in town. Look out for celebrities and wearers of floppy felt hats.
Rustic Canyon
Nearly 20 years into its run in Santa Monica, Rustic Canyon still sets the standard for farm-to-table California cuisine in Los Angeles. They focus on slow and seasonal, celebrating ingredients found at the nearby Santa Monica Farmer’s Market (farmers are highlighted throughout the menu). Dishes like wild halibut with Jimmy Nardello peppers and spaghetti with squash and spinach feel nourishing and comforting, but never boring. The restaurant’s motto is “simple ain’t easy,” and you can feel it.
Somerville
Somerville is a supper club in South LA, the View Park-Windsor Hills area, where a live jazz band takes to the stage most nights. Part-owned by Issa Rae, the restaurant is a real special occasion place, where comfort food is taken up a notch—fried chicken sliders are topped with caviar, and bitter collard greens cut through a rich lasagna. You dress up for Somerville, and in a city full of athleisure, that alone makes it worth the price of admission.
Sushi Gen
No LA restaurant guide is complete without Sushi Gen. The Little Tokyo strip mall restaurant has been serving high-quality sushi that doesn’t completely break the bank (the lunch special is a real gift) for decades, arguably kicking off LA’s epidemic of (generally excellent) strip mall sushi restaurants. You might have to wait, but for fish this good, you’ll want to.
Soban
LA’s densely populated Koreatown is home to countless standout restaurants (other favorites include the smokey Soot Bull Jip for barbecue, the peaceful Western Doma Noodles for cold noodles with kimchi, and Dan Sung Sa for a rowdy night out, complete with beers in the parking lot). Soban is famously where Bong Joon Ho and his cast went to celebrate their best picture Oscar win for Paradise, and it’s easy to see why Director Bong is a fan of the place—specialities include galbi jim, braised center-cut beef short ribs with vegetables and dried jujubes, and soy-marinated raw crab (the brains are the best part).
