Fraiche Culver City 9411 Culver Blvd Culver City, CA 90232 Chef Benjamin Bailly is a bit of a blogger darling. During his short stint at Petrossian in West Hollywood, I read blog after blog post raving about his food. I’m not really a huge fan of caviar, and I don’t go out of my way…
Commonwealth 2224 Mission Street San Francisco, CA 94110 In my opinion, one of the most exciting dining trends is chefs cooking serious fine dining in reasonably-priced, casual environments. These chefs are focusing on putting good food on the table – that’s what everyone’s there for; and, because they’re cutting out the expensive decor and extra waitstaff, the…
Luce InterContinental Hotel 888 Howard St San Francisco, CA 94103 One of the chefs I was most highly anticipating at Test Kitchen was Dominique Crenn. Unfortunately, her sole Dec. 5th appearance conflicted with the finale of LudoBites 6.0, which is where I ended up dining. However, I stumbled upon a happy coincidence – BlackboardEats had…
Tony’s Pizza Napoletana 1570 Stockton St San Francisco, CA 94133 San Francisco has had a bit of a pizza revolution in the last couple of years, and Tony’s is probably one of the most popular of the new pizza restaurants to open up. Tony Gemignani is one of the more famous American pizzaiolo personalities, first for…
Christmas seemed to come up pretty fast this year. Maybe I’m just getting older. But maybe it’s because I didn’t have any days off between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Either way, the past month really flew by and Christmas was here before I knew it. As usual for this occasion, Christmas is a two-round affair; lunch with my mother’s side…
The House 1230 Grant Ave San Francisco, CA 94133 The House has been around for almost 20 years and had been serving Asian fusion even before it became cool to do it. Quite fittingly, its location straddles the border of San Francisco’s Chinatown and North Beach (Little Italy) neighborhoods. It’s one of the top restaurants on Yelp…
Leatherby’s Cafe Rouge Orange County Performing Arts Center 615 Town Center Dr Costa Mesa, CA 92626 I tend to think of Leatherby’s Cafe Rouge as a sort of “Patina of Orange County.” The Patina Restaurant Group runs the gamut between fast casual and fine dining, and both Leatherby’s and Patina represent the latter. Plus, they…
Mo-Chica 3655 S Grand Ave Los Angeles, CA 90007 Executive Chef Ricardo Zarate has been one of LA’s rising star chefs in 2010, most notably for frequently being in the kitchen at the recently-closed Test Kitchen. Zarate has developed quite a following and now has a couple of restaurants in the works; however, Mo-Chica’s humble…