Los Angeles

photo: Joshua Lurie/944.com

With a sensibility learned from fairy tales, one would expect a baker, the conjurer of butter, sugar and fruits, flour and spices, to be a kind and gentle person. Peering over a row of story-book cakes and pies, the baker, always wrapped in a white apron with a dusting of flour, desires only the customer’s enjoyment of what has been produced by “her” skilled hands and generous heart.

That fairy tale baker has come to Santa Monica with the appearance of Zoe Nathan, she of the mile-wide smile, generous heart, and magical hands. Zoe and husband Josh Loeb are the proprietors of Huckleberry (1014 Wilshire Blvd. Santa Monica CA) and Rustic Canyon Restaurant and Wine Bar just across the street from Huckleberry. Since Zoe begins baking each day at 3AM, she is not always peering over the display case filled with her efforts, although one morning I glimpsed her dancing behind the pastry board. The display case at Huckleberry makes for its own worthy peering and astonishing, addictive eating. Every day it is a bit different depending on the availability of farmer’s market fruits and Zoe’s whims.

- A Pleasant Surprise

Having almost given up on the Italian cucina here in Los Angeles, I was very pleased to enjoy the offerings of this ristorante. It was a whim that brought me there and also an offer from Blackboard Eats. After all Pane e Vino has been around for the past 20 years, no small accomplishment in a metropolis of shifting loyalties and chefs’ inabilities to produce and present authentic cuisine. Not their fault really, for if a restaurant wants to stay in business in this city, then they have to cater to many of their patrons uneducated knowledge of what real Italian food is all about and offer Americanized versions.

So back to why I rarely venture out to eat in restaurants, be they Italian, French, English or Mexican, cuisine that can be so exciting and different and a pleasure. I am a purist and like to eat food as it would be prepared in the countries of origin using as much local produce as possible, and not drowning everything in sauces. I found out why that happens – because the ingredients/meat/chicken/fish have no taste coming from force fed animals, farmed fish and other things that I won’t mention!!!

After watching Ludo Lefebvre on Top Chef Masters I knew I wanted try out his food. Around the same time his episode aired he opened up a “pop-up” restaurant at Bread Bar on 3rd St. On Tuesday night a bunch of my friends and I went. Simply put the meal was amazing. It’s really a mixture of classical french food and molecular gastronomy. Onto the food.

The table that was supposed to be ours decided they wanted to sit and talk for a long time so we had to wait. To make up for this Ludo’s very nice wife brought us out some lobster medallions with daikon & rosemary with a honey-sherry vinaigrette. It was amazing and great indication of things to come. It looked like a scallop and the sauce was very strong and sweet so the lobster was mainly there for texture.

One of the best things about the meal was the butter for the bread. It was a homemade honey and lavander butter.

First came the chorizo soup with cantaloupe and cornichon. It really tastes like the essence of chorizo. It was perfect. When there was only a little left we almost fought over it like junkyard dogs.

What is wrong with me? Why do I drive past intriguing places and keep on driving? Or, why do I keep going to the same places because I know them, they are familiar and safe? My friend, another foodie, Andrea, had made a plan with me last night to try a Japanese restaurant. Then, she kept reading reviews online that scared her straight. This new Japanese usually costs $100 per person. She called me ahead of time to warn me and then told me she really likes this other place on Sawtelle. So now we really have two choices.

When I hopped in her car, she navigated her way around the city in such a way as to end up directly in front of the alternative restaurant and not the original terribly expensive restaurant. I still don’t know whether she did that on purpose, but I was hungry and said, lets just go in there. I had seen it before and it called to me. When she mentioned a place on Sawtelle I just thought it was Hide Sushi and I do already go there all the time.