Gastronomy Blog by Cathy Chaplin

Restaurant Review

17 Jul 2019

Otium – Los Angeles (Downtown)

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I liked my first dinner at Otium well enough, but I loved my second dinner even more. Chef Tim Hollingsworth has hit his stride in the three years since I last visited, and the food and drinks coming out of the kitchen are some of the most thoughtful and delicious in the city.

My friend Liz and I came in for a weeknight dinner. The dining room was a lively hub of noise and conversation filled with neighborhood worker bees unwinding and a few families fueling after a visit to The Broad.

Crafted by Chris Amirault, all of the specialty cocktails this evening employed a different culinary technique. My Rhumble in the Jungle ($15) with Rhum J.M. Gold, fermented pineapple, chartreuse, and salted almond highlighted the joys of fermentation.

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Restaurant Review

09 Jul 2019

Tsubaki – Los Angeles (Echo Park)

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To celebrate our ninth wedding anniversary, The Astronomer and I booked a babysitter and a table at Charles Namba and Courtney Kaplan’s Echo Park izakaya Tsubaki. We also procured a tagine and cooked some lamb in it, in case you were keeping tabs on all the festivities.

The menu of simply composed and deftly executed small plates didn’t let us down this evening. From pristine cuts of amberjack sashimi to start, to grilled chicken oysters somewhere in the middle and the finest pork porterhouse to finish, let’s get started on the rundown.

First up were thick and cool slices of kanpachi ($26), which arrived topped with a ponzu gelee, an apple-ginger oroshi, and fresh shiso.

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Potpourri

02 Jul 2019

Jichan’s Onigiri-ya – Monterey Park

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Jichan’s Onigiri-ya is a sweet little spot on the edge of Monterey Park specializing in Japanese rice balls called onigiri. Here in the shadows of Resurrection Cemetery, three childhood friends are sharing the nostalgic snack with the neighborhood.

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