What Do Angelenos Want From Restaurants Right Now?
A survey!
On a recent Thursday evening, I spent 30 minutes searching for parking in the part of Culver City that houses Amazon Studios. You know where I’m talking about: there’s an Erewhon, a movie theater (owned by Amazon), and traffic lights that seem to last a lifetime. Cafe Vida is nearby, as is the brilliant Museum of Jurassic Technology, and at one point, there was a short-lived outpost of Konbi (RIP). The whole area feels like a poorly designed mall, crowded with corporate-looking signage and frustrating to move through. I was meeting a friend for dinner at Laurel Grill, an extravagant new opening from restaurateur Dean McKillen (Laurel Hardware, Ysabel) perched atop locations of CorePower Yoga and Formula Fig.
[In case you don’t have time to read two more paragraphs and want to take the survey, it’s HERE.]
I almost used the word ambitious instead of extravagant, but that would be incorrect. Laurel Grill, while expensive-looking, amber-hued, and decked in a flirtatious amount of wood, is a blatant Hillstone rip-off. If you blindfolded me, sat me down in a booth, and asked me to guess where I was, I’d confidently say, “Houston’s.” I mean, look at the menu. Not to mention the restaurant’s name! One could easily mistake it for a sister of South Beverly Grill or Cherry Creek Grill, one of several naming conventions employed by the beloved upper-middle class restaurant chain, a trick to avoid having to list calorie counts.
I’m not saying I hated Laurel Grill. I had a fun time, besides the parking situation. (In my opinion, valet should be required for a restaurant of this style, even if Laurel Grill occupies second-floor real estate.) Every dish tasted a tad sweet (as is the case at Hillstone), but the martinis were excellent and strong, and our server performed the Cold Switcheroo midway through (there’s Hillstone again!). The vibe was sexy in a suburban way (if you’ve been to a Hillstone, you know). And it was packed. This leads me to my question and the purpose of today’s letter: Is this what Angelenos want nowadays? Are we simply after more R+D Kitchens and Honor Bars? Laurel Grill is not the only new restaurant that’s either derivative or safe.
We know how hard the restaurant business is, particularly in L.A., where rent and payroll costs are uniquely prohibitive. I get wanting to cater to the mainstream. Still, I’m curious to know what Angelenos are actually looking for when they dine out. Specifically readers of The Angel. What makes us excited to go out to eat these days? What do we want from a new opening? Are we cool with the status quo? Where are the gaps in the current Los Angeles restaurant scene?
I’m running a survey to assess the current desires of the dining public, and I think The Angel’s readers—who, like me, are obsessed with restaurants—are the perfect group to poll. Hopefully, the answers will illuminate not only you and me but also operators and chefs working in Los Angeles today. I’ll run it for a week and publish the results shortly after. One thing to note: This is a survey about L.A., so please keep your answers local—I’m not looking for anyone to tell me that their favorite new restaurant is in New York.
TAKE THE SURVEY HERE. And please send it to your friends! The more responses from people who care about restaurants, the stronger the insights will be.
The survey is a quick (~5-10 minutes), mostly multiple-choice exercise, and it will close at 8 a.m. on Wednesday, April 23rd, so get your answers in before then.
In a couple of hours, I’ll be on Substack Live with
of talking about the state of Los Angeles dining. We’ll be chatting about the topics addressed above and in the survey. Tune in at 10 a.m. PT today!