Lotería Grill in Hollywood is closing
Lotería Grill, chef and owner Jimmy Shaw’s Hollywood Boulevard taqueria, is closing on Sunday. “Poor neighborhood conditions, high rent and wage increases make it hard for us to continue,” Shaw wrote Tuesday in an email.
“As hard as we have tried,” he wrote, “we haven’t been able to make a go of it here.”
Shaw opened his flagship taqueria in the Original Farmers Market in 2002, serving tacos and other dishes that he grew up with in Mexico City — including aguachile, chiles rellenos and queso fundido — from a crowded counter stall.
Other Loterías followed, and Shaw opened taquerias in Studio City, Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade, Hollywood, Westlake Village, downtown L.A. and outlets at LAX and the Forum.
With the closing of the Hollywood restaurant, all but the LAX and Forum locations will have closed; the original taqueria in the Farmers Market emptied its counter last October.
But when one door closes, another opens. Shaw has plans to convert the front of Lotería’s commissary kitchen at Pico and Crenshaw boulevards into a new Lotería Grill taqueria, to open in the coming weeks.
“It’s where we’ve been doing our magic for 17 years,” Shaw said of the commissary, where the business has a busy catering operation. “The menu may be revamped for that format. We’re a little limited in space.
“But the soul of it is the same; it’s even closer,” he added. “We go back to our roots — small, stall-style restaurants where guests can enjoy our celebration foods in a taco.”
6627 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles; (323) 465-2500; LoteriaGrill.com.
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