Newsletter: Counter: The emergence of the restaurant disrupter Destroyer, plus a lot of cookbooks
Welcome to the last weekend before the election, for which most of us are overwhelmingly grateful. If you like to stress-eat, then this might be an excellent time to see how many of Jonathan Gold’s new 101 list you can hit. The restaurant that is the subject of this week’s review, Jordan Kahn’s Destroyer, is, sadly, not open on weekends, but you can always get in line on Monday.
If you like to cook when you’re stressed, this is an excellent time to do it, as we’ve published our annual cookbook issue this week. Cook from one of the 27 cookbooks we feature, including new ones from Anthony Bourdain and Dorie Greenspan, who chatted with us. Or try some Silk Road recipes, or read about the current state of the cookbook industry.
In other news, we talk to a Nigerian chef who’s coming to town, and Jonathan visits a barbacoa specialist in Boyle Heights. So: lots of very good food to take your mind off politics this weekend. But however much you eat or cook, please remember to vote on or before Tuesday. And then go get a taco; in this town, you can find a good taco truck on most corners.
The return of Jordan Kahn
When Red Medicine closed, L.A. diners didn’t think they’d need to wait two years for the return of chef Jordan Kahn’s distinctive cooking. But that’s how long it took for Kahn to reappear, which he’s done with the opening of Destroyer in Culver City. Jonathan considers the particular conceit of the place, a breakfast-and-lunch-only counter with a very distinctive aesthetic. You probably won’t like it as much as our restaurant critic does.
Our annual cookbook issue
It’s fall cookbook season, when many of your favorite chefs and cooks come out with their latest — just in time for all that holiday cooking and gifting. This year, we’ve checked out 27 of the best. We also have interviews with Anthony Bourdain and Dorie Greenspan, both of whom have new cookbooks out. Evan Kleiman considers a new wave of Silk Road cookbooks; and writer Margy Rochlin finds out what’s up with the hardcover cookbook industry.
A Nigerian cook’s pop-up
The traveling restaurant is a relatively new conceit, and it’s one that Nigerian chef Tunde Wey has embraced — and with a particularly resonant theme. Wey’s dinners combine the food from his native Nigeria with political conversation tuned to his adoptive country: they’re called Blackness in America, and he’s bringing them to L.A. for the first time. Just in time for the election.
Taco Tuesday in Boyle Heights
The latest installment of Jonathan’s Tuesday Taco column is La Barbacha, a barbacoa specialist in East L.A. There you’ll find utterly tender lamb, a bowl of bland lamb consommé with chickpeas, and corn tortillas made to order. Need we say more.
The 101 on a budget
If you don’t have an expense account or a dining budget, you may not be going to Providence, Melisse or n/naka anytime soon. But that doesn’t mean you can’t check off a lot of the restaurants on Jonathan’s new edition of the 101: there are a lot of them that you can visit on a serious budget. We list 14 where you can get some spectacular cheap eats.
Jonathan Gold’s 101 Best Restaurants, the authoritative annual guide to local dining, is online for subscribers and now features his 2016 Best Restaurants. If you didn’t get a copy of the booklet, you can order one online here.
Our cookie bake-off returns: Have you submitted your favorite recipe yet? Entries are now open for our sixth Los Angeles Times Holiday Cookie Bake-Off. Now is the time to put your best up against the rest.
“City of Gold,” Laura Gabbert’s documentary of Jonathan Gold’s Los Angeles, is available on Amazon.
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