Food & Drink
The meats are able to be ordered a la carte, but most people will get a small, medium, or large combo with three or four different cuts, plus banchan, perilla seed salad, soybean paste stew (doenjang jjigae), shaken fresh kimchi, steamed egg, and an ice cream dessert.
Traditionally, Los Angeles’s members-only club scene has conjured images of tuxedoed men and well-heeled women sipping stiff cocktails while Hollywood power brokers flit in the background, disappearing into velvet- or wood-lined rooms.
Once firmly into the main courses, Kim and the crew feature a steamed sea perch with scarlet prawn, dry-aged dairy cow with roasted sesame, creamy perilla noodles topped with shaved winter truffles, and charcoal-grilled lobster tail with doenjang sauce and raspberry powder.
Sperling partnered with Lucia Flors and Carlos Leiva, co-founders of stylish high-end conservas company Siesta, serving the full array of tinned fish including white tuna, Cantabrian anchovies, mackerel, squid, clams, and sardines accompanied with lemon, regañas crackers, and mojo verde.
On a chilly Monday evening in mid-November, chef Dave Beran moves lightly around the dimly lit space that will become Seline, his new restaurant tucked behind a brick-lined retail complex along Main Street in Santa Monica.
Chef Aaron Zimmer, previously of the Ritz-Carlton Half Moon Bay, assembles a ranchero-style menu of steaks, butterflied fish, beans, crudo, and grilled little gem greens with approachable California ingredients to please the suburban crowd.
Previously the executive chef of Michael’s, Yoon made a name selling craft beer and burgers at Father’s Office, eventually landing to a top spot on the Los Angeles Times 101 with his Southeast Asian restaurant Lukshon (which has remained dormant since the pandemic).
Executive chef Nanor Harboyan, a veteran of Destroyer and large-scale operations at Disney World, oversees all the prepared foods and savory items, while head baker Jacob Fraijo manages breads and pastries.
All its locations feature churro-making displayed front and center, which allows guests waiting in line to peer through large windows to watch workers fry, cut, and dust the fritters with sugar to order.
Barman Devin Espinosa, a frequent collaborator with the Houston brothers, has shaped a thoughtful cocktail menu including the likes of the Yes Lawd!, which mixes pomegranate vodka, Grand Marnier, and lime, or the Suede, shaken with Ilegal mezcal, amaro nonino, and Rosso vermouth.
Now tucked inside a space cordoned off like the Jerusalem Temple’s Holy-of-Holies, Mélisse has a Hi-Fi stereo system that plays classic rock records while the tables are arranged so that every diner has a prime view into the intimate kitchen.
Mr. T Cafe is in partnership with one of the world’s most accomplished French pastry chefs, Francois Daubinet, whose resume includes Paris’s Hôtel de Crillon, three-Michelin-starred Plaza Athénee, two-Michelin-starred Le Taillevent, and famed patisserie Fauchon.