2024 LA Times 101 Best Restaurants: The Complete List

Kato occupies a spare, art-hung room in the redeveloped LA Terminal Mart in Downtown LA, where a 10-course tasting menu reframes Taiwanese and San Gabriel Valley references through precise contemporary technique. Jon Yao holds a Michelin star and the 2025 James Beard Award for Best Chef: California. The wine program, built around 2,665 selections and an exclusive Kato savagnin bottling, competes for attention with the kitchen.

A seven-seat kaiseki counter in Downtown L.A.'s Row DTLA, Hayato holds two Michelin stars and ranked second on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in 2024. Reservations open at the start of each month and close within minutes. Chef Brandon Hayato Go prepares each course in full view of diners, with commentary on provenance and seasonality that turns the counter into something closer to a seminar than a service.

Baroo occupies a quiet Arts District address in Los Angeles and makes a credible case for being the city's most ambitious Korean contemporary table. The $115 tasting menu, built around fermentation and seasonal vegetables, earned Michelin Plate recognition in both 2024 and 2025, plus the LA Times 2024 Restaurant of the Year. Reservations are available but book ahead.

Located in a 1928 building on La Brea Avenue, République operates as a French-inspired bakery, café, and formal dining room under chefs Walter and Margarita Manzke. The restaurant holds a 2023 James Beard Award for Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker, a Michelin Plate, and ranked #4 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in 2024. The wine program runs to nearly 1,845 selections and 9,280 bottles of inventory.

A Michelin-starred marisquería inside South Central's Mercado La Paloma, Holbox lands at #43 on the 2025 Opinionated About Dining North America list and #5 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants. Chef Gilberto Cetina Jr. applies dry-aging, wood-fire, and coastal Mexican technique to conscientiously sourced fish and seafood, served at a counter or across an eight-course tasting menu on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Morihiro Onodera's Echo Park omakase counter holds a Michelin star and a No. 6 ranking on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list, placing it among the most decorated sushi destinations in Los Angeles. Operating Wednesday through Sunday from 6–9 pm, the intimate format centres on Onodera's celebrated shari — rice milled in-house and seasoned with red vinegar — served on ceramic dishware he crafts himself.

Providence Los Angeles elevates sustainable seafood to three-Michelin-starred heights, where Chef Michael Cimarusti's ocean-to-table tasting menus showcase wild-caught treasures in an intimate Melrose Avenue setting. This James Beard Award-winning destination combines environmental stewardship with culinary artistry, creating America's most celebrated seafood experience.

A weekend-only curbside stand in Arleta, Barbacoa Ramirez serves Hidalgo-style lamb barbacoa slow-cooked in a pit for 24 hours, alongside moronga and fresh made-to-order tortillas. Ranked #8 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, it operates Saturdays and Sundays from 7am until sold out — which happens early.

A two-Michelin-star kaiseki counter in Culver City, n/naka translates a centuries-old Japanese dining tradition through California's seasonal produce and a kitchen garden grown by the chefs themselves. Niki Nakayama and Carole Iida-Nakayama have held their stars since 2011, ranking ninth on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list and drawing a reservation queue that rivals any tasting-menu address in the country.

A Glassell Park dining room defined by faded brick, amber light, and a central wood-burning hearth, Dunsmoor translates Southern American cooking through a California seasonal lens. Chef Brian Dunsmoor earned a Michelin Plate in both 2024 and 2025, and the LA Times ranked the restaurant tenth on its 2024 list of 101 best restaurants. The menu shifts with the calendar but stays rooted in smoke, heirloom produce, and American heritage technique.

A 44-year-old Sherman Oaks institution that became one of Los Angeles's most-discussed restaurants after James Beard Award-winning chef Justin Pichetrungsi reimagined its menu from 2019 onward. The à la carte menu runs from wok-fired classics and deep curries to dry-aged fish, with a wine program that draws serious attention. Ranked #11 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024 and a consistent presence on Opinionated About Dining's North America rankings.

Opened in Koreatown and later settled on Beverly Boulevard, Antico Nuovo holds a Michelin Plate and ranked twelfth on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024. Chef Chad Colby works with whole-animal technique and preserved-food traditions that most of Los Angeles's Italian restaurants have abandoned, producing pasta and crudo that sit in a different register from the city's more cautious Italian mainstream.

A pandemic-era pop-up turned Echo Park institution, Quarter Sheets earned back-to-back Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition in 2024 and 2025 and ranked #13 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list. Detroit-style rectangular pies share the menu with rotating bar pies and pastry-chef-calibre desserts. Reservations fill the moment they open; a walk-up line remains the alternative.

Moo's Craft Barbecue in Lincoln Heights brings Central Texas smoke technique into conversation with Southern California ingredients, producing brisket, house sausages, and pork belly that earned back-to-back Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition in 2024 and 2025, plus a #14 ranking on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list. The $$ price point makes it one of the more accessible Michelin-recognised tables in Los Angeles.

A Michelin Bib Gourmand recipient in 2024 and 2025, Tsubaki has been Echo Park's most consistent izakaya since Charles Namba and Courtney Kaplan opened the 32-seat room in 2017. The kitchen runs a daily-shifting menu of grilled, raw, steamed, and fried small plates grounded in California farmers market produce, paired against a sake program that earns as much attention as the food.

Inside the Farmers and Merchants Bank Building in downtown Los Angeles, Orsa & Winston holds a Michelin star and a top-20 place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for its five-course pescatarian tasting menu that draws equally from Japanese and Italian traditions. At $150 per person, it sits at the more accessible end of the city's fine-dining tier, with dishes built around peak-season California produce and a counter format that puts the kitchen on full display.

A Santa Monica French bistro operating at the intersection of destination dining and neighbourhood accessibility, Pasjoli has held consecutive Opinionated About Dining Top 100 placements since 2023 and earned an LA Times 101 Best ranking of #18 in 2024. Chef Dave Beran's prix fixe format anchors on a theatrical whole pressed duck service, with a bar program running casual à la carte for early diners and walk-ins.

Perilla L.A. operates out of a converted garage in Chinatown, serving Korean banchan as the centerpiece of the meal rather than an accompaniment. Chef Jihee Kim's daily selection draws directly from farmers market produce, prepared through variations of freshness and fermentation. Ranked #19 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, it is one of the few lunch spots in Los Angeles that rewards both a sit-down visit and a take-home haul.

Holding a Michelin star since 2024 and ranked 20th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024, Knife Pleat brings classically rooted French technique to the Penthouse level of South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa. Chef Tony Esnault's seasonal menus — spanning four- and six-course dinners, a three-course lunch, and Saturday afternoon tea — sit at the top of Orange County's fine-dining tier.

Ranked #21 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 and #2 on Esquire's Best New Restaurants list, Azizam brings Iranian home-cooking to a compact Silver Lake café with no reservations and a concise menu built around mazeh, sandwiches, and mains. The kofteh Tabrizi — a herb-and-rice meatball with a fruit-and-nut centre — has become the dish that defines what the restaurant is trying to do.

Opened in 2022, Saffy's brought a sharp reappraisal of Middle Eastern cooking to East Hollywood, earning a Michelin Plate and a rank of #22 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list. The team behind Bestia and Bavel applies serious technique to kebabs, shawarma, and a roster of appetizers that draw from Levantine, Persian, and North African traditions. Open nightly from 5pm, with a daytime café serving pastries, shakshuka, and lunch.

Chi Spacca on Melrose Ave operates at the intersection of Italian butchery tradition and Los Angeles carnivore culture, holding a Michelin Plate, Opinionated About Dining Casual North America ranking, and a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024. The format centers on cured meats, wood-fired cuts, and a focaccia di Recco that earns its own reputation. At the top tier of LA Italian, the value relative to price is one of its clearest arguments.

A two Michelin-starred tasting counter inside Josiah Citrin's larger Citrin restaurant on Wilshire Boulevard, Mélisse operates at 14 seats with a menu that layers classic French technique over California seasonal produce. Recognized by La Liste (91pts, 2025), Les Grandes Tables du Monde, and the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants, it represents the city's most sustained argument for French fine dining on the Westside.

Evan Funke's eponymous Beverly Hills restaurant occupies three levels on South Santa Monica Boulevard, anchoring its identity in handcrafted pasta and wood-fired Italian cooking. Reservations have remained notoriously difficult since opening, the dining room draws a stylish, well-connected crowd, and the LA Times ranked it 25th among the city's 101 best restaurants in 2024. Michelin has awarded a Plate in both 2024 and 2025.

Eight years after opening a small counter in downtown Los Angeles, Sonoratown has grown into one of the city's most consistently recognized taquerias, ranked #24 on Opinionated About Dining's Cheap Eats in North America list for 2025 and #26 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants. The kitchen draws on the traditions of San Luis Río Colorado, Sonora, building every order around handmade flour tortillas and mesquite-grilled carne asada.

Ranked #27 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Al Baraka has anchored Anaheim's Little Arabia district since 2003, serving Palestinian home-style cooking — Musakhan, Mansaf, kubba laban — that rarely appears on restaurant menus. The kitchen operates as a family affair, producing dishes rooted in seasonal tradition and Palestinian culinary heritage that draw a loyal, returning crowd from across the region.

Rustic Canyon has anchored the Santa Monica dining scene since its early days as a farmers' market-driven neighborhood restaurant, earning Michelin Plate recognition in both 2024 and 2025 alongside consistent placement on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list. The daily-changing menu tracks California's harvest calendar through local seafood, vegetables, and meats sourced from the Santa Monica Farmers' Market. Dinner runs nightly from 5 pm on Wilshire Boulevard.

A Los Feliz fixture on Hollywood Boulevard, Kismet applies a California-forward lens to Levantine flavors across a nightly dinner menu that rotates with market availability. Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition and consecutive appearances on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list confirm its place at the more considered end of the city's Middle Eastern dining tier. The price point is accessible; the cooking is not casual.

Open since 2007 on Melrose Avenue, Osteria Mozza holds a Michelin star and a James Beard Award in Nancy Silverton's corner, and it has shaped how Los Angeles understands Italian cooking at the table-cloth tier. The mozzarella bar anchors the room; handmade pasta and a wine list of serious depth do the rest. Ranked 30th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024, it remains a benchmark in the city's Italian category.

A six-seat Michelin-starred omakase counter operating within the larger Inaba Japanese Restaurant on Beverly Boulevard. Chef Yasuhiro Hirano builds each sequence around micro-seasonal and aged seafood, with technique that earned a 2025 Michelin star and a 31st-place ranking on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in 2024. Reservations are highly competitive; booking several weeks ahead is advisable.

A 10-seat Edomae omakase counter in the basement of a Little Tokyo office building, Sushi Kaneyoshi holds a Michelin star and ranked #78 in Opinionated About Dining's 2025 North America list. Chef Yoshiyuki Inoue's focus on hikarimono and Edomae technique draws serious connoisseurs to one of Los Angeles's most demanding reservations.

Holy Basil brings Bangkok street food sensibility to downtown Los Angeles with an ambition that consistently outpaces its compact footprint. Ranked #33 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, the restaurant serves a short, revolving menu of noodles, curries, and fried rice that draws on Thai, Chinese, Indian, Mexican, and Japanese influences. Booking ahead is strongly advised.

Pizzeria Sei on Pico Boulevard has built one of the most discussed pizza programs in Los Angeles by fusing Neapolitan technique with Japanese precision. The almond wood-fired oven produces a crust that is simultaneously airy, chewy, and leopard-spotted, landing the restaurant at #2 on 50 Top Pizza USA 2025 and a Michelin Plate. The monthly omakase format sells out almost immediately after dates are announced.

Yangban Society, the visionary project from chefs Katianna and John Hong, reimagines modern Korean-American cuisine through a lens of bold technique and intimate artistry. Within a moody, industrial-chic setting softened by sculptural paper lanterns and lush greenery, the menu balances indulgence and nuance—think golden Hokkaido scallop toast glossed with brown butter and grated egg, ocean trout nestled in beurre blanc brightened with white kimchi, and double-fried wings lacquered to crystalline crispness. A nod to Korean flavors with unexpected Jewish deli inflections, Yangban’s spirit is both communal and couture, drawing discerning diners who savor inventive craft, textural extravagance, and a palpable sense of place.

Ranked #36 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Ammatolí brings Levantine cooking of real depth to downtown Long Beach. Chef Dima Habibeh draws on Palestinian, Syrian, and Jordanian heritage to produce mezze spreads, slow-cooked shawarma, and knafeh that read as personal rather than generic. The sun-drenched corner room, now expanded to three spaces, is among the most gracious settings for Eastern Mediterranean food in Southern California.

Bar Amá has anchored downtown Los Angeles's Tex-Mex conversation for over a decade, operating out of the Farmers and Merchants Bank Building on 4th Street. Chef Josef Centeno draws on four generations of Tejano family cooking, threading seasonal California produce through dishes that sit somewhere between San Antonio tradition and LA adaptation. Ranked #37 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, it holds a consistent place in Opinionated About Dining's North America casual rankings.

Los Angeles's first craft molino operates inside Mercado La Paloma, nixtamalizing 100% Mexican heirloom corn daily to produce masa for a focused menu of antojitos rooted in Mexico City street-food tradition. Awarded a 2025 Michelin Bib Gourmand and ranked 38th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Komal delivers some of the most technically grounded tortillas in the city at single-dollar price points.

Compared to LA's tasting-menu circuit, Bavel operates in a different register: a shareable, Levant-spanning menu at 500 Mateo St in the Arts District that has held a place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list and Opinionated About Dining's North America rankings every year since 2023. The kitchen draws on Israeli, Moroccan, Turkish, and Egyptian culinary traditions, producing dishes that reward groups over solo visits.

Ranked #40 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 and recognized by Opinionated About Dining's Cheap Eats list, Fat & Flour is Nicole Rucker's Culver City bakery where seasonal fruit pies and shattering butter crusts have made it a reference point for serious baking in Los Angeles. A second counter operates inside Grand Central Market.

At Sushi Kisen, the art of Edomae sushi is distilled to its quiet, shimmering essence. An intimate counter becomes a stage for precision and restraint, where immaculate, line-caught seafood meets hand-warmed shari seasoned with elegant balance. Each course unfolds like a well-timed breath—clean, nuanced, and deeply expressive—while the soft glow of wood and the hush of attentive service create a cocoon of calm. This is omakase for the discerning: a seamless progression of texture and temperature, sourced at the peak of season, and delivered with the kind of gentle confidence that only true mastery affords. For those who measure luxury by clarity of flavor and purity of craft, Sushi Kisen offers a profoundly satisfying, quietly unforgettable evening.

Tucked into a quiet Glendale side street, Mini Kabob transforms humble Armenian family recipes into an intimate, destination-worthy ritual. Skewers hiss over charcoal, perfuming the air with smoke and spice as succulent chicken, lamb, and beef are pulled from the flames at their precise peak. Silky hummus, tangy sumac-dusted onions, and warm lavash complete a plate that’s both rustic and refined—food that feels deeply personal yet plated with a chef’s restraint. With just a handful of seats and a fiercely loyal following, Mini Kabob is the kind of insider address discerning travelers whisper to friends: a tiny counter with outsized flavor, where hospitality is generous, pacing is deliberate, and every bite tells the story of a family’s craft perfected over time.

Alta Adams brings produce-driven Southern cooking to West Adams, one of Los Angeles' most historically layered neighborhoods. Holding a Michelin Plate in both 2024 and 2025 and ranked 43rd on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024, the kitchen reframes familiar comfort dishes through a California lens. It is the kind of neighborhood restaurant that earns citywide attention without losing its local footing.

Among Los Angeles's most recognised Uyghur restaurants, Dolan's in Alhambra has appeared on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in both 2024 (#44) and 2025 (#63), placing it firmly within the San Gabriel Valley's most compelling dining destinations. The menu draws from centuries of spice-trade influence across Central Asia, with big plate chicken, hand-pulled laghman noodles, and cumin-laced lamb among the dishes that bring regulars back repeatedly.

At a marble counter in Hollywood, Petit Trois has spent a decade refining what a Parisian bistro can mean on the West Coast. Ranked #45 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 and recognised by both Michelin and Opinionated About Dining, it operates at the intersection of French classicism and Los Angeles informality, serving escargot, steak frites, and a burger drowning in Bordelaise to a room that never quite quiets down.

Ranked #46 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 and #4 on Esquire's Best New Restaurants list, Camélia brings French-Japanese cooking to a Midcentury Modern bistro space in the Arts District. Sister to Echo Park's Tsubaki and Ototo, it applies the same community-rooted hospitality to a larger, more ambitious format, with a beverage program that treats sake and wine as equals.

Two Hommés in Los Angeles offers a Contemporary African, Afro-centric menu that circles the globe. Must-try dishes include honey berbere chicken bites, the jollof platter with “bomb azz black beans,” and shredded smoked lamb quesadillas off the lamb dibi. Chefs Abdoulaye Balde and Marcus Yaw Johnson blend Ethiopian berbere, Senegalese mustard-grilled lamb, and Latin techniques for bold, layered flavors. LA Times named Two Hommés one of its 101 Best Restaurants of 2024 at #47. Expect bright, crunchy textures, caramelized glazes, tangy passion-fruit crudo, and mountains of garlicky noodles—an approachable yet refined meal that makes reservations essential for an in-demand Inglewood dining experience.

A Michelin Bib Gourmand honoree two years running and ranked 48th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Heritage Barbecue in San Juan Capistrano applies Central Texas pit technique to an open-ended question about where smoked meat belongs across cultures. The result — tri-tip tacos on tallow-rendered tortillas, char siu pork belly, galbi-marinated beef ribs — has made it the most talked-about craft barbecue address in Southern California.

Ranked #49 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Dear John's in Culver City is the rare room that rewards loyalty over novelty. Behind heavy red curtains, a darkness-wrapped dining room delivers martinis, chicken parm stuffed with oozing mozzarella, and caviar-topped tater tots to a clientele that returns not for the spectacle but for the ritual. A 1960s-era space saved from demolition in 2019, it has earned its second life.

Vespertine occupies architect Eric Owen Moss's steel-and-glass Culver City structure known as the Waffle, where Jordan Kahn's two-Michelin-starred menu unfolds over roughly four hours. The cooking draws on wild-foraged and regenerative ingredients mapped to California's four regions, producing a dining format that sits closer to performance art than conventional tasting menu. Ranked #98 in North America by Opinionated About Dining in 2025 and awarded 76 points by La Liste in 2026.

Bridgetown Roti brought Bajan and Trinidadian cooking to East Hollywood via a pop-up that ran from 2020 before landing a permanent storefront in 2023. Ranked #51 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, the menu centers on roti built with paratha and layered with bold, spice-forward fillings alongside cod fish cakes, callaloo, and baked macaroni and cheese.

Chef Jeremy Fox's deeply personal tribute to family heritage, Birdie G's Los Angeles transforms Midwestern comfort food and Jewish-American traditions into innovative California cuisine at Santa Monica's Bergamot Station, earning Michelin recognition for dishes like grandmother's matzo ball soup and inventive Jell-O pie.

Opened in March 2024, Mori Nozomi earned a Michelin star in its first full year and landed on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list, ranked 53rd. Chef-owner Nozomi Mori runs an eight-seat counter in Sawtelle, leading an all-female team through a kaiseki-inflected omakase that folds farmers market pickles, fresh wagashi, and seasonal Japanese seafood into a format that reads as distinctly its own.

Ranked 54th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Si! Mon brings Central American cooking into a finer-dining register that Los Angeles has rarely seen. Chef José Olmedo Carles Rojas and executive chef Christian Truong frame Panamanian and regional flavors through seafood-forward plates, from culantro leche de tigre to shrimp dumplings finished with charred scallion oil, inside a Venice space marked by Indigenous Panamanian ceiling prints.

Ranked #55 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Yang's Kitchen in Alhambra operates where farm-to-table sourcing meets Chinese and Taiwanese cooking — dry-aged barramundi alongside cornmeal mochi pancakes, smoked pork jowl char siu alongside Serbian natural wine. It is one of the few LA-area restaurants that works as a weekday lunch counter, weekend brunch destination, and serious dinner spot without compromising any of the three.

James Beard Award winner Chef Lord Maynard Llera's 28-seat Melrose Hill restaurant translates regional Filipino cooking from Lucena City, Quezon Province into a fast-casual format with serious classical technique behind it. Ranked #56 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Kuya Lord operates from a tight, focused menu built around dishes that reward repeat visits. The Kuya Tray — a platter sized for two — is the most direct entry point into the cooking.

Mae Malai Thai House of Noodles in Thai Town holds consecutive Michelin Bib Gourmand recognition (2024 and 2025) and ranked 57th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024. The draw is boat noodles: a dark, spice-threaded broth topped with pork cracklings, built from a Bangkok recipe refined over decades. At under $10 a bowl, it sits in a category where craft and price rarely align this cleanly.

A Michelin Plate honoree and LA Times 101 Best Restaurants pick (ranked #58 in 2024), Henry's Cuisine in Alhambra serves California Cantonese at its most social: live lobster priced by weight, deep-fried salted pig's feet that arrive to a double bell-strike, and lazy Susans loaded with Hong Kong-style banquet seafood. The $$$ price range and 4.3-star Google rating across 876 reviews confirm its standing as a serious dining address east of downtown Los Angeles.

Danbi in Koreatown holds a Michelin Plate for 2024 and 2025 and ranked 59th on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in 2024. Chef Lareine Ko's menu moves between tradition and invention, pairing haemul pajeon and bone marrow beef tartare with California-inflected desserts. It occupies a mid-price tier that makes it one of Koreatown's more thoughtfully positioned Korean dining addresses.

Ranked #69 on Opinionated About Dining's 2025 Casual North America list and holding a Michelin Plate, majordōmo has anchored the northern Chinatown industrial corridor since 2018. David Chang's Los Angeles flagship runs Korean-inflected California cooking through large-format dishes — smoked bo ssäm, whole short rib — in a warehouse space that draws a fashion-forward crowd. The wine list runs 515 selections across 3,175 bottles, with particular depth in France, California, and Italy.

A family-run Mexicali-style taco operation that earned a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Asadero Chikali started as an East L.A. taco truck and has since opened a brick-and-mortar in Inglewood. The draw is guisado-style braises served on handmade flour tortillas, with the carne deshebrada drawing particular praise from LA Times critics as a benchmark taco for the entire city.

Ranked #62 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Delmy's Pupusas is Ruth Sandoval's farmers market operation built around El Salvador's national dish. Operating across Silver Lake, Atwater Village, Echo Park, and other LA markets since 2007, the stand turns fresh, local masa into griddle-crisped pupusas finished with curtido and red salsa — a disciplined, ingredient-led format that earns serious critical attention.

Dulan's on Crenshaw in Los Angeles serves contemporary Southern soul food anchored by a family fried chicken recipe. Must-try dishes include the signature fried chicken made with a brown paper-bag method, ultra-cheesy macaroni and cheese, and slow-braised collard greens with rich pot likker. The kitchen reopened earlier this year after a substantial remodel, trading the old hot bar for a large, efficient cooking space and fresh service flow. Honored on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list at #63, Dulan's blends multigenerational techniques with vibrant, hearty flavors, delivering a crunchy, juicy fried chicken and velvety sides that demand a second helping.

Every Friday night in South L.A., Alfonso 'Poncho' Martínez fires mesquite and folds tlayudas under a tent at 4301 W Jefferson Blvd — a once-a-week pop-up that ranked #64 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024. The menu is three meats, one format, and masa imported from Oaxaca's Central Valley. Arrive with patience and an appetite for one of Los Angeles's most precisely executed regional Mexican traditions.

A Casamata restaurant in Los Angeles' Arts District, Damian brings contemporary Mexican cooking rooted in Pacific coast traditions to a converted warehouse space. Chef Chuy Cervantes works seasonal Californian produce into a menu that earns consistent recognition: Michelin Plate honors in both 2024 and 2025, a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list, and a ranking inside Opinionated About Dining's top 350 casual North American restaurants.

A family-run Hermosa Beach restaurant drawing on Tunisian roots and wide-ranging travel, Barsha landed at #66 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024. The menu moves from harissa-spiked brik to slow-cooked lamb meatballs with oversized couscous, holding its own as both a neighbourhood staple and a citywide reference point for North African cooking in Los Angeles.

Pine & Crane brings Taiwanese fast-casual to downtown Los Angeles's South Park neighborhood, earning a Michelin Bib Gourmand in both 2024 and 2025 and a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list. The menu spans cold appetizers, dumplings, noodles, and rice dishes, with the DTLA location adding Taipei-style breakfast service and a beverage program anchored in Taiwanese whiskies.

Charbel Hayek's debut at the Kimpton La Peer Hotel brings Lebanese cooking into a West Hollywood register that is dressy without being stiff. The $130 mezze platter — hummus in two variations, pomegranate-jeweled baba ghanouj, herb-green falafel — earned a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for 2024. The kitchen applies technique to a tradition that rarely gets this kind of hotel-dining attention in Los Angeles.

Chris Bianco's first Los Angeles location occupies a former coffee roaster in Row DTLA, bringing six signature wood-fired pizzas and a sourcing philosophy built around Southern California produce. The 2022 James Beard Outstanding Restaurateur and back-to-back Michelin Bib Gourmand honoree (2024, 2025) operates at the $$ price point with credentials that outpace the category.

My 2 Cents in Los Angeles offers Contemporary Californian, comfort-driven cuisine with clear Southern roots. Must-try dishes include the six-hour braised Oxtail Tacos, the panko-crusted Turkey Meatloaf Burger on Texas toast, and Theresa Fountain’s vegan Sweet Potato Pound Cake. The kitchen balances slow, soulful techniques with bright California produce and a signature whiskey reduction that dresses tacos and plates alike. Praised by the LA Times in its 2024 101 Best Restaurants list (#71), My 2 Cents pairs bold, comforting flavors with careful technique and an inviting, lively dining rhythm that keeps locals returning for lunch and late dinners alike.

Ranked #72 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Borit Gogae delivers a set-menu feast of barley rice, banchan, and seasonal sides from a communal Koreatown dining room for $30 per person. The name references mid-20th century Korean food scarcity; the experience runs counter to that history, arriving as an near-overwhelming spread of seasoned vegetables, soups, and acorn jelly salad.

A pop-up taqueria turned permanent daytime fixture inside Milpa Grille on Boyle Heights' Cesar Chavez Avenue, Macheen earned a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list for breakfast burritos and creative tacos that push well beyond the neighborhood norm. Soft-scrambled eggs, Swiss cheese, chile-dusted tater tots, and blue corn tortillas define a menu that has found its groove since going permanent in 2023.

Found Oyster transplants the New England oyster bar to East Hollywood with enough conviction to earn a Michelin Plate, back-to-back LA Times 101 recognition, and a top-100 Opinionated About Dining ranking. The format is narrow and boisterous: raw bar, chowder, lobster rolls, and rotating specials on a chalkboard, paired with Champagne or Coors depending on your mood.

Cassia elevated Los Angeles fine dining through Chef Bryant Ng's masterful fusion of Southeast Asian heritage and French technique, creating family-style feasts in a stunning Art Deco Santa Monica setting. This James Beard-nominated restaurant celebrated multicultural cuisine with dishes like Singaporean white pepper crab and lemongrass chicken confit, establishing itself as a cornerstone of the city's diverse culinary landscape.

Villa's Tacos has held a Michelin Bib Gourmand for two consecutive years and appeared on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list, yet the Highland Park taqueria operates on a single-dollar price tier. The draw is a taco philosophy Victor Villa calls 'estilo Los Angeles': blue corn tortillas, lacy cheese crusts, mesquite-smoked chicken, and a salsa roster that includes a Michoacán family recipe built on smoked chiles.

Ranked #77 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 and #16 on Esquire's Best New Restaurants list, Yess brings seasonal kaiseki to LA's Arts District with a menu that draws on Southern California's produce, sustainable seafood, and Japanese technique. Chef Junya Yamasaki's cooking finds genuine common ground between Japanese restraint and California plurality, in a dining room of pale wood and smooth concrete.

Camphor holds a Michelin star and a place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list for its French-Asian cooking in the Arts District, where classic bistro forms — soupe à l'oignon, beef tartare, roasted chicken — are dismantled and rebuilt with Asian technique and ingredient logic. The dining room is painted almost entirely white, the bar pours martini-adjacent cocktails finished with absinthe and celery bitters, and the menu resists easy categorisation by design.

Ranked #79 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Hu Tieu De Nhat is a nine-table storefront in Garden Grove's Koreatown community, specializing in hu tieu — the Saigon street-food noodle soup that draws on Chinese, Vietnamese, and Cambodian culinary traditions. The Nam Vang section of the menu is the reason to visit, with a choice of egg, rice, or glass noodles arriving with shrimp, pork belly, ground pork, fishcake, and quail eggs.

Masato Midorikawa's Culver City restaurant has earned a place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list for its focused approach to ju-wari soba — noodles made purely from buckwheat flour and water, produced to order each morning on a custom machine. The meal follows a prescribed sequence of tastes: bare noodle, yuzu salt, matcha salt, then broth. It is one of the few places in Los Angeles where soba is treated as a primary subject rather than a supporting dish.

Ranked #81 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, El Bacano is a 16-seat Dominican fast-casual in a North Hollywood strip mall where siblings Deany and Jonathan Santana serve their mother's and grandmother's recipes. The mangú with los tres golpes and Jonathan's pollo guisado — richly browned chicken in a brothy pepper gravy — are the dishes that bring regulars back repeatedly.

Sincerely Syria on Hollywood Boulevard brings the deeply marinated shawarma tradition of southwestern Syria to Los Angeles in a stripped-back, two-protein format. Ranked #82 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, the operation now spans four Southern California locations. The menu is brief by design: spiced lamb-and-beef lahme or lemony chicken djej, each finished on the griddle until the wrap crackles.

Tacos La Carreta began as a food truck on the northern fringes of Long Beach in late 2020, bringing Sinaloa-style carne asada to Los Angeles through a family tradition rooted in Mexico's El Verde. Listed on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 and a Taco Madness winner, the operation now includes a Whittier strip-mall taqueria, where the chorreada and Sinaloan pellizcada have built a dedicated following across the region.

Open since 2011 and operating from the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw mall, Post & Beam has become one of the more reliable anchors of Southern cooking in Los Angeles. Under chef John Cleveland, dishes like shrimp and grits, braised oxtail grilled cheese, and freshly baked biscuits have earned the restaurant a place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list and consecutive Opinionated About Dining Casual North America rankings in 2024 and 2025.

At Lalibela, light spills across an intimate Little Ethiopia dining room where Chef Tenagne Belachew and her daughters honor Ethiopia’s culinary legacy with refined warmth and quiet confidence. Oversized silver platters lined with pillowy injera become the canvas for vividly spiced classics—lentils laced with berbere and turmeric, verdant vegetables, and the house specialty: finely chopped kitfo, offered in a spirited Somali variation of lean prime beef, onions, and jalapeños. Best savored in elegant company, this is a place where generosity meets precision, and authenticity is elevated into an urbane, deeply satisfying ritual.

Ranked #86 on the LA Times 2024 list of 101 Best Restaurants, Stir Crazy occupies a 500-square-foot room on Melrose Avenue where a coffeehouse stood for roughly three decades. The Euro-Californian menu is deliberately unhurried, and the wine program punches well above the room's modest footprint. It is the kind of neighbourhood restaurant Los Angeles rarely produces with this much intention.

Two years into its life on N Sycamore Ave, Mr. T has established itself as the Sycamore District's most considered Franco-Pacific table. The Paris original's pastry DNA, courtesy of François Daubinet, anchors the daytime offer, while chef Alisa Vannah's dinner menu draws on a distinct set of influences. The LA Times placed it at #87 on its 2024 list of 101 Best Restaurants.

Ranked #88 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, Hakata Izakaya Hero brings the casual, group-oriented energy of a Fukuoka izakaya to a compact Westwood room on a block otherwise defined by Persian dining. The kitchen anchors on Hakata-style tonkotsu ramen — including a 24-hour pork head and knee broth version — alongside skewers, stuffed chicken wings, and a rotating handwritten specials list that tracks the season.

On Pioneer Boulevard in Artesia, Bhookhe sits within one of Southern California's most concentrated corridors of Indian regional cooking. The vegetarian maharaja thali, anchored in Rajasthani tradition and built from nearly two dozen components, earned the restaurant a place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in 2024. The kitchen rotates seasonal dishes on the thali regularly, giving repeat visitors consistent reason to return.

The sister izakaya to n/naka brings Niki Nakayama and Carole Iida-Nakayama's Japanese-California sensibility to Mid-City at a register far easier to book. Head chef Yoji Tajima runs a menu that moves between crudités with mochi flatbread, seasonal donabe rice, and cocktails built on aged sake and California produce. Opinionated About Dining ranked it #196 in North America for 2025, and the LA Times placed it at #90 on its 2024 list of 101 best restaurants.

Lasita in Los Angeles delivers Modern Filipino rotisserie and natural wine bar dining focused on grilled technique and bright flavors. Must-try dishes include inasal—lemongrass, ginger, garlic and calamansi–marinated chicken—pork belly lechon rolled like porchetta, and grilled branzino stuffed with lemongrass and ginger. The menu rotates with seasonal plates such as grilled shrimp over sweet corn purée and whole dorade in a sweet-and-sour plum sauce. Run by Chase Valencia, Steff Barros Valencia, and chef Nico de Leon, Lasita earned LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 (#91). Expect high-acid whites and chilled reds selected to slice through savory, garlicky meats for a vivid dining experience.

Tokyo Fried Chicken in Los Angeles serves Modern Japanese comfort with a focus on bone-in karaage. Must-try dishes include Giant Bone-In Karaage Thigh, Chicken Fat Rice, and Shredded Cabbage Salad with ginger dressing. Owners Kouji and Elaine Yamanashi transformed a cult Monterey Park strip-mall operation into a downtown counter-service restaurant, earning LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, #92. Expect scabrous, golden batter that cracks to release soy, garlic and ginger steam; thighs, drumsticks and wings arrive with pickles, a side and dipping sauce. Pair fried chicken skins dusted with chile or crisp potato chips with onion dip. Quick trays arrive in under 10 minutes, making this an essential stop for serious fried-chicken lovers in Los Angeles.

Ranked #93 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Las Segovias in Huntington Park is one of the few Los Angeles restaurants bringing serious Nicaraguan cooking to a broad audience. The brick-sized nacatamal, stuffed with bone-in pork ribs and finished with sour orange, is among the most discussed tamales in the region. A small marketplace at the back rounds out a visit that goes beyond the plate.

Bistro Na's occupies a strip-mall address on Las Tunas Drive in Temple City, but the dining inside is grounded in Qing dynasty imperial court tradition. Chef Tian Yong's Peking duck, a three-day process requiring advance reservation, has drawn a Michelin Plate and back-to-back Opinionated About Dining top-ten rankings. For royal Manchu cuisine at a $$ price point, the value proposition is difficult to argue with.

Ranked #95 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Nok's Kitchen operates out of a Westminster strip mall and delivers Laotian cooking rooted in family recipes from Laos. Nokmaniphone Sayavong's coarsely ground pork sausages, larb rib-eye, and coconut-milk-fried pork belly have earned the restaurant a 4.8 Google rating across more than 200 reviews since opening in 2022.

Origin Korean Barbecue in Los Angeles delivers hands-on Korean BBQ with bold flavors and a high-energy Koreatown scene. Must-try plates include the garlic-seasoned prime short rib, paper-thin shaved pork belly that crisps at the edge, and the brisket soybean paste stew crowded with tofu and ramen. The restaurant centers on communal tabletop grilling, ssam-style lettuce and kimchi wraps, and celebratory pours of soju and Terra beer. Recognized on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list at #96, Origin pairs precise seasoning and smoky char with lively soundtrack and late-night hours for groups who value flavor and atmosphere.

A Koreatown fixture ranked on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in both 2024 and 2025, Surawon Tofu House has built its reputation around in-house soondubu jjigae made with both classic white and black-soybean tofu. The black-soybean variation, which carries notes of sesame and peanut, is produced from soybeans sourced through traditional Korean methods. Group meals here follow a clear ritual: individual stews first, then shared plates of grilled mackerel, seafood-leek pancake, and stone-pot bibimbap.

Crossroads Kitchen on Melrose Avenue has been Los Angeles's most-recognised upscale vegan restaurant for over a decade, earning a place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list. Chef-owner Tal Ronnen's menu moves through Italian-leaning pasta and plant-based cheese alongside produce-driven seasonal plates, all inside a clubby dining room that has long attracted the entertainment industry crowd.

A Newport Beach butcher shop and delicatessen that earned a spot on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list, Mario's operates at the intersection of whole-animal craft and chef-driven lunch. Master butcher Mario Llamas smokes his own pastrami, cures meats in-house, and grills Niman Ranch steaks over wood fire for the steak sandwich that has drawn an obsessive following across Orange County and beyond.

In the San Gabriel Valley's dense grid of regional Chinese cooking, Kang Kang Food Court in Alhambra has built a specific, hard-to-argue reputation around a single dish: sheng jian bao. Named to the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants list in 2024, the cafeteria-style counter draws diners from across the city for pan-fried bao with crispy bottoms, thin chewy tops, and a hot pork-and-soup filling that rewards patience over appetite.

Reopened under a nonprofit model in Watts, Locol earns its place on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024 list through smoked brisket, ribs, oxtails, and the griddled stuffed tortillas that made its original 2016 run memorable. Co-owned by Daniel Patterson and executive chef Keith Corbin, it operates as an employment vehicle for the surrounding community as much as a restaurant.