Funke

Should You Return to Funke?

If you've already been to Funke once, you already know the answer is probably yes; the question is when and what to focus on next. The Beverly Hills trilevel restaurant from Evan Funke holds a Michelin Plate (2025), landed at #25 on the LA Times 101 Best Restaurants 2024, ranked #609 on Opinionated About Dining's Casual North America list for 2025. Reservations have remained notoriously difficult to secure well past the opening buzz, which tells you what you need to know about sustained demand. If you haven't locked in a table yet, plan at least three to four weeks ahead and treat Thursday as your leading weekday opening window before the weekend competition intensifies.

Dinner Is the Main Event; And the Only Option

Funke is dinner-only, Tuesday through Saturday (5–9:45 pm) and until 10:15 pm on Fridays and Saturdays. There is no lunch service. That matters for how you plan and budget: you are committing to a full dinner spend in the $$$$ tier with no lighter midday alternative at this address. If you want a Funke-adjacent pasta experience at a more accessible price point and format, Osteria Mozza offers a lunch-friendly setup and a la carte flexibility, Angelini Osteria runs a more traditional trattoria pace for afternoon visits. For a second visit to Funke specifically, the right move is to lean into the full dinner format rather than trying to treat it as a quick meal.

What to Focus on the Second Visit

First-timers often anchor on the pasta, rightly so. The kitchen's pasta laboratorio is visible from the dining room, the handcrafted output is the clearest reason to pay $$$$ prices on South Santa Monica Boulevard. But on a return visit, the smarter play is to go wider. The sfincione palermitano, a round of dough finished with jammy tomato, onion, sharp cheese, wild oregano, breadcrumbs, is a dish the LA Times specifically called out: it starts with crisp structure and collapses into something airier. If you ordered past the pasta section last time and stopped there, the prime rib-eye cap with crispy potatoes has been described as among the more satisfying meat-and-potato combinations in the city. And dessert from pastry chef Shannon Swindle earns its own line item: the seasonal crostata is worth holding space for, even at this price point.

The arrabbiata is the pasta benchmark worth ordering on every visit. The LA Times noted the tomato and chile find a balance point that the spaghetti strands carry well, it reads as a calibration dish, the one that shows whether the kitchen is on that night. Use it as your baseline when comparing visits.

The Room and the Rooftop

The physical layout shapes the experience in ways that differ depending on where you sit. The main dining room surrounds the open kitchen and pasta laboratorio, which is the seat to request if the craft process is part of why you're here. The private dining room offers separation for groups or occasions where conversation matters more than kitchen theater. The rooftop bar is a genuine third option: arrive early, have a drink upstairs before your reservation, assess whether the night calls for the full dining room commitment or a lighter bar-side approach. For a second visit, spending twenty minutes on the rooftop before sitting down is the move that first-timers often skip.

Booking and Practical Details

Funke is closed Sundays and Mondays. The Friday and Saturday seatings run fifteen minutes later (last table at 10:15 pm), which gives you more flexibility if you're working around a Beverly Hills evening. Book through the standard reservation platforms three to four weeks out at minimum; the LA Times noted that more than a year after opening, reservations were still notoriously hard to get. If you're flexible on date, mid-week Tuesday or Wednesday typically offers the most availability at this difficulty level. The address at 9388 S Santa Monica Blvd puts you firmly in Beverly Hills, with valet and street parking options typical for this stretch of the corridor.

How Funke Fits the Broader LA Italian Scene

Funke sits at the top end of LA's Italian category by profile and price. For comparison, Antico Nuovo and Bianca offer handcrafted pasta in formats that are easier to book and less expensive, making them better choices if the theatrical setting and chef-name premium aren't part of your criteria. Bestia competes at a similar energy level with a broader Italian-influenced menu and a downtown Arts District location that some diners prefer for its less formal register. Funke's specific argument is the combination of the pasta laboratorio, the multilevel room, the Beverly Hills clientele, if those elements don't matter to you, the alternatives above deliver strong pasta for less friction. If you want to benchmark Funke against Italian at the highest international tier, 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo Bombana in Hong Kong and cenci in Kyoto represent what Italian cooking looks like in different global contexts. For chef-driven destination dining in other U.S. cities, Lazy Bear in San Francisco, Le Bernardin in New York City, The French Laundry in Napa, Alinea in Chicago, Single Thread Farm in Healdsburg, and Emeril's in New Orleans offer useful reference points for how Funke's $$$$ pricing compares across formats.

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The Verdict on a Return Visit

Funke is worth going back to, but only if you're prepared to book early, commit to dinner pricing, use the second visit to push past the obvious pasta order. The room is theatrical by design, the pasta laboratorio is a genuine draw, the awards record across Michelin, the LA Times, OAD confirm this isn't a one-hit restaurant.