There’s a bunch down in orange county/fountain Valley. I have a very good bakery, I HRAM fresh Simit.
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No idea about the quality. I’ve enjoyed it but would be curious as to your take on café Bolivar in Ocean Park. They have a variety of Arepas
http://www.cafebolivar.com/
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Moscow Deli in Costa Mesa
Has soups, sandwiches, and appetizers. Also a lot of imported Russian and Eastern European items that are beyond my understanding.
There are tons of Russian/Former Soviet Bloc delis throughout the southland, but Georgian food, which basically is to Russia as Mexican food is to LA, just isn’t here outside of a couple of the above mentioned khinkhali and khachapuri specialists.
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Resident Georgian person (on both sides of my family) here.
We don’t have the same Georgian food representation as NY/brooklyn.
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Definitely Armenian.
The closest real Georgian restaurant I’ve found is in San Diego.
My wife did a medical mission years ago to Georgia. She really wants Georgian food, and especially an authentic GEORGIAN khachapuri.
She has a place in NYC she goes to, but is desperate for something out here. Any recommendations?
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Mate I wish I had one for ya. As far as khachapuri there are so many varieties, and there are a few places that do the intersection of Armenian/Georgian like Sipan in Glendale. For the most common kind you’ll find in America, the ones at Oui on melrose are pretty good despite using a different cheese blend.
Otherwise, other georgian dishes that aren’t kchapuri and khinkali are very hard to come by here. If anyone wants to invest in bringing my grandmother to the west coast with me, I’m sure we can start a place…
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I don’t know the difference between Georigan and Armenian khachapuri, but Pomegranate in San Diego and Piala in Sebastopol use the right spices and have dishes that the Russian and Armenian khinkali / khachapuri places don’t, such as pkhali and lobio.
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There is also Tamari and Bevri on the SF Peninsula
Bevri is Russian. No hint of the right spices last time I was there.
quarter sheets
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Belated thanks for the suggestion - I’ll check it out
IIRC anthony bourdain (RIP - it’s really been almost six years now?) was trying to create a food hawker complex similar to what you might find in singapore. i personally would love to see stalls accommodating one trick ponies gathered together in one (conveniently located in relation to the SGV of course) location.
responding to a few thoughts posted previously, LA is a food destination, but the location in terms of proximity to central america and of course being on the pacific rim has resulted in a non-european sensibility to food. “fine” dining as michelin might define it is not why you’d want to visit LA for the food. kogi, for example, would have likely not gained much traction in a region where there is no combination of a strong latin american presence as well as an asian (specifically korean in this instance). and gold would have likely never won a pulitzer (sp?) without the plethora of various ethnicities all producing cuisines so dissimilar to ‘american’ cuisine as white bread america perceives it to be with gold doing his best to make it accessible to white bread america.
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Someone recommended Donna’s. Is it worth eating at? Put a little differently, is the pasta al dente?
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Is it supposed to be at a red sauce joint? Genuine question…
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Depends on the price point.
They ended up opening it in New York just without Bourdain but with KF Seetoh still involved.
Food looks just ok and everything is $20+ so if you dont wanna pay those prices then thats why we dont have one here that is financially sound.
My perception is that since, or because Gold left us, the pendulum of LA has been swinging back into “white bread america” with the endless appetite the city has for chicken sandwiches, pizza and obnoxious mediocre coastal Italian that are spreading so invasively. LA food went from the cultured sophistication of J.Gold to a 10 year old’s food preferences.
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