Everson Royce Bar (DTLA)
Pre-dinner drinks with friends before Bestia. Happy hour is great with $8 artisan cocktails and frozen boozy slushies. Free chips & salsa if you ask. I loved their pomegranate Paloma, but am reminded that frozen drinks are not my thing…freezes my entire palate. The outdoor patio is darling with bocce ball.
Songbird Cafe (DTLA)
Through the refrigerator/freezer door is an adorable speakeasy lounge with nice cocktails. Post dinner drinks in Chinatown. There are interesting choices at the bar. Lots of different cocktails depending on your mood. I’m a huge fan of refreshing cocktails that are not too sweet. I got the Style & Grace…blanco tequila, lemon, agave, cucumber, mint, and sparkling wine. I loved it…super balanced and a perfect drink for a summer day.
Sound like a lovely evening!
Playground 1.0 (Santa Ana)
Found ourselves in the neighborhood so we dropped by to check out the Artwalk and snack after a kid’s birthday party.
Grabbed 2 seats at the front bar for snacks and drinks. Loved how enthusiastic the bartenders were about the menu here. I even loved that they make fun of their 1-star Yelp reviews by slapping them on T-shirts that the service staff wears and the restaurant sells.
Summer cocktails have made it to the menu. Light, refreshing, and a touch fruity…these drinks make you wish you were sitting outside on a warm summer afternoon. Teaches of Peaches and Bad Boys both were great.
House fermented sourdough with ramp butter - charred to that point where it could be considered a touch burnt, this sourdough is so good and a perfect foil for their herbaceous and tasty ramp compound butter
Salt & Pepper squid - inspired by chef’s travels and love of Chinese cuisine, this dish actually reminded me of family dinners/celebrations where we always ordered a salt and pepper (insert seafood here). While good, I think the kitchen needs to work on the slice size of the squid…some were too small so they were over cooked and chewy.
A Lot of Work Went Into This - (literally the dish’s menu name) after a taco man birthday party, we needed something green. This was a mixed quickly blanched sugar snap peas, snow peas, pea greens, and fava beans with a radish tzatziki and focaccia crumbs…simple, but so fresh and delicious. The radish tzatziki offering a spicy zip to the dish.
Side note, along 4th Street there are some pretty cool shops and restaurants. They’ve got their own food hall (Portola coffee, All Flavor No Grease, and Dos Chinos being some of the vendors) at the 4th Street Market where we found a delightful agua fresca stall selling pineapple strawberry agua fresca and we hopped over to the Recess bar for a double shot of vodka to spike the agua fresca. A couple of blocks away, McFadden’s Public House has an old school arcade with pinball machines and a full bar upstairs while downstairs holds a couple of food stall vendors and a tiny tiki bar. Totally didn’t know this was all here…have to make a point to come back to try some of these other places.
Kawamata Seafood is pretty definitely the best Poke in OC. When I worked in Dana Point Harbor I could sometimes maneuver a stop there before their early close. I now work farther North and live even farther North. Kawamata is now a day off destination. Sad, especially because the three other Poke places I found good but closer to me have all closed.