Wow.
Surprised.
She was certainly caring and passionate about her subjects, but kind of a ho-hum writer who did not go out of her way to dig up new places, IMHO. Even Gold rarely does the digging these days, I guess that’s a by-product of these Online Times.
Awww crap. I really enjoyed her reviews and respected her opinions. She will be missed.
It’s not as much fun as one might imagine.
Nice. She got her 3 rounds in at Vespertine then boned out.
Nice read. Thanks for posting.
I hope that shit show was not her last meal in LA.
Given the way print publishing works, she probably didn’t leave for Australia until a couple of weeks after that meal.
Didn’t know much of her writings until today and now i’m sad she’s leaving after Otium and Vesper reads.
That’s a really good point that I hadn’t considered. It seems print reviews are now mostly reserved for the “big” openings, but I guess there are more and more “big” openings to cover these days.
Personally, I liked that Besha was not afraid to be brutally honest about a place, which made her relatively positive review of Salazar that much more meaningful for us. I’m really sorry to see her go.
I enjoyed her writing. Maybe LA Weekly will find a POC to replace her, but I’m not overly optimistic.
They’ve probably already replaced her.
JGold has a team of bilingual scouts for him to search for places.
Or maybe they’re eliminating the full-time position and she’ll be replaced by one or more freelancers. That seems to be the assumption here:
certainly an interesting viewpoint here:
But internally, Los Angeles is a city in a restaurant struggle. Locals and longtime cooks will tell anyone that listens that there are, probably, too many restaurants in LA already, and having more on the way is only going to make things tighter for everyone involved. Los Angeles is also a $15 minimum wage town (come 2020), with high rents and a staffing shortage to boot. It’s harder to get access to as much of the same quality produce as before, and harder still to stand out on blocks that might offer half a dozen similar small plates restaurants with only slightly varying flavor definitions.
“One wonders what the LA Weekly has done with all the money it makes from throwing food events like Tacolandia, The Essentials, and numerous other profit-generating endeavors that it couldn’t sustain a full-time restaurant critic. Perhaps LA Weekly simply held onto the position because of Jonathan Gold’s incredible influence when he was the critic at the alt-weekly publication.”
My favorite part.
I wonder if that’s inside dope or just speculation.