Tom yum aguachile, part of the Evil Cooks Kamikaze tasting menu
“It’s like a raw bar with pizza,” chef Josh Skenes casually says of Leopardo, his buzzing new Los Angeles restaurant in the storied space that formerly housed Nancy Silverton’s La Brea Bakery flagship.
It’s a Tuesday night, and Leopardo’s dining room is full of prominent chefs, food-TV personalities, podcasters and assorted hospitality-industry scenesters, who are eating expertly composed ocean tilefish crudo and purple sea urchin filled with tuna. At many tables, there’s a waffle with a side of spring-water caviar that’s been cured in bacon salt.
Leopardo’s pizzas, including the sweet and spicy Hello Satan, are light and bright, with crust that has the right amount of fight-back. A whole grilled whitefish is a reminder that Skenes excels at preparing seafood, that he understands the difference between umami-rich and deeply savory and how weaving together both has profound effects.
Leopardo’s tagline is “unfamiliar takes on the familiar,” which shows that Skenes (who made his name in San Francisco with live-fire fine dining destination Saison) understands how LA wants to eat.
The Hello Satan pizza at Leopardo.
A couple days later, we visit Yang’s Kitchen in Alhambra for dinner. Bangers like chef Christian Yang’s Hainan fish (barramundi) rice, Santa Carota beef cheek stew (cooked in red wine like a European classic), smoked pork jowl char siu and dan dan campanelle taste both familiar and brand-new. This is thoughtful, elegant comfort food that works for both Chinese-food purists and fans of California brasseries. (Not incidentally, Yang used to work for Cassia boss Bryant Ng at The Spice Table.) This is pure Los Angeles in every bite.
A couple days after that, we head to El Sereno for the Kamikaze tasting menu from Evil Cooks.
Evil Cooks, run by heavy-metal-loving 2024 James Beard semifinalist duo Alex Garcia and Elvia Huerta, is best known for its popular Smorgasburg stand. But these are chefs with range. And here is how they explain their tasting menu: ‘“Why do we call it a Kamikaze? It’s because we don’t plan the menu, we say it’s a suicidal menu. We let the food speak to us and let us create exciting dishes from memory and the years accumulated in our careers.”
Smoked pork jowl char siu at Yang’s Kitchen.
At the most recent rendition of Kamikaze, Garcia pays tribute to Huerta and her culinary memories with a progression of clever, playful, loving dishes. It’s one day before her birthday, and Garcia serves Huerta and guests a seven-course menu that includes a pepperoni-pizza croissant, nigiri made from tomahawk steaks and a chorizo dumpling. Huerta’s favorite dish is also our favorite: terrific tom yum aguachile, with shrimp and scallop inside a scallop shell. This, also, is pure Los Angeles in every bite, the best kind of unfamiliar take on the familiar, a balancing act of savory, spicy, sweet and oceanic umami.
On June 22, Evil Cooks, Barrio Cantina and great chefs like Macheen’s Jonathan Perez will collaborate on the second year of The Disciples of the Corn, a 32-course dinner that represents all 32 states of Mexico. This is the kind of exuberant and freewheeling culinary ambition that exists in Los Angeles, a city that never stops rewriting the script.
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