Eating (or Not) in LA

Comics and Hollywood bon vivant Mark Evanier has launched a new section on his Website, Great Los Angeles Restaurants That Ain't There No More. He hedges on the word great ("Well, maybe 'great' is the wrong word for some of these. These are places I've dined in the past that are now defunct. Some I miss, some I don't, some I miss for reasons other than the food.") and perhaps memorable might've been a better word, but it neither rings nor packs the punch of the single-syllable great.

We didn't move to LA until 1989, so most of these were already gone, but I ate in three or four of the twenty-four restaurants he mentions. He says Ship's Coffee Shops closed in the '80s, so there couldn't have been much overlap between me and it, but I definitely remember driving by, and I may actually have eaten at the ones in Santa Monica and at Olympic & La Cienega. (I have distinct memories of the two meals in question, but it's possible that I've just put them at the wrong locations.)

I was at Chasen's for a big tented party, so although I ate the food at the establishment, I didn't have the actual restaurant experience. Part of the Chasen's experience, though, was seeing movie stars, and there were movie stars at the tented party, so that much of it was authentic, at least.

At various times, we went to both Hamptons (and actually didn't live that far from the one in Toluca Lake). They didn't last for very long after we got to town, though. The burgers were good (although on another page, Evanier provides more information and argues that the burgers weren't as good by that point, which is something I wouldn't know; I liked them well enough, but if they'd previously been even better, I'm sorry I missed them), but the atmosphere was even better.

I went to Kelbo's, a Polynesian-type place, once. Francesca had worked nearby the restaurant and had occasion to go a few times, and after one visit, she regaled me with tales of flaming bowls of liquor (which remains a catch phrase in our house to this day). It wasn't necessarily clear what the drinks were (though they undoubtedly included rum), but they were brought to your table in a giant shell-shape bowl and lit afire. Or maybe they were set on fire at the bar and already flaming when they arrived. I wouldn't know, because by the time I visited, only a couple of weeks after Francesca had her experience--surely not any more than two months--Kelbo's had apparently changed owners, toned down (though not eliminated) the Polynesian theme, and taken flaming bowls of liquor off the menu. You couldn't even get a mug and a Bic lighter. And now, according to Mark Evanier, there's no Kelbo's at all. We've been keeping our eye out for the possibility of flaming bowls of liquor ever since--if anybody's got a line on an establishment that continues to serve them, please let me know.

Mark promises more remembrances of LA restaurants of yore to come, so I'll be checking in to see what comes down the pike (and find out if any of my favorites have bitten the dust).