Posts by Richard Foss

Some of the most successful restaurants in the world serve only one thing. I haven’t visited Ma Yu Ching’s Bucket Chicken House, which has been serving chicken and noodles in the Chinese city of Kaifeng since 1153, but I fondly remember the Regensburg Sausage Kitchen, which has been serving grilled bratwurst and sauerkraut since 1806…

New And Interesting… Nuna’s Mediterranean Kitchen is open in Redondo. They’re serving more than the standard Middle Eastern food you’d expect. Nuna is from Morocco’s Jewish community and is offering some of his family specialties alongside the usual falafels, shawarma, and hummus. He is trying out specials to see which ones are popular, so the…

There was a time when restaurants fit into categories, serving only the French, German, Mexican, Italian, American coffee shop, or whatever else was their specialty. California cuisine blew up that expectation, creating eclectic cuisine as its own category. Suddenly you had to scan the menu carefully and weigh unanticipated flavor combinations in your head. The…

If Jeff Melodia’s caddy had preferred tea, he would be in a different business right now. Melodia had finished playing golf in Hawaii and started chatting with the caddy cleaning his clubs, a friendly fellow named Lee. The conversation was sufficiently interesting that they decided to continue it over a cup of coffee, and the…

It makes sense that the most popular variant of French cuisine in California is from the Mediterranean coast of Provence. The climate there is similar to ours so the same produce is readily available, and the use of olive oil and robust seasonings fits our concept of healthy dining better than richer and more delicately…

Once in awhile I get reminded that the logical explanation for something is often wrong. Consider what you might think of a restaurant named Casa Vincenzo with your sole starting point being that it is an Italian restaurant owned by a Frenchman. Since Italy and France share a border that is over 300 miles long,…

My favorite poem is “The Rubiyat of Omar Khayyam,” an extended meditation on life and death, pleasure and destiny, that was penned in 16th century Persia. The nineteenth century translator Edward FitzGerald brilliantly condensed the sprawling manuscript of more than 1,000 verses into a mere 101 quatrains, of which the most famous is A book…

A Proud Name Disappears… To the surprise of nobody who has noticed how empty the place was even when nearby restaurants were slammed, Killer Shrimp at the Mermaid recently closed. The name hinted at the identity crisis here. They lost much of the crowd that had liked the place when they painted the walls black…

A few years ago, I spent an afternoon in a Thai culinary garden learning about the sight, scent, and flavor of the herbs that make that cuisine so magnificent. I tasted the world’s spiciest basil, something that is so pungent that even Thais wear eye protection when cooking it, as well as fruity pandan leaves,…

In 1953 Dwight Eisenhower was President, Elvis Presley graduated from high school, and a fellow named Michelangelo Mance started a deli in Hermosa Beach. His clientele included surfers who showed up with whatever pocket change they could scrape together. To keep them happy he started selling marinara sauce sandwiches for five cents each. Sixty-four years…

Hot Summer, Hot Dining Scene… After a lull in openings and changes, things are heating up in the South Bay restaurant scene. The big surprise is the changeover at Chez Melange, which will close for a few days and reopen with a brighter main room and new concept. That news and a story about the…