DineLA 08: Chaya Brasserie

We went to Chaya Brasserie for the dineLA menu. There were three of us and it was the first time for all of us.
Before proceeding with the dineLA menu, one of my friends ordered the seared foie gras with black truffle mac and cheese:

After one bite of this, the rest of us decided to order another one to share. The mac and cheese was excellent and you can really smell the black truffles! The seared foie gras was great (although not the best ever). The thing is though is that eating both the foie gras and the mac and cheese together were strange and personally I don't think they complement each other. Individually, however, they were excellent.

Now, on to the dineLA menu: Everyone ordered the lobster ravioli.

The sauce was good, but all in all the dish was just okay. The lobster inside the ravioli was not particularly good. Rather flavorless, in fact.

Next up is the entree. We got one of the fish and two shortribs to share.
The fish was flavorful, but the rice even more so.

This was a pretty good dish. The fish was not as dry as it seems and was in fact quite moist.

The short ribs though, in our opinion, was by far better.

I am partial to short ribs to begin with, and this one is tender and moist. To top it off, the risotto with champignon and black truffle oil was excellent. I just love that truffle smell. Mmmm.

For both entree, although we really liked them, we noted that the rice/risotto is more flavorful than the main meat/fish. If you eat them together, they tend to overpower the meat/fish.

The dessert for the prix fixe was pretty simple, nothing particularly worth noting. Got the ice cream cookie sandwich and the gelato. They were good and end the meal nicely, but nothing special.

The service was good throughout the night. They changed the gelato flavor of the day in the middle, and when I got the green tea instead of the banana walnut, I made an unhappy face, so the waitress brought me the other one also. I ended with two scoops of gelato now.

If I have to sum it up, I enjoyed the meal. The food was very good although their combination of sides and main meat do not really go well together. But I wouldn't give up any of the sides ... I just want to eat them individually.

Food: 8/10
Service: 8.5/10

Chaya Brasserie Beverly Hills
8741 Alden Drive
Los Angeles, CA 90048

DineLA 08: Circa 55

Running out of options, we decided to try Circa55 since you can't really go wrong with 10 oz new york steak for dinner. I just got back from the dentist, so I wasn't really eating that night, but I'll report on what my friends had.

The starter was a crab cake with garlic aioli.

The crab cake was pretty big, and had a lot of crab in it. The garlic aioli was really good.

Then comes the New York steak.

The steak was well prepared, cooked just the way we asked. The blue cheese was really good and a really nice touch for the steak. The only thing was that the mashed potato was cold ...

For dessert one friend has the Journey to Chocolate.

Chocolate sponge cake, which we thought was infused with sage. Good, and unique.
The others were an opera cake (good, like normal), and a chocolate shot thing, which she didn't comment on.

All in all the food was pretty good, and it was a pretty good value for $34.

Circa 55
The Beverly Hilton Hotel
9876 Wilshire Blvd
Beverly Hills, CA 90210

DineLA 08: Asia de Cuba

We went to Asia de Cuba for lunch today for the dineLA event. 11:30 reservation. The restaurant was empty when we arrived. All in all the food was good, but service sucked.

I got the pulled pork empanadas for starters, which was excellent.

The pulled pork was tasty, and the empanada skin was flavorful and crunchy.

My friend got the lemongrass skewered chicken.

This was not bad but I liked the empanadas much better. The chicken was a bit tough IMO. So I can't eat spicy and this dish was pretty spicy. I ran out of water, but my waitress never came. I raised my hand etc etc finally got the attention of a bus boy. I asked him for water, but he didn't come back with the water for a while while my mouth was burning.

I had the butterfish as the entree.

This was good, fish was tender. Black bean and edamame salad was also very good. I also liked the shishito pepper. (It was like any other miso butterfish, and it was one of the better ones).


My friend got the BBQ chicken and I had a bite.

Chicken was tender and sauce was good. The sticky rice though, my friend claimed was soggy and no good at all.

We had the carrot cake and cuban opera for dessert (no one wanted to get the sorbet so we had 2 opera cakes). We watched as other tables that came after us and finished entrees after us get served desserts first. It seems like they screwed up the order - afterwards they brought us desserts but didn't get the right orders. Either that or our server was just not as attentive as other servers.

Desserts were good, although nothing particularly special.

Asia de Cuba
MONDRIAN LOS ANGELES
8440 Sunset Blvd.
West Hollywood, California 90069