Monday, January 25, 2010

DineLA 2010 Restaurant Week Launch! What's on Your Agenda?

The 2010 Dine LA Restaurant Week is here! Has everyone started dining out?

Last week Dine LA held a launch party at the Hollywood Roosevelt and dozens of Los Angeles chefs, restaurateurs, and media people gathered over cocktails served up by the Library Bar.
Starting from the refreshing arugula gimlet to the interesting umami-driven-but-I-probably-can't-drink-a-whole-glass-of Shiitake Manhattan (shiitake infused bourbon, yes) to the sweet strawberry cocktail as a finisher, Library Bar was hard at work to keep us happy.
My favorite was definitely the arugula gimlet. I haven't been to Library Bar before but am definitely planning a visit after this party!

We mingled over Mexican food provided by the Roosevelt hotel, me trying to find all the LA chefs around and listening to Villairaigosa gave a short speech.
Chefs in attendance were almost everyone in town from Joachim Splichal, Ludo Lefebvre, John Sedlar, Ben Bailly, Mark Gold, Josie Le Balch, Akira Hirose, Keizo Ishiba, and many many more.

On one of the tables they had a chef's coat that all the chefs in attendance had been signing. I recognized Josie, Neal Fraser, and David Myers among others (it's hard to read signatures :P )
I wonder what they'll do with this coat ... it might fetch a fun price for an auction!

During the launch party they also released their Los Angeles chefs/restaurants family tree, the first ever! It looks something like this, but is actually more interactive than that, so you should just go on their website and check it out.

It's quite interesting to see which restaurants have been responsible for launching these great chefs! Spago, Campanile, and Patina are definitely some of the more productive ones.

Dine LA has also been running a DineLA-a-Day! daily giveaway of $100 certificates to various restaurants! You can check out this page for the day's giveaway, and be sure to look at the hints (you may need to refer to the family tree).

So far here's my agenda (and other tentative plans):
Lunch at Cube
Lunch at Fogo de Chao
Petrossian
The Lazy Ox Canteen
Ortolan

If you still can't decide from the menu, feel free to check out my old dineLA reviews.

4 comments:

weezermonkey

I heart Ortolan. It is tres romantic!

I am also going to Petrossian. :)

My other destinations are not so interesting because my companions insisted on $ and $$ places that I wasn't really digging myself.

Anonymous

I went to Eva last week for a preview dinner. I didn't like it too much, nothing special. This week Im going to Ugo for lunch, here's hoping jury duty doesn't get in the way

stuffycheaks

I went to Petrossian on Monday, just posted my review. I know pork belly is overdone, but we really enjoyed it! The Crispy peanut egg was interesting too. Next on my list is Cafe Was, Spago and La Cachette Bistro. Can't wait, but also need to work out like crazy!!

Unknown

Dear Gourmet Pig, this review of the DineLA 2010 restaurant launch was so entertaining! The photos of the drinks were awesome and I would love to try the arugula cocktail. I also found the the family tree of chefs so cool. Where ever I go, I always ask to be seated at the chefs table or to give my compliments to the chef because you never know who you might meet! Your site was such a pleasure to visit. Well presented, clean, clear and beautiful photos. I shall be returning for another delicious bite. Thank you for sharing,
Cheers, Gaby
You can visit me at http://ptsaldari.posterous.com

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