LA Restaurants and Chefs That Stepped Up for Their Communities in 2020
Restaurants were an essential part of helping communities this past year
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Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images
2020 will be the year that upended the restaurant industry. It’s difficult to talk about the year in review when everything changed, when people and businesses suffered during the pandemic. In light of the challenging year for everyone in Los Angeles, we asked food writers and industry folks about restaurants they thought stepped up for their communities and stakeholders.
Mona Holmes, Eater LA Reporter
Post & Beam’s chef/owner John Cleveland and numerous South LA restaurants worked with Councilman Marqueece Harris Dawson to prepare meals for seniors from March until June. The program ended June 12, but Clevelend extended the program by fundraising within the Baldwin Hills-Crenshaw community. I can’t think of another restaurant so committed to its community
La Scala
Upscale Italian restaurant La Scala in Beverly Hills has come under fire in the past several days for trying to “discreetly” attract diners for an indoors New Years Eve party. A not-so-secretive invite was reportedly slipped into a number of to-go bags by restaurant staff, reading in part: “Welcome back to the 20’s Prohibition. We are currently taking reservations for New Year’s Eve dinner. Inside.” Naturally, the final line read: “Please keep this discreet, but tell all your friends.”
The restaurant was quickly roasted across social media once the note got out, including on their own Instagram posts. Though they’ve yet to make a formal public statement, the
Governor Gavin Newsom appointed native Angeleno Alex Padilla to the vacant California Senate seat left behind by Vice President-elect Kamala Harris yesterday, marking the first time a Latino U.S. Senator has emerged from the state of California. Padilla, a San Fernando Valley native, has often discussed his immigrant parents over the years, including in a press release sent wide yesterday, but here’s where things get interesting: Padilla’s father, Santos, was apparently a longtime, beloved short-order cook at several Du-Par’s locations around greater Los Angeles.
Padilla even mentions his father’s work in a video circulating social media yesterday, where Gov. Newsom surprises the younger Padilla with the Senate seat announcement. In the emotional video, which can be seen here, Padilla says through tears: “I can’t tell you how many pancakes my dad flipped, or eggs he scrambled trying to provide for us.” Eater wishes Alex Padilla well on his new appointment.
The 22 Best Dishes Eater LA Editors Ate in 2020, Mapped
Mining LA’s dining gems to uncover the best bites of 2020
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The editors at Eater LA shared our best disheseach week, so it’s only appropriate with 2020 drawing to a rapid close to bring forth the very best dishes of the year. From barbecue to braised sardines and Khmer sausages, here now are the 22 best dishes Eater editors ate this year. Dishes are presented from geographically, starting with places in Los Angeles and the latter few placed outside of the city limits but within driving distance.Read More
Apparently, If You’re Rich You Can Keep Eating at Steakhouses in Malibu
Plus, the Real Health Department of Beverly Hills, counties sue over the state stay-at-home order, and Manhattan Beach gets in trouble for its ‘public seating’ eating areas
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Elizabeth Daniels
Yes, it’s true: Mastro’s Ocean Club in Malibu is still letting diners eat expensive steak and lobster on-site, directly in defiance of a state-level public health order demanding that restaurants across Southern California revert to takeout and delivery only. Here’s a look at the tented setup, per TMZ.
Not only is the chain steakhouse rather busy, it’s also violating a number of different COVID-19 related rules not least of which is the tent itself, which is supposed to be open on at least three sides, per LA County Department of Public Health protocols. Eater has previously confirmed that the restaurant (located in one of the richest places in America) continues to offer on-site dining a