LA Delikacy

DOMINICK’S

This past weekend, we paid a little visit to Dominick’s, the patron saint of one of my favorite restaurants in LA, Little Dom’s. Little Dom’s is the product of the same team behind Dominick’s, and let me tell you the apple does not fall far from the tree. I usually don’t order spaghetti & meatballs at an Italian restaurant, not because there’s anything wrong with it, but because spaghetti & meatballs is something my short list of cooking skills allows me to replicate on any given day, and I’m always eager to let the professional chefs show me what they got! But I digress. What I’m trying to say is, that despite my cardinal rule of (trying) not to order spaghetti & meatballs at an Italian restaurant, I ALWAYS order the spaghetti & meatballs at Little Dom’s. Simply put, their ‘balls’ are delicious, not to mention gigantic. They’re savory, they’re meaty, they’re rich, they’re tender. Everything you want in a meatball. So my every intention was to order the spaghetti & meatballs when we got to Dominick’s, but our waiter mentioned one of the specials of the night was spaghetti and VEGETARIAN meatballs! He had me at spaghetti. But he intrigued me at vegetarian meatballs. So I went for it, while the boyfriend went for the real deal (spaghetti and meatballs). You know the saying “grass is always greener on the other side”? Well, the grass really, definitely, absolutely was greener on the other side with my dish. My veggie meatballs were…meh, and I might have eyed my boyfriend’s dish in the same lecherous way Anthony Weiner probably eyed any mirror he walked by as a possible photo op. They were not bad by any means, but it only made me realize I would much prefer the real deal. All in all, our dinner was a “ball” (get it? get it?) but on my next visit, I will not let the word “vegetarian” make me stray from my usual doings. Oh! and of course, it goes without saying, the arancini balls were fantastic as always. Ciao!

OROCHON LITTLE TOKYO

Recently, my boyfriend turned me onto a gem of a restaurant in Little Tokyo called Orochon, a restuarant solely dedicated to serving ramen noodles. He saw the restaurant featured in an episode of MAN VS. FOOD (if you haven’t watched, I highly recommend. Food porn at its best, I tell you).  Now I may be biased since ramen is one of my favorites foods, but who can resist a piping hot bowl of fluffy noodles? So of COURSE I happily obliged a trip to this noodle wonderland. So here’s the twist. If you’re familiar with MAN VS. FOOD, the host is challenged to consume foods that are generally not easy to consume. How hard could it be to consume…”a piping hot bowl of fluffy noodles”? Well, if it’s spiked with fire from hell in the form of jalapenos, peppers and spices, it may prove to be a bit difficult. The menu is simple, the level of hotness starts at level 7 (not spicy), and counts down to level 1 (very spicy). I like to think that I have a pretty high threshold for spicy foods, but the 4 was spicy enough for me to realize that I did not need to go any further down the number scale on my future visits. So of course, on my next visit, I ordered the 3. I only managed 2 or 3 bites before I watched in defeat as my sad, full bowl of noodles was taken away from me and my boyfriend got in a few “I-told-you-so” gloating moments. That said, if you’re a fan of ramen, be sure to check out Orochon in Little Tokyo. But I warn you: tread lightly with that spice level. Sometimes, Man not stronger than food.