Republique and Bar Ama

I've been fancy as fuck lately and have been eating at places that don't have drive-thru's. Although, I would like to take this opportunity to challenge high-end restaurants to explore the idea of drive-thru's because I think the industry has underestimated just how many people want to eat things like bone marrow or escargot in their 2005 Prius'. Why should I be limited to eating chicken nuggets from my lap and/or center console, when I can enjoy a nice handheld tomahawk instead? The idea of  sitting in traffic, waving around a tomahawk and yelling at people from my car is so elegant to me. So please, to all the hoards of James Beard award-winning chefs that read this blog- you need to bulldoze the businesses next to your restaurants to accommodate room for a drive-thru if you want to maintain any sort of edge in this town. 

 So my friends and I went to Republique on La Brea the other night and we had one of the most arousing meals I've had in a long time. I make this claim around twice a week, mostly after any meal where I've consumed carbs, but this time I really mean it. Not just because dinner was expensive as shit, but because it tasted expensive as shit. We also saw Common and John Legend here, so that could have been the source of most of our arousal.

Escargots en Croute. Yes, bugs sitting in a hot bath of butter, parsley and garlic beneath a heap of pastry crust. If you come here, make sure you order this and use the butter concoction as a condiment for everything else. My friend opted to just take shots of it throughout dinner and barked like a dog whenever someone tried to pry it from her hands.

This is the Eggs on Toast, which is uni (sea urchin gonads) and scrambled eggs (scrambled chicken abortions). In a perfect world, this would be my daily breakfast and would be AVAILABLE AT A DRIVE-THRU. 

I would like to welcome foie gras back to California. I mean, I get why you left because I care about the well being of live ducks, but at the same time I suppose I don't because I ate this and seeing a roasted duck carcass hanging from a window in Chinatown results in me bartering in Cantonese and waving around a wad of cash. Basically, I'm sorry you're so delicious. Oh yeah, pour escargot butter on this. 

" I know things get hard
But girl you got it, girl you got it there you go
Can't you tell by how they looking at you everywhere you go
Wondering what's on your mind, it must be hard to be that fine,
When all these motherfuckas wanna waste your time
It's just amazing, girl, and all I can say is...

I'm so, I'm so, I'm so, I'm so,I'm so proud of you" 

- Drake on this Black Truffle Risotto 

IT ARRIVED WITH A FUCKING CHEESE SCROLL!! Like how regal do I gotta be to have cheese scroll announce my arrival!? 

Beef Short Ribs. This was so tender, all you need is a fork and spoon to pull it apart. In fact, we all just whispered encouraging words to it and it fell apart on it's own. 

Do yourself a favor and go here. I need to go back because I saw waiters carrying around charcuterie/cheese boards that were the size of ski's and I need to experience a cheese ski ASAP. 

For Valentines Day, Juls and I went to Bar Ama in DTLA because I'd been stalking it on the internet and sending him creepy e-mails about it for months because I thought it was necessary for him to get in touch with his Mexican heritage by eating here. I thought Valentines Day would be an opportune time for me to force this upon him, so I did. 

We actually started off with the puffy tacos, which were off the menu. My instincts were to shove them in my mouth whole as soon as they were placed on the table, so I didn't take a picture. SOOO GOOD.  Anyhow, here we have the Cauliflower & Cilantro Pesto, Pork Belly Chicharron and the Snake's Blood cocktail. 

The Seared Lengua. By far, my favorite lengua (cow tongue) that I've ever had in LA and that's saying something because lengua is my go-to taco meat whenever I visit any taco truck or table. And no, that is not a safe life choice. 

Everything went gorgeously together and hat's off to the waiter for stopping us from ordering a family sized portion of lamb in addition to all of this. I don't like to be told what to do, but I do like it when people are kind about calling me fat, saving me money and saving me from looking like this...