Fallout from the massive Westland/Hallmark meat recall scandal continues to affect Southland restaurants, stretching from San Diego to Ventura County. The California Department of Public Health has released a document listing every food purveyor which has purchased the recalled beef -- and at 59+ pages, it's a doozy. Chances are very good you have purchased or ingested some of Westland/Hallmark's product at some point, since markets and restaurants across the city are represented. My......

Increasingly free of gang violence, it may be getting safer to walk the streets of Watts, the Daily News reports. Homicides in the area have dropped from 24 in 2006 to just 11 last year and many residents are pinning hopes for further neighborhood revitalization on economic opportunities. Hey Magic Johnson, that's your cue! A man died last night after sliding down an escalator at the Hollywood Highland shopping pit of hell today. Apparently......

a writer's perspective It’s hard to believe that this is already Week Seven of the strike. No one’s talking about ruining Christmas anymore. They’re just talking about how they’re going to celebrate. (lots of eggnog and homemade gifts) After a much needed sabbatical, I was back on the picket line for the last day of marching before the Holiday break. To commemorate the occasion, I sign up for a marathon walk/picket organized by a......

We couldn't do a proper tribute to Late Night Eats in Los Angeles without a visit to the original Late Night Eats establishment, the one that started it all, the restaurant that embodies the very essence of car-hopping, car-worshiping SoCal burger culture: Bob's Big Boy. The Big Boy Burger was born in Glendale in 1936, the brainchild of Bob Wian (I know, the alliteration is getting a bit much for me too); the Burbank branch......

Back on April 30, 2006 the Dodgers played the Pads in San Diego leading 5-0 going into the bottom of the ninth. Lance Carter comes out to pitch for the Dodgers and loaded the bases by giving up two singles and a walk with no outs. The Dodger’s then-closer Danys Baez tried to get out of the jam but gave up a single, two walks and two sacrifices to tie the game up 5-5.......

I love manager ejections. I love it when the manager gets up in the ump’s grill and lets him have it. With that said, it seems to me that Grady Little has the tamest ejections in the history of baseball (click on the appropriate linky for a video of the ejection). More on baseball meltdowns later. A serious cause of concern came in the bottom on the ninth in Sunday’s 5-4 win against the......

Cafeterias are so much more than Jell-O and hair nets. And the Southern California Restaurant Historical Society is going to prove it to you. Its fourth event -- a “Salute to Cafeterias!” – will be held at Clifton's Cafeteria in Downtown Los Angeles on Saturday (May 26) at 10 AM. Guest speakers include: >> D.J. Waldie, author of Holy Land: A Suburban Memoir, who’ll discuss postwar dining in Lakewood (the prototypical suburb), >> Charles......

I was really reluctant to go to the game Tuesday night. For starters I’m typing this in my new living room where boxes of books and junk are stacked up next to me awaiting a new home. I have thawed chicken in the fridge that waiting to be part of pad thai that I’ve been wanting to cook. And after watching the horror that was Monday night’s game, you can understand my reluctance. In......

Today KPCC featured the man behind the website Los Angeles Time Machines. Despite its archaic design, it's a great resource for restaurants and bars across the southland that are still operating in, basically, their vintage state. Canter's. Clifton's. Casa Bianca. Cicada. If you're familiar with these restaurants — a deli, a cafeteria, a pizza joint, fancy French — you'll notice the cuisine is all over the place. But for this site, whose proprietor is......

We're glad the weekend has done that wondrous, clock-work thing again by showing up just when we need it to. Years ago, when weekends meant early shifts at undesirable jobs, or, maybe worse, late night shifts at even less desirable jobs, we didn't feel the love for the weekend. But we're one of the Monday-Friday work week folk, and weekends are about rest, fun, friends, and, more often than not, food. When we were......