Any fans of "Curb Your Enthusiasm" may have recently been intrigued by the mouth-watering Palestinian chicken dish featured in the July 24 episode. The chicken was so good, noted Larry David, that it could have ended the rift in the Middle East. As it was, throughout the episode the seemingly innocent piece of poultry found itself in the middle of fights, flings and covert liaisons. more ›

What began as an April Fools' Day prank meant to rib his LA Weekly photographer, restaurant critic Jonathan Gold wound up punking himself by sitting down to a review lunch at the Arcadia outpost of the megachain the Olive Garden. In today's "Counter Intelligence," column, Gold breaks down how he came to dine upon a "Tuscan" feast of lasagna and those famous doughy breadsticks. more ›

They're sort of the Oscars of the food world: The nominees for the 2011 James Beard Awards, which honor chefs, pastry chefs, restaurants, food writing, food personalities, and cookbooks from around the nation were announced today. Los Angeles makes a decent showing in the star-studded categories in which we were eligible. more ›

Last week the LA Weekly released Jonathan Gold's annual picks for his Essential 99 restaurants in Los Angeles. Though you can condense the multiple web pages into one printable list, or get your fingers good and inky with the paper itself, some intrepid diners have been using some web tools to make the endeavor to enjoy meals at all 99 spots more manageable. more ›

Today's LA Times includes an opinion piece by the LA Weekly's Jonathan Gold in defense of food trucks. Specifically in defense of the trucks as they face potential political foes such as Councilmen Paul Koretz and Tom La Bonge, both who have made waves--and enemies--for calling for tougher regulations or, in some cases, getting rid of them altogether. Recently, La Bonge proposed creating specific zones for truck parking. more ›

Los Angeles' foodie Twitterati went into a tailspin on Sunday when they caught Chicago-based Top Chef Master Rick Bayless dissing the city's favorite food writing son, Jonathan Gold in a Tweet: "@thejgold Thought a Pulitzer meant you checked facts. Sneering at me for something I never said is either mean or sloppy. I'm offended." more ›

This weekend LA Weekly provided an A+ collection of speakers and performers. The only thing missing was you. Where were you? Seriously, you could have called. LA Weekend had the misfortune of going up against the larger-than-life Silver Lake Jubilee, but the trek across town to hit both Saturday actually wasn't that bad. more ›

There are lists and lists and lists aplenty of where to eat in Los Angeles, many of the compiled by people considered to be the premier epicureans, culinary enthusiasts, and savvy eaters in the city. Not so much of a list but more of a curatorial effort is this evolving map of places you may have heard made mention on the KCRW airwaves during the weekly "Good Food" broadcast. more ›

Tonight and tomorrow LA Weekly will present two days of events "connecting politics, art, music, comedy, theater, film, food and books. The event includes film screenings, speaker panels, book signings and other activities. LA Weekly LA Weekend 2010 will take place at the beautiful art deco Saban Theater on Wilshire near La Cienega. Here are a few highlights. more ›

Pulitzer Prize-winning Jonathan Gold of LA Weekly today acknowledges that naming the best mac and cheese in L.A. is a battle between foodies, but he gives a big nod to Larkin's in Eagle Rock. And it's Larkin Mackie himself who recently opened a mac & cheese-dedicated restaurant in downtown which Gold visited: "It is superb drunk food — on weekends, Mac & Cheeza stays open until 2 a.m. And you get a shot at the classic banana-Nilla Wafer pudding from the recipe of Mackey's mom, an intense, thin custard that resolves into a divine containerful of sweet banana-spiked mush. Is this the mac 'n' cheese of the future? It might be." See LAist's photos of the eatery here. more ›

The annual James Beard Foundation Awards nominees have been announced, and Los Angeles has its typical modest representation among a large swath of categories that includes everything from food writing to restaurant design to TV food personalities to cooking. more ›

The sushi restaurant at the center of the controversy and investigation over selling whale meat leases its space from the city of Santa Monica, which announced last night that it will also investigate accusations that came to light yesterday. The Hump leases space from the city for its airport location and the contract includes termination if illegal activity is proved. The news came after Heal the Bay's Mark Gold e-mailed the City Council urging them to take action. He also notes that his brother, the famous Pulitizer Prize winning food critic Jonathan Gold, calls the place “gimmicky and weird." Jonathan explains that “restaurants resort to gimmicks generally because their chefs just aren’t very good,” more ›

"It was the longest I have ever waited for food in my life. And I'd do it again in a flash." That's LA Weekly's Pulitizer Prize winning food critic Jonathan Gold on last week's first annual L.A. Street Food Fest. It's about your personality, he says. "In my experience, you are either a festival guy or you are not..." more ›

When a restaurant has 20+ items on the menu and 30+ specials on the chalkboard, who goes to Lazy Ox and orders a burger? Although most people are there looking for the baco, the burger shouldn't be ignored. more ›

Forget "You are what you eat." What you want to be eating in L.A. is what the LA Weekly's Jonathan Gold is eating. And while you may clutch your fingerprint-smudged personally annotated copy of his 99 Restaurants annual list as you use your Google map make your way from taqueria to San Gabriel Valley strip mall to white linen tablecloth finery, one way to eat what the J. Gold eats is to get a ticket to The 2nd Annual Gold Standard Food & Wine Event, where you can sample food from an assemblage of chefs and restaurants curated by the Pulitzer Prize-winning critic himself. more ›

With the end of the year comes the inevitable wrap-ups, reflections, and predictions, and in the world of food this is no exception. Here in Los Angeles our Patron Saint of Dining Out, Pulitzer Prize-winning LA Weekly columnist Jonathan Gold, offers his take on the eating year that was in the LA Times' Opinion section today, noting how many high-profile restaurants our city has seen launch despite the tanked economy (Rivera, Drago Centro, Bouchon, and so forth) and the resurgence of the "tony cocktail bar." more ›

This week was a bleak one for those who love "see food"--as in the words and images of the 60-year-old magazine Gourmet, which will serve up its last meal in the November issue following a death notice from publisher Conde Nast. more ›

It's finally here! Tomorrow Union Station will be the site of "Jonathan Gold's Union Station Cocktail Party", which makes the name just perfect. The event is a benefit for Zócalo, "a non-profit organization that builds community by broadening access to civic discourse". Here is the third and final interview in our series with Jonathan Gold: more ›

This Saturday sees the much-anticipated benefit for Zócalo, "Jonathan Gold's Union Station Cocktail Party". Participating restaurants like Rivera and Providence, along with Cedd Moses' signature cocktail pairings makes for an exciting event. Here is part two of our three-part interview with Jonathan Gold: more ›

Rarely has an event caused as much buzz as the upcoming benefit for Zócalo. And who can resist? The restaurants are hand-picked by Jonathan Gold, LA's patron saint of good eats. Just check out a few of the participants -- Rivera! Perrier Jouet! Church & State! Providence! All this and one of the most beautiful locations in Los Angeles, art deco landmark Union Station. It definitely makes for a night to remember. How much would you pay? But wait! more ›

You've seen the list, you've double-counted and confirmed you're not crazy--it is 105, not just 99, and now you're ready to tackle the task: Eat at all of the restaurants selected by the LA Weekly's Pulitzer Prize-winning food writer Jonathan Gold as LA's essentials. The annual list--err, event for the foodie set--is still fairly hot off the presses, and for many means that no matter how many hot spots they've settled in for a fork, hand, spoon, chopstick, or mouthful, there's still plenty left to try. more ›

K-Town is getting its own food festival early next month and it looks like it could become a staple of LA's summer festival scene. How could grilled and smoked meats with magical flavors not be a hit? Details are slowly coming out for the event, set for August 8th, but here's what we know: Jonathan Gold and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa are confirmed to be cook-off judges. Confirmed restaurants include Beverly Soon Tofu, Byul Dae Po (Star BBQ), Ham Ji Park, Mu Dae Po, Park's BBQ, Seoul Jung, So Hyang, Soowon Galbi. There will be a food eating contest more ›

Four Los Angeles eateries received awards tonight at Dwell on Design honoring excellence in their design. The 4th annual 2009 Restaurant Design Awards presented by American Institute of Architects Los Angeles (AIA/LA) presented Bottega Louie and Chaya Downtown with top category jury prizes and The Conga Room with the lounge/nightclub award. The Lab Gastropub on USC's campus garnered the People's Choice award in the cafe/bar category. more ›

Pulitzer Prize winning food critic Jonathan Gold did not discover an unknown but extremely tasty mom and pop restaurant in a strip mall in one of his reviews this week, but instead headed to LA Live's Wolfgang Puck Bar & Grill. "To be honest, Wolfgang Puck Bar & Grill feels more like Puck’s restaurants in the Midwest or Las Vegas than it does like Spago: This is the export model, food in the crunchy, spicy, sprightly, smoky, slightly sweet groove he does so well," Gold writes. "He’s not making any breakthroughs here. But Puck, the Magic Johnson of chefs, perfected many of the tropes of new American cuisine, from the Mediterranean-Asian thing to hardwood grilling, from exotic pasta to rowdy herbal accents to wood-oven pizza, and there is a sheen, a professional presence to the cooking here — burgers, chops, sautéed Alaskan halibut and beet-burrata salad — that Puck always seems to execute more consistently than anyone else." more ›

The big media news today is that LA Weekly's Editor, Laurie Ochoa, is "parting ways" after eight years of leading the paper (she also worked there in various roles from 1978 to 1998). As that news hit, foodies were abuzz that is must be due to her husband, Pulitzer Prize winning food critic Jonathan Gold, being offered the Food Editor position at the New York Times. However, a source close to the matter at hand told LAist that Ochoa was fired and that Gold is staying. more ›

The Official Recession has enveloped us for seventeen official months. It’s still no reason we can’t enjoy life. This is LA -- we have a ton of inexpensive options! A Recession Obsession is truly fantastic, whether you've recently been downsized or are about to cash a large commission check. It's not just a "cheap eat." We last obsessed over ginormous Korean Dumplings in K*Town, and via a Taco Crawl in Highland Park. Today, we obsess... more ›

Thursday night 826LA presented a seminar titled, "Food Writing!" And as fans of punctuation know, anything with an exclamation point has got to be good. more ›

After Pultizer Prize winning food writer Jonathan Gold caused a flame war between the two cities this week, LA Weekly has now highlighted noteworthy comments made on LAist and SFist. Among those noted is Orange County native and SFist Editor Brock Keeling sneaking over to LAist and writing "pst, your burritos are secretly much, much better." more ›

Ever wonder what Anaheim tastes like? Tonight from 5:30-9:30 pm, the 14th Annual Taste of Anaheim takes place at the Gardenwalk on Katella. It’s an evening of music, wine and food -- from purveyors like Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, Naples Ristorante, Catal Restaurant & Uva Bar, Tortilla Jo's, Roy's Hawaiian Fusion Cuisine, Mr. Stox Restaurant, and Alcatraz Brewing Co. Tickets are $35-$40. more ›