The Brief

Flash back to the pandemic, when everyone you knew made sourdough bread because all they had was time on their hands. That new obsession birthed a million loaves of bread.

There was a whole rabbit hole to fall into, including how to source a sourdough starter, the length of fermentation, consistency, taste and crumb. People began showing pictures of their home-grown loaves, and naming their sourdough starters as if they were their children.

Post-pandemic, it led to a new appreciation of something that had been under our noses for some time — the handful of L.A. bakeries making artisanal sourdough bread.

While you can get sourdough rolls in your local supermarket, commercially made bread often doesn't follow traditional sourdough baking methods, likely supplementing with yeast to get a quicker fermentation.

But other bakeries, like Lodge Bread, Clark Street Bakery, and Bub & Grandma's, have committed to the full-on, time-consuming process, taking at least two days to allow different tastes and textures to bubble up (literally). And now, it's spreading to other dough-centered foods, like pizza, as pizza makers experiment with techniques allowing the rise to take four to five days.

What is it about slow fermentation that has captured the attention of bakers and pizza makers? I spoke to some people leading this trend.

Something in the air

At Colossus, located in Long Beach and San Pedro (and soon to be Anaheim), Kristin Colazas Rodriguez has been slowly perfecting her recipe for naturally leavened sourdough loaves for over five years.

Colazas Rodriguez cultivated her bread-making style when working in the Bay Area in the early 2010s. There, she worked alongside ex-employees of Tartine Bakery, the famed bakery that started in San Francisco and built its reputation on slow-fermented sourdough bread. The technique fascinated Colazas Rodriguez, who brought it down to Long Beach and began making her own version of the bread, and selling it at local farmer markets before expanding to open Colossus.

The sourdough starter at Colossus, affectionately named Jesus, is the basis for their naturally leavened sourdough loaves.

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Kristin Colazas Rodriguez, owner of Colossus, taking time to prepare the naturally fermented dough.

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Her team starts each morning by making the dough, adding a portion of their starter, and allowing it to ferment at room temperature for five to six hours.

Kristen Colazas Rodriguez, owner and operator of Colossus Bread

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Then, it's time for cold fermentation, where the dough is put in the refrigerator overnight, slowing the fermentation process. This also forms lactic acid bacteria, which gives the dough its sour flavor.

After roughly 36 hours, the dough is finally ready to be baked into a stretchy, crunchy loaf of bread.

Her work is best exemplified by their country levain, a tangy, sliced sourdough loaf. Its large open crumb makes it perfect for a sandwich, or toast with butter and jam. For me, no other type of bread comes close.

Colazas Rodriguez's passion for sourdough isn't simply artisanal; she also feels it contributes to a healthy way of life.

"We can manipulate it, improve the nutritional quality of the starches and enzymes, and unlock its minerals," she said. "I don't think we would have a product that was as healthy if we were throwing in instant yeast, if we weren't correctly fermenting, and if we weren't long fermenting those grains."

A customer looks over the bakery case fulled with naturally leavened bread displayed at Colossus in Long Beach.

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The pizza dough whisperer

Chef Daniel Holzman, owner of DannyBoy's Famous Original Pizza inside the Wells Fargo building in downtown L.A., with another location in Westwood, makes acclaimed New York-style pizza.

But it comes with a twist. Instead of proofing the dough for a day, as is customary for New York style, Holzman, who has formal training as a chef, extends the fermentation for four or even five days. It's been somewhat controversial.

"I was told I was doing it wrong, and I've been consistently told we're doing it wrong," Holzman said.

Daniel Holzman of Danny Boy's Famous Original Pizza with his prized take on New York-style pizza

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Daniel Holzman of Danny Boy's Famous Original Pizza shows the gluten structure that's formed after the long fermentation process.

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Wrongness be damned, as plenty of customers (and I) discovered, the pizza he creates is buttery, flaky, soft and chewy. Holzman's pizza dough, however, doesn't use a sourdough starter. Instead, he uses commercial yeast for the long fermentation, even though it's typically used to speed up the fermentation process.

The yeast produces carbon dioxide, which allows the dough to rise and creates micro blisters, or bubbles, in the crust, similar to the bubbles in beer. This results in a crispy crust on the outside yet an airy, light texture on the inside. While that is happening, the formation of the gluten structure occurs, which gives the dough its elasticity and chewy quality.

As an illustration, Holzman recently made a viral social media video where he walks shows a series of proofing boxes containing furled pizza dough balls.

Each box holds dough at a different stage of the fermentation process. You can see the texture developing as he pokes his finger in each one. By the time he reaches day three, the dough is producing complex structures resembling spiderwebs. It's impressive to see, and not something you expect in traditional pizza.

A New York-style pepperoni pizza being sliced at Danny Boy's Famous Original Pizza in Westwood.

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He said part of the reason long-fermented New York-style pizza isn't more common is not a cooking issue; instead, it involves real estate. In New York, space is much more scarce, and access to large refrigeration areas is a challenge.

In less-cramped Los Angeles, Holzman was able to experiment before honing in on his now trademark style.

" We use the same ingredients and method that we would use in New York," he said. "Ultimately, we concluded that fermentation would be one thing we would extend."

Easier on the body

A little further down the road in Historic Filipinotown is Grá ('love' in Gaelic), founded by owner Michael McSharry. He's originally from Ireland, but was living in London, working in advertising, when he discovered he had a gluten intolerance.

" At that point, I had to stop eating pizza, bread, stop drinking beer, and all those kinds of carbs," he said.

But when he tried sourdough pizza, he discovered he could eat it and still feel OK.

Michael McSharry, the founder of Grá, during the fermentation process for his sourdough pizza.

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Michael McSharry of Grá turns his sough dough starter.

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While it's a bit of a grey area, scientifically speaking, it seems that some people with a gluten intolerance can eat sourdough bread. The long fermentation is theorized to help break down the gluten, making it easier to consume.

Fast-forward almost a decade to Los Angeles, where McSharry decided to open a restaurant focusing on sourdough pizza, natural wine and fermented foods.

McSharry described it as "food that not only tastes good, but nourishes the soul." He wanted his pizza to be as healthy as possible, which is where fermentation comes in.

As he prepared to finalize his menu for Grá, McSharry planned a last-minute trip to the famed Irish cooking school Ballymaloe Cookery School in County Cork. There, he studied under celebrity chef Darina Allen for a weekend course about fermentation.

Upon completing the course, he was given a sourdough starter as a parting gift, which he brought back to Los Angeles.

McSharry explains that his fermentation program at Grá takes approximately 40 hours, with the dough assembled in the morning and used for the following evening during their dinner service.

The dough is made from whole grain and 00 flour (a very finely milled Italian flour used in pizza and pasta).

" It took me a while to dial in the recipe, or should I say the principles behind the processes that exist within the pizza we have today", McSharry said.

In great detail, McSharry described all the elements of the process to get his sourdough just right, from the proofing stage to the temperature of the water and the oven. He recounted working 8-10 hours daily for over six months in his apartment before the restaurant opened, tweaking each element to achieve his desired result.

The Banger pizza at Grá made with tomato sauce, mozzarella, salami, ‘nduja, fermented mustard seeds, honey & basil

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Diners sit for dinner service inside of Grá

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After locking in his dough recipe, McSharry and his team decided to fire the pizza at 750 degrees inside a wood-burning oven.

" It's another element to this very natural process. So you're working with Mother Nature in the fermentation and then with Mother Nature with real fire, and it's exciting," McSharry added.

The sourdough pizza at Gra isn't particularly sour in flavor. Instead, it takes on a soft and chewy texture, similar to a Neapolitan-style pizza. This format works well with various topping combinations on the menu, as is the case with a couple of house favorites, such as The Banger ($27), made with salami, nduja, fermented mustard seeds, and honey, and their Kimchi Pizza ($27), which contains tomato kimchi sauce, gouda, buffalo mozzarella, green onions, and sesame seeds.

The punch of flavor and freshness brings home precisely what McSharry aims to achieve.

By including other fermented foods — kimchi and fermented mustard seeds — McSharry hopes to extend the notion that the natural process can be applied to different foods, not just sourdough.

While he runs a business, he believes fermented foods are an extension of a more global way of thinking.

" One of our main focuses is having good working relationships with the farmers and doing our little bit to save the planet, like with upcycling," McSharry said. "This is an important characteristic of maximizing the return."

Orange County’s biennial count of people experiencing homelessness starts on Tuesday.

Over the course of three days, volunteers will fan out across the county to determine how many people are experiencing homelessness so officials can decide what services are needed and keep track of changing demographics and trends.

Around 17,000 people in Orange County lost their housing and fell into homelessness in 2025, according to data from United to End Homelessness, a coalition of business, civic and political leaders.

The last point in time count in Orange County saw a spike of around 28% in the number of unhoused people, with around 7,300 people experiencing homelessness. Results for the point in time count usually come out in May.

This year’s count will be the first since the Supreme Court’s Grants Pass ruling in 2024 which made it illegal for unhoused people to camp on public properties even if they don’t have a place to sleep. Since then, Orange County cities like Newport Beach, Anaheim and Fullerton have ramped up anti-camping laws by making it illegal for people to lie down on park benches, sleep on sidewalks or even lay your bag down on the sidewalk. Late last year, the county also followed suit.

The count also comes as Orange County grapples with potential federal funding cuts and increased costs for homelessness programs.

If the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development cuts Continuum of Care funds, around 1,400 households will not have a home, Nishtha Mohendra, chief program officer for Families Forward, said at United to End Homelessness’ recent 2026 State of Homelessness.

“That would mean that we run the risk of having an even higher two-digit increased literal homelessness in our community. That has the ripple effect of everything that impacts our system,” she said.

How the count works

Volunteers, including service providers and law enforcement, will fan out from six locations over three days in the morning and evening. Tuesday is dedicated to central cities, including Santa Ana and Fountain Valley, Wednesday for the northern region and Thursday for the southern cities.

It’s still not too late to volunteer, with the county looking for people to take on different roles, including for set up and clean up. To learn more about how to get involved, click here.

In a major change in vaccine policy, the Trump administration recently dropped recommendations that all kids get six immunizations long considered routine. Instead, they're now in a category called "shared clinical decision-making."

That's when the patient (or the parents if the patient's a child) has a conversation with a health care provider to decide if a treatment is appropriate, says Wendy Parmet, who studies health care policy at Northeastern University in Boston.

"In theory, shared clinical decision-making sounds great," she says. But the approach is usually reserved for complicated medical decisions where the answer is often muddy, not for routine vaccines that have been clearly shown to be safe and effective.

Some examples include: Should someone get surgery or physical therapy for back pain? Which men need regular PSA prostate cancer testing?

But many doctors say there's no ambiguity when it comes to these vaccines, which protect against hepatitis A, hepatitis B, the flu, meningitis, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and rotavirus, a dangerous gastrointestinal infection.

"These vaccines have clear evidence of benefit for all children," says Jake Scott, an infectious disease researcher at Stanford University. "So moving them to shared decision-making doesn't reflect the scientific uncertainty that the category exists for. It manufactures this sort of uncertainty where no uncertainty really exists."

The problem with shared decision making in this context, is "you're suggesting that both options are equally valid," says Dr. Lainie Friedman Ross, a pediatrician and bioethicist at the University of Rochester School of Medicine. "And the fact is: Not getting vaccinated puts your own child at risk, puts you at risk and puts your community at risk. So it is not an equal decision."

Vaccine critics argue there's enough nuance about these immunizations to warrant moving them to the shared clinical decision-making category. And administration officials say the change is designed to restore trust in vaccines.

But Ross and others argue that dropping these vaccines to a lower spot in the new CDC vaccine hierarchy sows dangerous confusion and doubt, especially at a time when vaccine hesitancy is already on the rise and vaccination rates are already falling.

"It's a huge embarrassment for U.S. public health and a disaster for public trust, and most of all for children," says Dr. Douglas Opel, a professor of pediatrics at the Washington School of Medicine.

They also point out that doctors already routinely answer any questions parents may have, in addition to providing detailed handouts about each vaccine.

New hurdles to vaccine access

And there are many practical implications that could become hurdles to kids getting the shots, even if their parents do want them, Scott says. That includes deleting automatic electronic medical record alerts when shots are due and canceling standing orders for nurses and pharmacists to vaccinate kids without getting a doctor involved.

"Moving it from routinely recommended to shared clinical decision-making has a dramatic effect on the practical delivery of vaccination," Scott says.

And while the administration says the decision shouldn't affect whether government programs or private insurance pay for the immunizations, some legal experts say that may not be guaranteed.

"The administration says that there's not going to be insurance implications. But there are a number of problems there," says Dorit Reiss, who studies vaccine policies at UC Law San Francisco. "First of all they can change their interpretation later. Second, if a private insurer wanted to challenge this and say, 'This vaccine is no longer recommended. I don't have to cover it,' they probably have some good arguments."

Even with insurance, parents may now get hit with co-pays for those extra conversations with swamped pediatricians, according to Dr. Molly O'Shea, a Detroit-area pediatrician who serves as a spokesperson for the American Academy of Pediatrics.

"Before, if it was a vaccination that we didn't have to have a conversation about, we could feel safe allowing families to schedule a vaccine-only appointment," O'Shea says. "Because shared-decision making is required now, that takes time and that now is going to be billed for."

New liability concerns for drugmakers

Another big question is: Does this make vaccine makers and doctors vulnerable to getting sued? Many lawyers don't think so.

"On a legal standpoint, nothing has changed," says David Carney, a Philadelphia lawyer who's the president of the Vaccine Injured Petitioners Bar Association.

But some lawyers argue that the change does open the door to more litigation over vaccine injuries.

"The immunity under the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act of 1986 (the 1986 Act), which shields pharma and physicians from liability when vaccines cause serious harms and deaths, only applies to vaccines that are recommended for routine administration to children and/or pregnant women," Aaron Siri, managing partner at Siri & Glimstad, wrote in an email to NPR.

Siri is a close ally of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and has been extensively involved in litigation against federal agencies and vaccine manufacturers.

Some legal experts say that this uncertainty is alarming. Without liability protection, vaccines could become unavailable, says Parmet.

"We don't quite really know whether shared clinical decision-making will be considered as sufficient enough of a recommendation to provide the liability protection," Parmet says. "And if it doesn't do that, then there are real concerns about whether the manufacturers will continue to make vaccines."

A chilling effect on prescribers

Even if the change doesn't lead to an increase in successful lawsuits involving vaccines, just the possibility of lawsuits could be enough to intimidate doctors, some say.

"They're worried about stepping on a landmine if one thing goes wrong," Parmet says. "One kid gets sick. The next day — even if it has nothing to do with the vaccine — are they going to be the ones held responsible? And someone's going to say, 'You had the nurse do it without talking to the doctor?'"

That could make doctors hesitant to recommend these immunizations, which means imposing shared clinical decision-making could leave more kids more vulnerable to dangerous infections.

"I do think many physicians will be chilled in their behavior around recommending vaccination," says Michelle Mello, a professor of health policy and law at Stanford. "We've got this change now that plunges us into a situation of chaotic uncertainty."
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Long Beach Unified students returned to school Monday for their spring semester, but under a new policy, classrooms will be free of cellphones.

The district convened a working group of staff, educators, students, parents and caregivers in October 2024 to develop such a policy in response to a California law that requires schools to restrict student cellphone use by July 2026.

The district announced the policy in September, promising the rollout would begin this month.

How does the cellphone ban work?

Here are the basics:

• The policy applies to smartwatches, headphones and gaming consoles.
• Students in transitional kindergarten (TK) through eighth grade must turn off and store their devices when they arrive on campus until they leave, including before- and after-school programs. 
• High school students can use their devices during passing periods and at lunch. 
• Students can’t use their phones in restrooms or on field trips. 

There are exceptions. Students can use their phones:

• In case of an emergency.
• With administrator permission.
• At the direction of their doctor.
• If they have a disability and using their device is part of an individualized education program (IEP). 

Each school is responsible for creating a plan to implement the district-wide policy and individual teachers may use lockers or other methods to store students' phones.

The district’s policy prohibits specific types of cellphone and social media use, too:

• Cyberbullying on or off campus. 
• Recording or photographing fights, criminal behavior or another person without their permission. “We've had major problems with kids filming inappropriate things in the bathroom, with things like fights,” said Chris Itson, a program administrator in the district’s communications department, during a July 16 board meeting. “It's a motivator because it's ‘Now I can get attention by doing this online.’”
• Impersonating another person online. For example, creating a fake social media profile or posts that falsely represent another student. 

The policy also cites research that shows young people interact less often in-person than previous generations and that social media use can be linked to negative mental health outcomes, including anxiety and depression.

What we know about bans in other districts

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On Feb. 18, 2025, the Los Angeles Unified School District, the second largest public school district in the country, implemented an all-day cell phone ban for its students. Now that it’s the end of the school year, we head to Venice High School to see how the ban actually went.

Did the cellphone ban in LAUSD schools work?

On Feb. 18, 2025, the Los Angeles Unified School District, the second largest public school district in the country, implemented an all-day cell phone ban for its students. Now that it’s the end of the school year, we head to Venice High School to see how the ban actually went.

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