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NYC's Papaya King Looks to Reign in the West Coast with New Restaurants

West Coasters no longer have to trek to New York City for the oh-so-good hot dogs from Papaya King. The 80-year-old hot dog heavyweight chain plans to open a shop in Hollywood.

Papaya King Hollywood, which will be on Wilcox just south of Hollywood Boulevard, is scheduled to open in May. And we're loving its ad campaign, "We're 100% Natural, But We Think We'll Fit in L.A. Just Fine."

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Restaurant Week / Restaurant Travel / Los Angeles Restaurants / Food Travel / Los Angeles / → All Tags

dineLA Restaurant Week Turns Into Restaurant Month

Los Angeles foodies, cleanse your palates and rev up your digestive systems, because dineLA Restaurant Week is extending for yet one more week. Originally slated to run from October 4-9, it stretched through the 16th, and now through the 23rd. In that case, shouldn't it be called Restaurant Month? No matter, because the extension is to your benefit, giving local restaurant-goers the chance to sample some of the city's best eateries for a mere fraction of what it would normally cost to dine at them.

Here's how it works: Go online and take a look at the list of over 200 participating restaurants, choose where you'd like to eat, and make a reservation by calling them directly or via OpenTable. As a friendly tip, we suggest telling your maître d' and server upon arrival that you have joined them as a dineLA Week patron, for two important reasons: 1) You want to make sure that you're getting the adjusted rate, which ranges from $16-44, depending on which price tier of restaurant you choose, and whether you're eating at lunch or dinnertime, and 2) You can't just go about ordering whatever items you want. The restaurants have crafted special dineLA menus for the occasion—three courses of some of their chef's best.

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Cupcakes / Food Travel / Los Angeles / Food Trucks / Los Angeles Travel / Los Angeles Restaurants / → All Tags

Prepare For A Sugar Rush, LA; Magnolia Cupcakes Is On Its Way

Non-New Yorkers might be familiar with Magnolia Bakery because of a certain SNL Digital Short, where Andy Samberg claimed to love their cupcakes "like McAdams loves Gosling," not to mention that some scenes in Sex and The City took place just outside. Their baked goods are famous local lore, with lines of buttercream enthusiasts consistently snaking out the front door, even in the blistering cold of winter, even if personally we think they are a little dry to be so famous.

Los Angeles is no stranger to the maniacal cupcake trend; bakeries like Crumbs Bake Shop and Sprinkles (and now, the distinct, chocolate-hued Sprinkles truck) have been feeding the city's sugar-starved masses for years now, and while they've earned solid reps of their own, Magnolia has a certain unshakeable appeal. Well, sweets fiends rejoice, because on a recent stroll down West Third Street, we came across a sign announcing that the New York institution is fast on its way to the Left Coast.

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Food Truck BBQs Its Way Onto LA Weekly's 'Gold 99' Restaurant List

LA Weekly is every Angeleno's go-to guide for local news, legit entertainment reporting, and event listings. Like other weeklies, it can easily be found at any number of freestanding news kiosks, or piled high in front of trafficked restaurants. We're hesitant to admit it, but there's one useful piece of information that's stuck with us after watching reruns of perkier-than-thou Rachael Ray's food travel show $40 a Day: The local paper is a prime source for learning about a city.

Arguably, the Weekly's crown jewel is food critic Jonathan Gold's column, a helpful survey of the Los Angeles restaurant scene, from $5 pho to prix fixe dinner menus. Honored with a Pulitzer Prize for his writing, Gold is something of a local hero, so when his Gold 99 list of Essential LA Restaurants is released every year, copies of the Weekly seem to disappear from newsstands quicker than normal.

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High-Tech Restaurants / Technology Travel / Interactive Menus / Los Angeles Restaurants / → All Tags

We Love Geeky Restaurants, And LA Does Too

It might not be quite as spooky hi-tech as the interactive touch screen tables of Inamo restaurant in London, but the uWink restaurant in the touristy Hollywood and Highland Center of Los Angeles is still very geek-friendly.

When we first heard the name and knew there was a high-tech menu involved, we have to admit we were hoping that we just had to "wink" at the screen and our order would appear … you know, "you wink?" Unfortunately, winking interactive menus are still a thing of the future, and instead uWink has screens sticking out of your tables that you can use for a whole variety of purposes.

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Los Angeles Restaurants / New York Times / Los Angeles / → All Tags

A Writer's Escape to the Other LA

The image of a struggling writer at a dingy motel is a well-worn cliché. That of a writer housed at clean, wi-fi connected digs in LA's Koreatown is a little more fresh and is, as New York Times writer Dave Itzkoff tells us, a welcome change from the desperately posh hotels of Sunset Boulevard.

But even the most focused journalists need to leave the room sometimes. If you're in Koreatown, don't miss Tahoe BBQ on Wilshire Blvd. Bring a friend to this large, hall-style restaurant. Get a couple orders of samkyubsal (fatty pork), eat it ddukbossam style--wrapped in chewy rice cakes--and wash it down with a few shots of soju. Expect to pay about $15.

The next morning, get out of the neighborhood to have some delicious espresso at Intelligentsia in Silverlake. NYT says this cool, blue-and-white tiled joint has "the best cup of coffee in Los Angeles." Their signature Black Cat espresso is $2.

If inspiration is calling you towards the sea, the Library Alehouse in Santa Monica is your spot. Hammer out the last bits of your article before deadline, use the free wi-fi to send it in, and then relax in the back patio with a glass of high-gravity Belgian ale. At $7.50, sip slowly--or you might stumble into another cliché.

Related Stories:
· Checking In, Glamour Free [NYT]
· Los Angeles coverage [Jaunted]

[Photo: Clinton Steeds]

Restaurants / Celebs / Food / Los Angeles Restaurants / → All Tags

Ford's Filling Station

Ford's Filling Station in Culver City has made a lot of noise for several reasons. One, it's helmed by Harrison Ford's son Benjamin Ford and in Los Angeles, any venture related to a celebrity is hot for at least two weeks. Two, Ford (Ben, not Harrison) has gone the route of a gastropub, often found in New York and London and other cities with more authentic culture than LA.

The other month we popped in for lunch on a Thursday. Having had some bad luck trying to get dinner reservations, we thought we should at least check to see if we needed a reservation for lunch before arriving. After all, Tinseltown loves to lunch and with the Sony studios nearby, we didn't want to take any chances. Turns out, reservations are recommended for lunch and dinner.

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