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tater tots

Astro Doughnuts

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Astro Doughnuts

After four years of success in Washington, DC and Virginia, Astro Doughnuts & Fried Chicken opens its first West Coast location on April 5, 2017 in Downtown Los Angeles at 516 W, 6th Street, between Olive and Grand, bringing its seasonal and creative menu to a town that is notoriously in love with doughnuts.

A casual yet refined take on two comfort food classics – fried chicken and doughnuts – Astro’s unique cuisine has had loyal customers lining up around the block for years. The menu features an evolving array of seasonal doughnuts, creative takes on fried chicken, unique side dishes and specialty doughnut sandwiches. Sourcing only the finest ingredients, Astro’s menu evolves based on the freshest fruit and produce available from local farmers and purveyors. Astro’s crème brûlée doughnut has been named one of 40 “Must-Try Dishes” by The Washington Post, one of the “best fried chicken restaurants in America” by TimeOut, one of the “Best Doughnuts in DC” and “Best Donut Shops in America” by Thrillist, one of the “Hottest Doughnut Shops in America” by Eater and “The Best Southern-Style Fried Chicken in Washington, DC” by Serious Eats.

Fried Chicken Sandwich with Bacon, BBQ Sauce, with a potato roll.

The beauty slice in half.

Los Angeles, CA

516 W 6th Street Los Angeles, CA 90014

213-622-7876

Hours:
Monday - Friday:                 7:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m. 
Saturday:                               7:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Sunday:                                  9:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m.

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Chicken or the Egg - Playa Vista

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Chicken or the Egg - Playa Vista

Have you been to Playa Vista? It's almost like the pretty step sister to Culver City. The area is a newer development with tons of new condos/townhomes and big businesses like Google, Youtube and Fox. I came through this area when stopping by "Chicken or the Egg" and I am definitely glad I did because now, this neighborhood is going to be one of my few weekend stops. 

 

Going back to Chicken or the Egg, like the neighborhood, this restaurant is also new in town. Their chef and partner, Hunter Pritchett, was also involved with a few known restaurants of Los Angeles, Song of a Gun and Mendocino Farms. At CoE, they take high importance of the quality of the chicken they use. From their menu, they are proud to use Pitman Farms Marys Organic Free-Range chicken and noted that it is the highest quality chicken in the world. The eggs used are also sourced locally from Chino Valley Ranch just east of Oxnard. They are organic cage-free vegetarian fed. Their chickens are also gluten free. 

Here is a glimpse of their menu:

They have an awesome soft drink selections. From soda pops or ice teas and lemonade for you to customize your drinks like this arnold palmer.

12150 Millennium Drive, Suite 101 Los Angeles CA 90094

 

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The Counter Burger - Pasadena

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The Counter Burger - Pasadena

I've been going to The Counter Burger for over 7 years now. I would also add that it was my first gourmet burger I've ever had. Now that I work up the street on Lake Avenue in Pasadena, The Counter is literally within my reach whenever I want it. It's crazy. And I've been on this burger diet last year where all I ate was mostly that. I'm not sure if it was a phase. But I think it's just all the people telling me how crazy I was to eat burgers constantly. Get this straight. There is no judge zones when it comes to eating. If I want a damn burger, I will get me a damn burger!

Their new menu no longer comes in a binder. It is now as you can see, a laminate menu printed on both sides. The build your own burger is still available, but they cut down on the ingredients that were available to make the building less complicated, and more realistic. Like really, do you really need 10 items on your burger? Might as well go down the street to Souplantation if you just want to fill your cup. Make it quick, make it simple.

The Counter Burger has other locations, please click "Here" to find one near you.

Tater Tots with Pimento Cheese and BACON

If you've never had Pimento Cheese, obviously you need to try it. But to have it served with tater tots becomes a whole new ball game. You definitely want to eat these with a fork to get the biggest bite possible. Portions are great to share.

Sweet Sriracha Chicken Wings

The first bite is sweet, spicy, and tangy. The heat will slowly creep up. And next thing you know it, you are craving for the next one. It's not as spicy as you think they'll be, but they do pack a good punch of flavor in each bite. Don't worry about napkins. It's all finger licking and sucking at this point.

Crab Encounter

This item is also on their new menu. Monster lump crab meat, diced eggs, bacon over bacon, roasted red peppers, green onions and spring mix to make you feel better about yourself. Served with a honey mustard dressing, but of course you can always ask for something else. This was $18, but well worth it. I'll say it again, HUGE lumps of crab. I also loved the diced eggs and tomatoes. This was very fun to eat.

Southern Fried Chicken

They put the chicken in a buttermilk brine. Served with jalapeno jack, tomatoes, sliced Jalapenos, coleslaw, honey dijon all sandwiched between a brioche bun. Jalapenos are frightening. There are days where it wouldn't do much, but there are days it will totally destroy my stomach and bottom after a few hours. This was spicy when I had it, just the way I like it. If you want to give it a spicier punch, ask them for buffalo sauce or something instead of honey mustard. A bleu cheese dressing sounds delicious too.

Last but not least, 2 milkshakes to put out the butt fire. Strawberry Banana and Nutella. YUM. I love milkshakes. They really do make me feel like a kid because we didn't grow up drinking these. So to have it was definitely a treat.

There are also a few new items on their menu. Feel free to ask the staff about them.

Pasadena:

140 Shoppers Lane, Pasadena CA 91101

 

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Top Round Roast Beef - Los Angeles

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Top Round Roast Beef - Los Angeles

1000 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90019

1000 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90019

On the corner of La Brea and Olympic, you will find Top Round.

I've seen this place when I used to work in BH. The restaurant really has an old fashion feel to it. Kind of like a hipper Johnny Rockets with a spazzle of Big Boy. I dig it.

I, like many of you, grew up eating roast beef sandwiches from Philippe the Original French Dipped Sandwiches in Chinatown. Top Round carries the delicious roast beef sandwiches, and others, with a twist.

Pulling up to the shack, you will find plenty of parking spaces. Not sure how packed it gets during the busy lunch hour, but it was fairly empty in the morning. We were recommended to try their breakfast sandwiches aside from their regular roast beef sandwiches.

As you wait for your sandwiches, you should get your sauces ready. I also like how they have spicy mustard and horseradish as condiments.

Tots with liquid gold. Words can't describe how guilty and awfully delicious these things were. I would come here just for this. Top Rounds has got it right so far with the hangover cure. Crunch tots and thick ooey gooey cheese sauce.

The classic with bacon

The classic with bacon

This English muffin breakfast sandwich has everything that you crave at McDonalds, but better. And real. You get your bacon, your fried egg, and their awesome Wizz sauce that is better than anything you can imagine. No need for napkins. There will be plenty of finger lickin'.

Served with a sesame bun, this little breakfast BLT is more comforting that it sounds. I'm not sure what made this so special, but it was pretty freaking tasty. Maybe it's just a golden rule to have bacon, eggs and avocados in everything. But for some strange reason, I really enjoyed the tomatoes, lettuce and mayonnaise. The flavors brought me back to when I was a child and road tripping through Mexico. Don't ask. The price was a little steep at over $8.

Steak and Eggs? How about more wizz sauce. GOLD I tell you! So this was the first bite of the roast beef. Absolutely bangers. Extremely tender 10 hours roast beef that will definitely catch you off guard. I didn't know what to expect. But this, some spicy mustard and a dash of horseradish? Just skip your plans for the rest of the day because you would want to stay right here.

Dagwood beef is the ultimate hangover cure. Roast beef, fried egg, fried tots, and provolone cheese inside an onion bun. Just add wizz sauce for an extra $1. WHY THE HECK NOT. Trust me it's some good sh*t. It's downright dirty and I love it. This is your ultimate cheat food. And they nail the fried stuff out of town.

 

Recommend this place STAT. Must order their roast beef, tator tots, and wizz sauce on everything.

1000 S. La Brea Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90019

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Dog Haus - Pasadena

My aunt Betty and cousin Celia were visiting from San Francisco this weekend to take care of some things. My aunt recently moved to San Francisco a year ago for her retirement, and to be closer to her daughters as well as her new born granddaughter.

To save this story for my next post, we were in queue as to when we were going to have dinner, so my dad told us to eat a snack first and dinner will be later around 7 - 8pm. This was around 3 close to 4 when he told me. John and I were done with the gym, and yea we were pretty hungry.

And that's where our post workout meal landed us at Dog Haus in Pasadena.

It was my first time here. John used to come with Brad, his best friend, that left us to Arizona (what a jerk right?). So now, John took me. I realized they used Hawaiin Kings roll instead of your American white logs, and they also have tater tots as an option for a side. Without getting too excited, I just wanted to stick with the classic downtown dog. John got a little leaguer, and we shared an order of tater tots and soda pop.

That looks pretty fantastic doesn't it? And a total failure to what a snack should be. Just imagine how full we felt afterwards.

This was my Downtown Dog. It consisted of a smoked bacon wrapped dog, caramelized onions, roasted bell peppers, mayo, mustard and ketchup. There was a few things I wished. One, was I couldn't unfortunately taste the bacon and wished the roasted peppers weren't so wilted that the only texture came from the dog. Other than that, I did enjoy the crispy toasty Hawaiin roll and the perfect combination of everything else.

Little Leaguer

Ok. I only looked passed this because there was "Little" in the name, and I was not looking for something little as a snack considering how hungry I was. If I actually read the description of " haus chili, fritos, shredded cheddar, diced onions" I would've ordered this in a HEARTBEAT. This was a pretty good dog. I wished the fritos had a stronger corn chip flavor due to it being slightly stale, but I still liked this better than the Downtown dog. I would order this again. I am the hugest sucker for Chili cheese. HUGE.

Tater Tots

Fried-to-perfect. Each one very extremely crispy with a piping hot center. Next time, I'm going to order these with Chili cheese.. because everything should have chili cheese... everything...

So there you go, a quick post workout meal after LA Fitness in Hastings Ranch. We always tend to find something to eat or going towards Pasadena because that's where the food is closest. Dinner ended up being at 7:30pm... so we were pretty screwed..

But in my genes, our family will eat no matter if we are hungry or full. Just wait and see later what we ate.

Enjoy a fantastic Sunday! I'm off to the Race tracks to celebrate a dear friend of mine's birthday today, Patrick Yorba. If I come home still standing from the champagne and endless shrimp cocktails, be ready to see my Chinese meal with my family.

Cheers!

Daiisies

 

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