While I've been eating curry for years, I had never experienced butter chicken until Great India Cafe. Saffron tomato and butter based curry? Sign me up! The best part is the online ordering and free delivery. Makes the garlic naan all that much more delicious when all you need to do is go to the door and pay the nice delivery man.

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In loving memory of one of our West LA favs, Orris, we wanted to give it a final farewell before it closed its doors to tapas styled food and ushered in a new age of generic pastas that would keep them in business (here's hoping they keep uni pasta on the menu).

I'm fairly sure that with 5.5 people at the table (a 2 year old was munching along where he could), we ordered half the menu, and as usual, everything was stunning. Highlights of the night go to snapper carpaccio with shallots and toasted almond slices, as well as Liberty duck breast with yuzu kosho on the side (since everything tastes better with yuzu kosho). Honorable mention goes to shrimp ravioli in mushroom reduction sauce.

Here's the special of the night, two slabs of seared foie gras with eggplant, with what tasted like a port wine reduction.

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DineLA is here! And with it comes the deliciousness of a bunch of restaurants with prix fixe meals. Our latest excursion took us to Cafe Bizou in Pasadena, one of the $26 options. Appetizer, entree and dessert, with the option to sub an entree or dessert for a glass of the house wine.

Appetizer: Lobster bisque. Incredibly rich and thick. Tasted just the right amount of seafood and just the right amount of cream. Good balance. Probably the best lobster bisque I've ever had.

Entree: Black tagliolini with lobster, scallops and prawns. Props for the huge chunks of seafood and clearly visible lobster claw meats! Maybe neutral points for the black pasta not tasting as "seafoody" as I expected from my previous experiences having black squid ink risottos. All in all still a highly recommended dish!

Of course I subbed out my dessert for a glass of the house wine, which wasn't too shabby.

All in all, good meal and highly recommended. Cafe Bizou never disappoints.

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Best dumplings in LA. The Shanghai Dumpling King pork dumplings are tastier, but spicy pork and shrimp wontons win here by a landslide. And they let you watch them make it!!

But really, I just come here despite the hour-long wait to order three trays of the juicy pork dumplings. So filling and delicious!

 

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For those of you who have not been fortunate enough to join us yet, this is tableside spring rolls at home. Proteins vary by week, but have included fresh shrimp, Kurobota pork belly, beef tongue, lamb, and pork jowls. Toss in some rice vermicelli and some lettuce, and you'd almost think it was a healthy meal!

P.S. Check out the marbling on that beef on the right! Courtesy of the Korean-owned Woori Market in Little Tokyo.

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Spring rolls for 6-8 people! This is a lunchtime special for those of you in the Garden Grove area looking for a nibble between your meetings. Excellent ambience, pretty good service, and unlike other Vietnamese restaurants, it has a full bar... ;)

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These Shanghai dumplings had a thin wrapper, but they just MIGHT have tasted better than Din Tai Fung... And check out the garlic stir fried green beans in the background! Yum!

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Truffle popcorn (from the La Folie-owned bar next door), foie gras mousse amuse bouche, raw egg yolk with pureed leek in an egg shell amuse bouche, seared foie gras with quince consomme (which quite frankly was a little on the sweet side), and butter poached lobster over a mushroom risotto with black truffle shavings. Michelin starred and fabulous! Everything tasted like heaven. Portions are a bit smaller and pricer than a few years ago when we first went (i.e. truffle shavings used to be $15 and they're now $30), but it's all still filling and worth the overall price tag.

A word of warning to all ye to dare: Go for the three course. Friends have also reported back that four courses of food is a LOT of food.

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