It was a year of triumph over adversity. It was a year of new beginnings and new late, late endings. It was a year of limber dancers revealed, of culinary legends unveiled…of regal cougars crowned. Fade with us into a dreamy flashback sequence involving the year's nine most enticing endeavors…
When Thomas Keller (or, as he is known to Francophile foodies, God) carved out a sprawling ode to oysters, Trout Amandine and wine in the Montage Beverly Hills, hungry locals wiped away tears of joy—and promptly made reservations for sometime in 2011.
It's not often you find yourself enjoying truffle season in the vicinity of models, English accents and Jane Fonda. Unless you're at the bright blue Cecconi's. Then it's just a Wednesday.
Even the walls are alive in this gleaming video-game-as-nightclub, where graphics and dancers and TV vampires all move to the same frenetic beat. Luckily, you can sometimes find naked people in the ceiling to help you relax.
When the women behind Lucques, A.O.C. and the Hungry Cat took to Brentwood, so did you—for pancakes in the morning, Persimmon Margaritas after work and wine-soaked dinners in the atrium under the right kind of glass ceiling.
The line between staying in and staying out got profoundly muddled when nightclubs and wine bars started looking an awful lot like your place. Then Mozza started with the takeout, minds were officially blown, and pizza parties were irrevocably altered.
On a deserted patch of tumbleweed-ish Downtown road, a very dark shrine to billiards, whiskey and Hunter S. Thompson (not necessarily in that order) emerged. Seriously, it's really dark inside.
Lithe women fussing with lingerie behind glass, or languorously stretching on the trapeze net overhead. A slowly undulating sax. Chairs made from well-worn headboards. This place has just one thing on its mind—Fontina-Chorizo Grilled Cheese Sandwiches.
Mad Hatter silhouettes, a rose garden, wildly inaccurate clocks—we'll go ahead and make a bold statement. This is the craziest nightspot inspired by a hallucinogenic Lewis Carroll novel we've ever seen in Hollywood. And you can quote us on that.
Deep inside a nondescript hotel, cougars took in a stirring keynote address on the state of cougardom, crowned a cougar queen and pounced upon brave young cubs on the dance floor. It also may have been the first convention no one left early.
