Lou on Vine

[essentialsaltes]

Last night, we went out with DebKev to Lou on Vine, which is fortuitously walking distance from their place. From the outside, you would not expect much, located as it is in a strip mall. As the website notes, "Yep, that's us, right next door to the fluff and fold." However, with the use of thick draperies across the entire storefront, you quickly forget that and find yourself in a snug little restaurant/wine bar.
dark_of_night had chosen Lou because they prepare the top-secret food product & we wanted to compare it to our own effort. To our mingled consternation/delight, our own first effort was superior to Lou's.

The cheese plate, however, was really excellent. Five fancy-schmancy artisanal cheese. I'm not a fan of runny, stinky or bleu cheeses, but I managed to enjoy at least a taste of all but the bleuiest bleu. Two I think were from Cowgirl Creamery, and the St. Pat, wrapped in nettles, was really interesting, albeit just at the edge of my stinky/funky threshhold.

We each had a different entree, and they all looked beautiful. Portions are modest, prices are immodest, but it's clear that primo ingredients went into everything, and it was all prepared to perfection.

And then, of course, there's the wine. They offer it by the bottle, by the glass, and by the taste, which really amounts to about a small glass of wine -- not at all insignificant. Our semi-hosts having plied us with a tasty cocktail as an aperitif before we strolled to the restaurant, I didn't go all out on wines, but managed to pick a couple, and share a few tastes of other people's selections. I will still credit myself (through no virtue of my own) with the most interesting find of the night, the Timorasso from Vigneti Massa. Evidently Walter Massa rescued this Italian grape from obscurity. Very fresh, with some mineral tartness. Went great with the cheeses.

For supper, I had the chorizo and lentils with fried egg on top. The chorizo was amazing: spicy and firm and tasty, and I don't want to know what went into it. I kept things in 'Spain' with a wine that was a blend of tempranillo and (I think) grenache. Usually, I like meat with a spicy wine, but this meat was so spicy, that no wine couldn't possibly win, and was instead a refreshing unspicy to go with the meal.

We staggered back to the DebKev homestead for fresh-baked cookies, muscat, and mock-acrimonious discourse on politics, religion and the foibles of common acquaintances. All told, a great evening!

Comments

[dogofthefuture.livejournal.com]

Lou is... pretty much walking distance from our place as well. A bit of a hoof, but still walking distance. We were still lucky enough to drive and score parking in the actual mini-mall.

Curiously, I used to eat lunch at Flaming Patty's (more or less next door to Lou, or at least in the same mini-mall) almost every day when I worked at Paramount Pictures. (Because I was largely broke, and Flaming Patty's offered a five-dollar cheeseburger, fries, and coleslaw special which filled me up enough that I didn't need a big dinner when I got home to Tujunga.)

Anyway, back in those days, that space was a video store.