The Tasting Kitchen, sitting at the northeast end of Abbot Kinney in Venice, is decidedly Northwest in its approach. Many Portland and Seattle ex-pats staff both the front and back of the house and have created a quirky restaurant that brings the Pacific Northwest to Southern California.
The restaurant’s food has been favorably received by local critics S. Irene Virbila (LA Times) and Jonathan Gold (LA Weekly). Nancy Silverton drops it as one of her “go-to” restaurants in the city. It’s a popular stop among bartenders and chefs from all across the city, who can often be seen here hanging out after finishing their shifts.
Chef Casey Lane’s food is a delicious paradox: elevated without being pretentious, rustic without being sloppy. There’s an atmosphere of refined comfort here that fits the neighborhood ethos of Abbot Kinney perfectly. All the while, Chef Lane and Sous Chef Jesse Barber stay true to their craftsmen roots, butchering whole hog and lamb in-house.
Humble dishes like spaghetti will escape the eye of most visitors, but it’s indicative of the skill of the kitchen. Truly, all the pasta dishes shine, but there’s something almost jarring about how amazing the spaghetti or rigatoni preparations are.
Meat dishes excel as well, from the chicken wings, to the pate, to the pork rillettes.
A quick anecdote. One Friday night, the restaurant was as busy as always; standing room only at the bar. I was hunkered over on my stool with a drink and a plate of the Tasting Kitchen chicken wings, cooked in apple cider. A gentleman apologized for reaching over me to grab his drink. I replied as I continued to chow down on the wings, “Aw man there ain’t nothing bothering me right now.”
While the chicken wings, sweet and sticky, satisfy a carnal desire, there’s another dish that is simply divine. The prosciutto platter offers a globe of burrata as an add-on. It’s there, on the menu, quick to be overlooked even by the most studious eyes. But to taste it, that burrata, O! what a revelation. Never did I think that a simple piece of dairy could be sublime. How can I have more of this? Do they sell it to go? I would brush my teeth with the stuff!
“There ain’t nothing bothering me right now.”
However, my connection to the restaurant was with Tasting Kitchen’s bar, led by Justin Pike. As a former employee of Clyde Common, I’ve had the pleasure of sitting at his bar on multiple occasion, and it’s with great pride that I’ve been able to showcase Portland-style bartending to my LA friends like Dylan and Jeni. I also love to refer to The Tasting Kitchen as a “Portland ex-pat bar”, and I often bring visiting Portlanders here as well.
The cocktails here extend beyond the usual Milk & Honey canon that many of the current generation of LA cocktail bars extoll. Oregon, as a liquor-controlled state, has a much more limited supply of many base spirits compared to California. Recipe development, then, centered around the usage of bitters and amari to add complexity. The result is an approach to cocktails that is less driven by the base spirit, but moreso by herbal and bittering agents. A perfect example would be The Rotten Scoundrel cocktail, combining Aquavit, Bonal and Chartreuse.
Luckily, more Los Angeles bars are steering in this direction as well, most notably Rivera in Downtown. The Tasting Kitchen, however, still remains the epicenter for the amaro-based cocktail scene in Los Angeles.
Of course, the classics are well represented here, and The Tasting Kitchen has succeeded in bringing those drinks to trendy Abbot Kinney. Customers have embraced it: on a recent Friday night, I witnessed more people at the bar ordering Remember The Maines than vodka crans! For that alone, The Tasting Kitchen deserves commendation.
One might struggle to perfectly peg The Tasting Kitchen. Is it Italian? Is it a gastropub? Should I have wine? Should I have cocktails? Small plates? Pasta? Do I try and get the off-menu burger? Is it casual or fine dining? Rather than attempt to categorize this restaurant, it’s best enjoyed as a wonderfully composed whole. The elements combine seamlessly to make a unique Los Angeles experience.
Addendum
GQ’s Alan Richman just named The Tasting Kitchen one of the best new restaurants in America.
Further Addendum
Bar manager Justin Pike has been named LA’s best bartender. Here’s my video of him during the competition:
