443683 Sat Sep 22 02:09:16 -0700 2007 2 2 Los Angeles Area 0 2965373 I wasn't about to let the rain damper my Friday out, as I was planning a night of barhopping. She had happy hour with some of her friends in the Mid-City, so I started off my evening with a couple of drinks at The Hungry Cat. My drink of choice there is the pimlico, which is more or less a mint julep but more on the sour end than sweet. The person sitting next to me at the bar was polishing off her king crab leg. I remarked to her that I could use the mustard butter for toothpaste. After getting The Call, I met up with her and we walked over to Ritual, in the former White Lotus space. It's big and expansive and had some pretty ambitious things on the menu, but knowing that I had more ahead of me, we opted to just split a bunch of things. The two specialty rolls were a variant of a shrimp tempura roll which I quite liked, and then a variant of a rainbow roll which she liked. And while it clearly had a little too much rice wine vinegar in the mix, I thought the the halibut cut roll topped with caviar and gold flake was a nice touch. You still would have found me digging into the shiitake mushrooms. Hey, I'm as big a Sushi Zo fan as the next 'Hound, but I had a feeling that she wasn't interested in hearing it, having dressed up in black spaghetti straps and a plunging neckline with tall black heels and .... I need a glass of water. Back to Ritual. We also split an heirloom tomato caprese with arugula microgreens. I have to say that this dish carried with it quite a bit of finesse. It would have been really easy to slap something together, but there was great flavor and texture balance to the dish. To say the least, I was quite surprised how good this salad was. To round the whole thing out, we had the sweet potato fries, which were quite delicious. It was served in that same cone you'd find at, say, Whisper Lounge, and while not as good as Father's Office, it provided a pleasing kind-of guilty-pleasure aspect to the meal. At this point, it was still early, so we walked over to Bowery. My current favorite whiskey there is a bourbon called Wathens, but on this evening I opted to stay simple with a ketel tonic. She saw the dessert menu on the chalkboard and ordered us a slice of the banana creme rum pie. The pie itself had a nice texture (the theme of the evening, it seems, would be stiff peaks) and the rum was definitely present in the flavor but I thought it gave it added to the dish while she didn't like the alcohol taste. We wanted to duck next door to Magnolia, but we walked in, didn't "feel it" and walked right back out. That's a shame, because I know they've got good satay skewers. After she vetoed the Arclight bar, I vetoed the Charcoal bar. We then made our way to Citizen Smith. Normally, a non-rain-filled night, the back patio would be packed at this hour (10pm at this point) but we walked in and had great spots at the bar. We split an order of the slider trio. The bread on these little mini-burgers had a wonderful buttery-ness that complemented the meat well. CS is underrated food-wise, and I'm okay with that, because it's packed enough as it is simply for the bar scene. I'll come back some other evening to try their version of chicken and waffles. And rather than head to Beauty Bar or Velvet Margarita, we made it through the rain to Boulevard3, right next to Social. The drinks were only so-so, and I ended up only drinking Red Bulls all night, which is why I'm here writing this now. But I have a feeling this guarana-induced buzz will fade soon, so I'll finish up. If I had to do this barhopping trip again, I'd also include Los Balcones (and maybe some of those holes-in-the-wall on the corner of Fountain and Vine), Lucky Devil's and also Magnolia. I'd also try to not make it rain. Sat Sep 22 02:09:16 -0700 2007 50350 SauceSupreme 1 2965380 You should have gone to Hyde and tried the Kobe burger, and chocolate chip cookies!!! Sat Sep 22 03:11:36 -0700 2007 2965373 26854 Frank_Santa_Monica 2 2966016 The burger doesn't entice me, but cookies certainly do. Adding Hyde to the list... Sat Sep 22 11:01:42 -0700 2007 2965380 50350 SauceSupreme