365 Places to Eat

The Magic Castle? For dinner?

Truth be told, the magic at the Magic Castle is on the stage, not so much in the kitchen.

However, when you visit the Magic Castle, you must make a reservation for dinner and spend at least $15 (before drinks). You shouldn’t have any trouble hitting the minimum charge, but you may be a little underwhelmed with what you get. I put it on par with banquet food at a hotel — edible, but not too remarkable.

But, don’t let that deter you from going to the Magic Castle. As campy and silly as it may seem, a night at the castle is a lot of fun.

After you have your dinner and are released to wander the castle, make sure that you get to the Close Up Room. It’s the smallest performance space and has the most amazing performances. My mind still spins from the tricks I saw there. No matter how hard you try to avoid the misdirection, you can’t keep up, so go with the magic and have fun.

One catch is that to get into the Magic Castle, you must be a member, accompany a member, or have a guest pass from a member. It seems like it used to be hard to find someone to give you guest passes, but now you can even find guest passes online from magicians like Mike Wong.

There are a few more rules (found here) about the strict dress code, $20 cover charge (in addition to dinner) and the 21+ age requirement for times other then Sunday brunch.

The Magic Castle
7001 Franklin Avenue
Hollywood, CA 90028
323-851-3313

Flaming Margarita (photo via El Compadre site)

“Waiter! My margarita is on fire!”

“Not to worry sir, you are just dining at El Compadre…”

El Compadre has every cliche going for it. Dark lighting with adobe decor, a mariachi band playing, located just east of the Sunset Strip, Americanized comfort Mexican food, and yes, FLAMING margaritas.

You would think that these are all reasons to avoid El Compadre, but for some reason, they manage to pull it off.

The decor is comforting and the dim lighting enhancing the fireballs coming from the bar.

The band is talented and it’s not so bad waiting for your table while listening to them.

The location seems to draw more locals than tourists and college students, although on a few occasions I have done from star spotting in the booths.

The food is fairly standard, but the menu is well executed when you want cheesy dishes with rice and beans on the side.

And then there are the drinks.

A flaming drink can often be the sign that the enjoyment ends when the fire dies out and the glass hits your lips. On the contrary, El Compadre’s margaritas are tasty and can pack a punch. It’s not the actual margarita on fire, but a small float of high potency liquor that feeds the flame.

The downsides of El Compadre are long waits and tight parking. We have been able to call ahead a couple times, but it didn’t really seem to help. The place gets packed, especially on weekend nights. It’s tough to seat larger parties, but it is fun to go with a lot of people because of the atmosphere.

El Compadre
7408 W Sunset Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90046
(323) 874-7924

My wife and I figured out that there are four places where we love having breakfast, and that we have a hard time branching out. One of those four places is Hugo’s in West Hollywood We go to Hugo’s the least out of our favorites, simply because of geography, but quality wise, it is one of the tops.

I’m not a creature of habit. When I go out to eat, I like to try different things. I’ve never thought it would be “cool” to be able to go into a place and order “the usual”. To me, that would mean going to the same place too often and ordering the same thing every time. Who wants that? Hugo’s, however, drives me to break my rules. I simply cannot go there and order anything except for the Desayuno Fuerte. Good god, just writing about it makes me crave it.

The Desayuno Fuerte has four basic ingredients. Starting at the bottom: potato pancakes, veggies, eggs and cheese. If only it were that simple, I would whip it up at home. Starting at the top. The cheese is fresh shreds of Parmesan, flavorful and robust. The eggs are two perfectly poached mini globes of goodness, with solid whites and runny motlen yolks. The veggies, a mix of spinach, tomatoes, onions and garlic are sauteed until slightly soft, but not mushy. The potato pancakes, well the potato pancakes are the very specific reason why this dish is so tasty. The first time I tried them, I thought that it was some sort of sausage patty. There was simply too much flavor to be tubers. In truth, well, they are potato pancakes, but the flavor and consistency is like no potato pancake I have had anywhere else. They are amazing, basically.

There are other options on the menu. Obviously. They used to have some great potato taquitos, but those aren’t always on the menu. Hugo’s also serves chilaquiles, although I will have to leave it to someone else to sample those.

In addition to the terrific food, Hugo’s has an extensive tea list. It was at Hugo’s where we learned that if you steep tea for about a minute then throw out the water, you can remove about 90% of the caffeine. It is for that reason that Hugo’s doesn’t serve non-herbal decaf tea.

Free two hour parking in the structure across the street from Hugo’s.

By the way, the other three in the top four? Jinky’s, Amandine and John O’Groats. Feel free to through darts at that list.

Other Hugo’s Write Ups (leave yours in the comments):

• Quarry Girl
• Snag Wire Media
• VegGuide
• Gourmet Pigs

Hugo’s Restaurant
8401 Santa Monica Blvd
West Hollywood, Ca 90069
323-654-3993