What's the food culture in Los Angeles?

LA doesn't have a food district. It has about 30 of them, spread across 500 square miles, and you need a car to eat well. That's the first honest thing to say. The second is that the best meals in this city tend to cost under $15 and arrive on paper plates. The San Gabriel Valley, a string of suburbs east of Pasadena along the 10 freeway, holds what might be the strongest concentration of regional Chinese cooking in the Western Hemisphere. Din Tai Fung's original US location opened in Arcadia in 2000, but the real finds are the Sichuan spots on Valley Boulevard in Alhambra and the hand-pulled noodle shops in San Gabriel proper. Chengdu Taste on Las Tunas Drive does a boiled fish in chili oil that smells like toasted Sichuan peppercorn from the parking lot. Expect a 45-minute wait on weekends. No reservations.

East LA and Boyle Heights run on Mexican food that predates the taco-truck trend by decades. Mariscos Jalisco, a truck parked on Olympic Boulevard near Breed Street since 2001, sells shrimp tacos dorados for $3.50 each. The tortilla is fried crisp, the shrimp is butterflied and still hot enough to steam when you bite through. Guisados in Boyle Heights does braised-meat tacos on handmade corn tortillas, 6 for around $18. The mole negro is thick and bitter-chocolate dark. For birria, the weekend-only stands on Cesar Chavez Avenue set up around 7am and sell out by noon. That sell-out time is real. South LA holds Oaxacan tlayuda vendors and Belizean stew spots along Central Avenue that most food guides skip entirely. Some of the most interesting cooking in the city is happening on those blocks right now.

Koreatown sits between Western Avenue and Vermont Avenue, roughly 3rd Street to Olympic Boulevard. It runs late. Kang Ho-dong Baekjeong on 6th Street packs in crowds past midnight for galbi and pork belly grilled tableside over charcoal. The ventilation hoods roar and your clothes will smell like rendered beef fat for days. A meal for two with banchan and soju runs $60-80. Worth noting, the strip malls on Western between Wilshire and 8th tend to hide the better Korean cooking. Sun Nong Dan does a galbi-jjim, a braised short rib stew that arrives still bubbling in a stone pot, the sauce sticky-sweet with soy and sesame. Thai Town occupies a 6-block stretch of Hollywood Boulevard east of Western Avenue. Jitlada on Sunset Boulevard has been doing southern Thai curls of heat since 1979. The crying tiger beef is smoky and searing. Night + Market on Sunset does a lighter, more wine-friendly version of Thai food, and it's good, but Jitlada is the one worth the drive.

The breakfast burrito is LA's actual civic food. Not the avocado toast. A good one is eggs, potato, cheese, and salsa in a flour tortilla, $5-7, from a window counter or a truck. Lucky Boy in Pasadena has been making them since 1974. The one at Tacos Villa Corona in Atwater Village weighs close to a pound. For food safety, LA County's restaurant grading system has posted letter grades on the front window of every restaurant since 1998. An A grade requires a score of 90 or above on the health inspection (sourced from LA County Department of Public Health). The taco trucks carry permits and get inspected on the same schedule, so street-food anxiety is misplaced here. Dinner reservations at places like Bestia in the Arts District or Republique on La Brea need to be booked 2-3 weeks out on Resy or OpenTable. No phone calls, everything is online. Late night is better than most American cities. Koreatown stays open past 1am. Hodori on Vermont Avenue does 24-hour Korean comfort food, and the taco trucks on Olympic Boulevard pick up after midnight.