I finally have some perspective on Los Angeles, having lived here for several years and grown to love the place more than anywhere else we’ve put down roots.
Everything the naysayers complain about is true of course- the appalling traffic, the dirty brown bathtub rim on the horizon on a bad air day, the above average number of the shallow and vacuous, the lack of proper seasons and the constant feeling of living on the edge of one catastrophe or another- brushfires, mudslides, or earthquakes. But for me these clichés are only a small part of the story.
I first visited in 1982 when the former governor of California Ronald Reagan was President, the Hollywood sign had only recently been rebuilt by a consortium of one percenters led by Hugh Hefner, Universal Studios had a brand-new scary attraction called ‘Jaws’ and the Los Angeles river had recently overflowed its levees. Sent there as a glorified courier by the London ad agency where I was a trainee, my one and only job was to pick up a can of film from Warner Bros Animation Studios; the master print of a 30 second commercial featuring Sylvester and Tweetie Pie, for of all things, a canned Spaghetti brand.
Friz Freleng, who created these characters as well as other Looney Tunes stalwarts like Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig and Yosemite Sam, to whom he bore more than a passing resemblance, generously spent a couple of hours with me at his drawing board patiently explaining how these cartoons were created and gave me an animation cell from the commercial as a memento to take home.
Back then the population of Greater LA was a (mere) 7 and a half million people, but even then the sprawl as we flew in over the city (and I looked down for the first time at all the little patches of blue in people’s back yards), seemed to go on forever. These days, it’s even more impossible as a visitor to get your mind around this ever-expanding collection of neighborhoods and cities (over 30 cities with a population of just over 13 million when I last checked), united under the label of Greater Los Angeles, which are glued haphazardly together by a freeway system that doesn’t work and a public transport system that despite recent efforts, is still sadly lacking. But when the initial shock is over after you move here, pick a neighborhood, put down some roots and get behind the wheel of your own car, the possibilities of this place for anyone with a sense of adventure start to become clear.
If you love sport this is one of the only places in the world where you really can ski in the morning and surf in the afternoon in temperatures that are appropriate for both activities.
If you love to hike or mountain bike this is the only major city that I’ve ever been to with the exception of Hong Kong, that contains genuine wilderness areas within its limits. But most important of all, if you’re the kind of person whose sense of adventure lies on a plate there are arguably more food adventures to be had here than any place in the world.
Even after years of exploring the restaurants, ethnic food stores and diverse cultural experiences of this heteropolis, we have hardly scratched the surface of its possibilities. Like Chinese food? Don’t feel confined to the usual quartet of Taiwanese, Mandarin, Cantonese, and Szechuan eateries. Here you can just as easily find Uighur, Hakka, Shanghai, or Hunan dishes or pick up the appropriate ingredients to make them yourself at home. Feel like a Chinese, Filipino or Vietnamese massage after you’ve eaten in the appropriate restaurant? Chances are there’ll be a place a few doors down in the same strip mall. We were regular visitors to Little Saigon in Garden Grove for bowls of Pho (a dish I’d never eaten before moving to LA), followed by a relaxing foot massage- it’s an unbeatable combination, take it from me.
Beef Pho: Serves Four
I first enjoyed this dish in one of the many Vietnamese eateries in Sydney’s Campbelltown but had never made it at home until we moved to LA and Marco and my daughter also fell in love with it. There are many different versions, but the classic is probably beef and tripe. This recipe is for people who don’t want to spend hours making their own beef stock.
For the stock
1½ pints beef stock made from beef bouillon
2 inch piece of ginger sliced
1 small onion cut in half leaving the skin on then charred
2 whole star anise
1 cinnamon stick
1 tablespoon of fish sauce
1 whole clove
1 tablespoon of sugar
1lb of dried vermicelli, soaked in warm water
8 sprigs of cilantro, roughly chopped
2 sprigs of Thai basil
Large handful of bean sprouts
Fish sauce to taste
½ lb beef tripe
4 oz rump steak, thinly sliced
2-3 red or green chilis, cut into rings
Bring the beef stock with all the rest of the ingredients to the boil then simmer for 45 mins, taste and adjust the seasoning, strain into another pot. Then add the tripe and bring it back to the boil then simmer until cooked.
Divide the soaked noodles into 4 bowls. Arrange the cilantro, basil leaves and bean sprouts in each bowl. Top each bowl with the raw thinly sliced beef, then pour the boiling hot stock over the meat filling up each bowl and turning the meat from raw to rare. Serve with a wedge of lemon and fish sauce.
Continuing my theme, have a hankering for some Hindustani ice cream while you’re out sari shopping in Westminster? There’ll almost certainly be a Kulfi vendor nearby. Want to peruse the latest Manga comics, Japanese Goth fashion or browse for a Bonsai tree after a bowl of steaming Ramen or an eye-wateringly expensive Kaiseki dinner, you’ll find them all on Sawtelle Boulevard in West LA. Crave some authentic Polish sausage and a Żwiec, (a brand of beer we used drink all the time in Poland)? We can find them easily at Jon’s, a small chain of supermarkets catering to LA’s large Central and Eastern European diaspora as well as its many Latino cultural communities.
These and other experiences have become a regular part of our lives and spending time here has exponentially expanded and enriched the range of dishes we enjoy at home.
A great commentary on LA. One only ever gets bombarded with the movie makers view of the City. We only ever see the Chinese Theatre or handprints on the pavement. This is a great view of LA and should inspire everyone to spend more time there.
Loved this! Thanks for sharing! I’ve never actually made pho, but perhaps I’ll give it a try after reading through your recipe. So interesting to see LA from the standpoint of world travelers like yourselves. I think you captured some of its zeitgeist, and it does grow on you when you’ve lived here for a while. My husband and I hated it on sight when we first arrived in 1979. Now I both love it and fear for it for any number of reasons—but that’s for a future blog or two.