Just when we thought Platform couldn't get more stylish, Hayden swooped into a corner of the high-end shopping and dining development in Culver City.
The bright and airy cafe and wine bar opens on Friday morning with those so-en-vogue light-wood, hanging-plant and modernist-furniture touches, and a California menu focused on seafood, sandwiches and light bites from James Beard Award semifinalist Ari Kolender, who's returned to L.A. after roughly four years spent in South Carolina kitchens.
"Everything in the Platform is really fantastic, but there's no really comfortable place to hang and eat and drink wine and small food," says Kolender. "[Hayden is] kind of just a vision of a place I wanted to hang out at in my neighborhood."
Photograph: Courtesy Hayden/Katie Gibbs Photo
As such, the menu is a reflection of how Kolender himself loves to cook and eat: lots of vegetables, seafood and lean meats, with an inclination toward smaller, shared plates. While Hayden will keep evening dinner hours—from 9am to 9pm Sunday to Thursday, and 9am to 10pm Friday and Saturday—it's still a cafe at heart. Expect a full coffee bar; Greek yogurt with wildflower honey; the very Instagrammable cast-iron banana bread; oysters, ceviche; and sizable sandwiches stacked between Bub and Grandma's pillowy focaccia. Come dinner, you'll find a few meatier dishes like lamb rillettes and braised chicken, with price points by and large at $20 and below.
Photograph: Courtesy Hayden/Katie Gibbs Photo
You can also expect a decent happy hour—here called "golden hour"—between 6 and 7pm, when they'll offer discounted dishes or special toasts or canapés, and reduced-price glasses of wine. Speaking of wine, Kolender tapped Anthony Cailan to helm the beverage program. "He takes the same approach to wine as I do with ingredients," Kolender shares, "and is really in touch with a lot of the local California grape growers and winemakers." Hayden's wine list includes French, Italian, German and Spanish labels, but primarily focuses on young, fresh, new-wave California wineries experimenting with European varietals locally. All the better to wash down those bright plates of raw-scallop ceviche and ancient-grain salads.
Hayden opens this Friday, July 21, at 11am in Culver City's Platform at 8850 Washington Boulevard.
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