5 foods to order this week if you don’t want to cook or leave your couch again

As we head into what could be the most anxiety-inducing election week in our nation’s history—coupled with the fact that we’re now three-quarters of a year into a pandemic—it’s important to be gentle with ourselves. What we’re eating is no exception: If we’re glued to the couch or trapped under the metric ton of a weighted blanket and can’t crawl our way to the kitchen, well, it’s time to leave a meal to the pros.

Here are a few ideas for delivery or takeout to order this week when the thought of cooking might be too much, whether you’re looking for distraction, comfort or just flat-out sustainability. Whatever your goal, all of these options are delicious—but not as delicious as the taste of democracy. If you haven’t dropped or mailed a ballot or headed to the polls early, California allows Election Day voter registration, and if you’re looking for where to vote, some of the city’s coolest landmarks are serving as polling places this year. Also, if you flash that “I VOTED” sticker at a number of L.A. restaurants, you can get free food and great deals—and then sink into your couch forever.

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1. Curry so hot it could numb you to the world

Take your mind off existential dread by overloading your senses with something so spicy you might glimpse another dimension. L.A. is home to phenomenal Thai food, and in addition to offering milder comfort classics such as pad see ew and pad Thai, some of the city’s top spots also cook up famously hot curries, such as Jitlada’s jungle curry (which truly does not mess around) or Luv2Eat’s crab curry. We’re also partial to ordering any and all Thai curries, noodles and grilled marinated meats—spicy or non-spicy—especially when they’re coming from the likes of Jitlada (East Hollywood), Luv2Eat (Hollywood), Anajak (Sherman Oaks), Same Same (Silver Lake), Chao Krung (Fairfax), Night + Market (Venice, West Hollywood, Silver Lake), Ayara Thai Cuisine (Westchester), Cholada Thai (Malibu), Wat Dong Moon Lek (Silver Lake), Ruen Pair (East Hollywood), Northern Thai Food Club (East Hollywood) and Natalee Thai (Beverly Hills, Venice).

2. Rotisserie chicken to live off for days

Rotisserie is a perfect comfort food for this week in that it’s hearty but relatively healthy, it allows you to mix and match sides, and you can use the bones to give yourself a project and make stock if you need a distraction. It also lasts for days, if you can stop yourself from devouring it out of deliciousness on night one—a feat given how strong L.A.’s rotisserie game has gotten in this year alone. Great White Rotisseria (Venice), Kismet Rotisserie (Los Feliz), Pollo a la Brasa (Koreatown) and Zankou (Glendale, Burbank, Toluca Lake, West Hollywood, Van Nuys, Pasadena, Westwood and Valencia) all make fantastic rotisserie chicken along with a range of sides to keep you fed for days.

3. Sushi to feel refreshed

It’s easy to fall into the same cooking tropes: what you know, what’s in your pantry, or maybe 10,000 chicken nuggets out of your freezer, but something you might not be making for yourself is sushi—especially sushi with quality ingredients sourced from Japan, the California coast and beyond. Give yourself a treat and give your kitchen a rest with something so light and refreshing that you might forget, at least for a few bites, that we’re in a historic election week and a simultaneous pandemic. If you’re looking for a brief respite in sushi form, some of the city’s best offer takeout or delivery, including Shunji Japanese Cuisine (West L.A.), Sushi Bar (Encino), Sushi Tama (Beverly), Hamasaku (Westwood), Sōgo Roll Bar (Los Feliz), Iki Ramen (Koreatown), Sugarfish (Studio City, Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Downtown, Pasadena, Marina del Rey, Santa Monica, Brentwood, West L.A.) and Asanebo (Studio City).

4. Trays of pasta to faceplant into

Pasta is a god-tier comfort food, and we’re going to need that comfort to be endless this week. Thankfully some of L.A.’s best restaurants offer absurd amounts of pasta (or just exemplary pasta dishes you can order à la carte), so we can twirl our forks into sheet trays and bowls of the stuff and try to feel warmth and hope once again. Union (Pasadena) sells to-go, family-style pasta trays, which technically feed four but really, this week, probably feed one. You can find them in options such as their spaghetti with a simple San Marzano tomato sauce and garlic; spaghetti with meatballs in Amatriciana sauce; their killer torchetti in Calabrese pork ragu with house-made ricotta and fried rosemary; and the lamb belly carbonara, which coats fettuccine in egg yolk and parmesan and crispy lamb belly. Pasta Sisters (Mid-City and Culver City) offers same-day catering sizes of their phenomenal fresh pastas (simply call the store of your choosing) so you can get massive quantities of pesto gnocchi, fusilli bolognese, Italian black truffle rigatoni and more, plus trays of lasagna and eggplant parmesan. Amante (Downtown) sells trays and half trays of their pastas, so you can load up on lasagna, penne in pink sauce, fettuccine alfredo, and shrimp scampi.

5. Pies, cakes and every other dessert to feel like everything’s going to be OK

Dessert is like a hug in food form, and if you’re the type who loves to be buried in the sweet embrace of rich chocolate cake, bright berry pies, gooey brownies, eggy flan, and decadent puddings, L.A.’s got you covered. For a little of everything, B Sweet Dessert Bar (Sawtelle) bakes up five-layer brownies, hot bread puddings, a range of cheesecakes (including flavors such as ube, red velvet, and pumpkin), ready-to-eat cookie dough, and cupcakes in a jar. Nicole Rucker’s artful Fat & Flour (DTLA) offers pies, cookies and brownies from Wednesdays to Saturdays, and Cake Monkey Bakery (Fairfax, North Hollywood) serves up whole cakes, mini cakes, pop-tarts, pecan bars, pudding pies, regular pies, cookies, loaf cakes and just about anything else you can imagine. Finally, if you can’t choose between baked goods or chocolates, Valerie Confections (Echo Park, Historic Filipinotown) has it all: boxed truffles, house-made chocolate bars, brownies, cakes, pies, jars of house seasonal jams, galettes, chocolate-covered pretzels, banana bread, you name it—and they also ship nationally, so you can send a dessert hug to a friend who might also need one right now.

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