Our top 10 food and drink stories of 2020

Practically built for lifting your spirits and arriving just when we could use a hug in food form, Japan's Champion's Curry opened a U.S. flagship restaurant right here in Little Tokyo. The fast-casual chain's been serving Kanazawa-style curry since the company's founding in 1961, and while it had previously launched a pickup window in Long Beach’s SteelCraft outdoor food hall, L.A.'s August opening—which brought us an expanded menu and its own designated patio seating—made serious waves with readers. Stories like this gave us at least a glimmer of normalcy in a whirlwind of a year, and the news was so exciting that Time Out Tokyo even translated and ran our local L.A. story in Japan. Champion's is still open in both Little Tokyo and Long Beach for all your curry, katsu and cheese-fry needs.

Like a number of restaurants in 2020, Petty Cash Taqueria & Bar had to close temporarily—but even when the modern Mexican spot hit pause, chef Walter Manzke still wanted us to have nice things. Most of us were already sick of sourdough starters and rehydrated beans by the time Petty Cash released the recipe for one of the restaurant's most iconic dishes, and readers lost their minds over the ability to finally have the famous cauliflower nachos on hand—and without too much effort or kitchen mess, either. This story gave us a bit of familiarity and comfort, not to mention something new to tackle in the kitchen, as we continued our months-long stretch of being homebound.

As restaurants closed and chefs turned to new methods for serving food during the shutdowns, some wound up creating our favorite new delivery operations. Brandon Kida of Hinoki & the Bird did just that. In early April Kida launched Go-Go-Gyoza, which brought delicious hand-folded chicken, beef or vegetable dumplings to your door. Prices have (rightfully) gone up since the launch, but back in April you could purchase a dozen for only $5. This combination of affordability, novelty, high quality and a thirst for new delivery options—no matter your neighborhood—resonated with readers. Go Go Gyoza is still delivering dumplings, and in fact Kida's gyoza wound up being one of the 25 dishes that got us through 2020. If you'd like to sample more of Kida's creativity, the chef recently launched a sibling delivery concept, Go Go Bird, which brings fried chicken and sides to you.

In the spring Governor Newsom announced a county-by-county "early reopening" process that would allow on-site dining to return, provided respective counties kept their case and hospitalization figures under a specific threshold. This article served as a running guide to the Southern California regions relaunching dine-in service after they received state approval to continue their "early" reopening, updating when a new county joined the ranks. It tracked Ventura, San Diego, Orange, Kern, Santa Barbara and L.A. counties (and beyond), and while all of Southern California is once again back to takeout- and delivery-only dining service for the foreseeable future, for a few months in the spring and summer this helped provide clarity during a confusing and ever-changing year. 

In one of the most exciting—and then promptly most deflating—openings for bookworms and wine enthusiasts alike, Pasadena's oldest independent bookstore built a wine bar designed to be a literature lover's dream. This story announced that the 126-year-old Vroman’s Bookstore would launch its first wine bar, called the 1894, in mid-February and that it would offer charcuterie, cheese, lit-inspired low-ABV cocktails and a place to perch with your favorite book. Of course when bars and on-site dining shuttered in March, it proved a rocky start for the new wine bar, but it returned with takeout and interactive tasting kits. It went dormant again on July 13, and while it thankfully isn't closed permanently, it has remained temporarily closed ever since. Follow along on Instagram for updates, and be sure to order books from Vroman's, which remains open.

A glimmer of hope for restaurants and stir-crazy Angelenos, this news marked the first return of on-site dining (including indoor dining) since the initial closures in mid-March. After eventually meeting key public health metrics set by the state of California, L.A. County restaurants could finally reopen dine-in service at the end of May. This story reported that L.A. County met the thresholds outlined in our seventh most popular food and drink story of the year, and explained just what the new "early" reopening phase would mean for Angelenos. But like most regulation updates, this would be short-lived; at the beginning of July indoor dining was banned again, and in late November, L.A. County restaurants had to revert to takeout-and-delivery business models only. The state issued its own temporary ban shortly thereafter, which we are still under.

With the exception of a few of its shopping districts, the happiest place on earth is still closed. However, if you've been itching to get a taste of Disneyland in your own home, we found the perfect way: This story published a recipe for the theme park's fan-favorite churros—here in bite form—which are easily replicated at home. (Trust us, we tried it, then promptly ate the whole batch.) During a year when millions longed for new recipes, and many of those millions longed for a trip to Disneyland, this was a way to make the House of Mouse, well, your own. This recipe also calls for precious few ingredients—a godsend considering some of the supermarket shortages we faced earlier in the year. All it calls for are butter, sugar, oil, eggs, salt and a small amount of flour, and though we've probably all restocked our flour supply by now, it's a good recipe to have in your back pocket (low flour or no). And seeing as it could be months before Disneyland reopens, this is the best we can do for now.

In 2020 one of the nation’s hardest-hit realms is indisputably the restaurant and bar industry. Millions of restaurateurs and employees working this essential service are struggling to navigate labor, food costs, rent and their own safety through modified re-openings, mandated closures and the sporadic announcements of dining regulations, and the cost and uncertainty are proving too great for some—resulting in the closures of some of the best restaurants and bars in all of L.A. This running list is updated every few weeks, and serves as a sort of memorial to the dozens of closures we've seen this year. Many include quotes from the chefs or restaurateurs behind their respective concepts, as well as the accodales garnered while these businesses were still running. We've lost no less than three of our top four Best New Restaurants of 2019. We've lost neighborhood favorites and date-night destinations. We've los fine dining institutions and cocktail bars and beachy gastropubs and some of our favorite concepts in the city. This year has been crushing, and unless independent restaurants receive aid, more closures will follow.

Like it was and always has been, the answer was local restaurants: Supermarkets and big-box stores quickly ran out of flour, toilet paper, yeast, dried pastas and other essentials, but L.A.'s independent restaurants came to the rescue. This story was one of the first on a local and even national level to spotlight the broader trend of restaurants pivoting to sell corner-store goods, giving Angelenos another way to find otherwise sold-out products, and giving small businesses another means of income during a time when their income, regulations and normal business plans all turned uncertain. The stocking of produce, dairy and other household items became—and still is—the norm for a number of restaurants and bars across Los Angeles, and we still love buying our products from them. Have you visited your new neighborhood corner store yet?

After a year of bad news, it feels like a breath of fresh air that we get to end this guide with something good. Our number one most-read food and drink story of the year is a spotlight on Quarantine Kitchen: the free, charming, comforting and folksy live Instagram cooking show from one of the best chefs in the world. In mid-March, just as our lockdowns began in L.A., chef Massimo Bottura of Gucci Osteria—one of our Best New Restaurants of 2020—virtually opened his home to millions upon millions of quarantined viewers with a free, nightly Instagram cooking show. This article was one of the first to report on the much-needed (and much-viewed) online escape, and Bottura's high energy and casual cooking demos proved just the jolt of optimism we all seemed to need. Each episode was more an informal peek into Bottura's daily life (as if you were simply a dinner guest) than any sort of formal or stuffy cooking class, and he welcomed the world in as he prepared dinner alongside his wife, son and daughter. Kitchen Quarantine’s lessons were always taught in English, despite the chef’s Italian provenance, and came to you live via Bottura’s own home where he was holed up with his family. (Famous chefs, they’re just like us!) While Kitchen Quarantine ended in late May, you can still find the catalogue of episodes on Bottura's Instagram Live channel. Watch one or six if you need a boost.