1. Sandra and Lolitas (East LA, Whittier Blvd.)-Tamales. It's Christmas. I come from no tradition that celebrates tamales this time of the year but I have no problem latching onto one (or beginning my own) anyway. Sandra and Lolita's is located directly across the street from the perhaps even more worthy Tacos Bajas Ensenada, where one can down a pair of precision crafted fish tacos and a more than decent ceviche topped tostada. Anyway, on the sidewalk (they have no seating), in the car, or microwaved for dinner, one could do much worse than the green cheese and red pork tamales from Sandra and Lolitas.
2. Huge Tree Pastry (Monterey Park)-Tony C. and JG have already covered this place far more thoroughly than I could. Let me just reify that the pork belly gua bao (above) is everybit as good as anyone has previously asserted: a moist but not too delicate bun encasing a mix of pickled mustard greens, pork and whatever else is in there that I can't figure out without asking the lady in a tongue I do not know. Either way, worth the drive. From what I remember, in their old incarnation as Yi Mei Chinese Pastries, they also make fairly mean turnip cakes, and good rice rolls filled with dried pork.
3. Omar's Halal Restaurant (San Gabriel)-When you first enter the door at Omar's, a restaurant in the SGV specializing in Islamic Uighur cooking, you're hit with a wall of cumin inflected air every bit as solid as a slab of stacked and reverberating guitar tones on a My Bloody Valentine record. The small dining room is packed with Chinese, non-Chinese muslims, and others, all hovered around decanters of tea, plates and bowls of hand-pulled noodles (stretched and pulled as you watch), lamb kebobs, cumin-saturated lamb, a giant pastry they call a meatloaf sandwich, and a dish known as big plate chicken. Can a single dish encapsulate the history of an entire culture? Of course not. But I like to imagine that seemingly simple big plate chicken - chopped chicken with potatoes, peppers, more than ample garlic, bay leaves, star anise, szechuan peppercorns, and who knows what else - comes close.
4. Big Mista's (Atwater Village Farmer's Market)-There are two weeks left in the NFL regular season and four weeks of postseason play after that. Big Mista's may be worth your attention for at least one of those weeks.
5. My in-laws-My wife's dad is an amateur cook in the same way that 14th century scientists were amateur scientists: working solely within the space of his home and the limited audience it attracts he has crafted some fairly memorable meals. Nothing too complicated: chicken with ginger, the various fish dishes pictured above, bitter melon soup, and garlic fried rice that could be worthy of its own food cart.
6. Philip's (Leimert Park)-Philip's is hidden away at the side of a commercial block in Leimert Park, nothing more than a doorway, a small hallway with a counter at the end that feels more like a place you would go to pay a late power bill, and a separate counter to pick it up. As far as the food goes, they're being honest. Hot is really hot (take this from someone for whom a raw jalapeno is a fine snack). And I suppose that's one of the main factors that brought me back. The ribs arrive wading, not swimming in the sauce, flanked by invitingly drenched and delicate pieces of pepper. There is also BBQ chicken which, almost unbelievably, comes off as almost just as good as the ribs.
7. Bay Cities Deli (Santa Monica)-Yes, the Godmother (genoa salami, mortadella, cappacola, ham, prosciutto, and provolone) lives up to every slice of renown it has garnered. I think I appreciated it as much for this, as for the fact that it led me to some kind of Proustian connection with a sandwich I had when I was like 7 or 8, and have thought about since. Proustian connection or not, not a bad way to spend 10 bucks in Santa Monica.
9. La Cevicheria (Pico, west of Arlington)-My experience listening to music is roughly divided between pre-Velvets and post-Velvets, much the same way I delineate my times as a baseball fan pre-Bill James and post-Bill James. For ceviche, I guess it is now pre-La Cevicheria and post-La Cevicheria. Maybe it's just that my ceviche-pallete was inexperienced, naive and undertraveled (only one trip to Latin America, and that, to Costa Rica, a country perhaps not in the same league on the culinary continuum as Peru or Mexico). Either way, I won't settle any more. Not when there's Bloody Clams (pictured above) or Guatemalan Ceviche, both virtual libraries of oceanographic data and citrus. On another note, the ceviche, justly, gets all the hype at this place but the fish tacos, drizzled with the appropriate amount of diablo sauce, have given me less incentive to make the drive to the aforementioned Tacos Baja Ensenada.
10. Brooklyn Bagel (Lower Echo Park, Historic Phillipinotown?)-Best bagels in LA.
7. Bay Cities Deli (Santa Monica)-Yes, the Godmother (genoa salami, mortadella, cappacola, ham, prosciutto, and provolone) lives up to every slice of renown it has garnered. I think I appreciated it as much for this, as for the fact that it led me to some kind of Proustian connection with a sandwich I had when I was like 7 or 8, and have thought about since. Proustian connection or not, not a bad way to spend 10 bucks in Santa Monica.
8. 5 Puntos Market (East LA)-Tamales. Worth a stop to take home for dinner after lunch at Ciro's, Antojitos Carmen, or Cemitas Poblanas.
9. La Cevicheria (Pico, west of Arlington)-My experience listening to music is roughly divided between pre-Velvets and post-Velvets, much the same way I delineate my times as a baseball fan pre-Bill James and post-Bill James. For ceviche, I guess it is now pre-La Cevicheria and post-La Cevicheria. Maybe it's just that my ceviche-pallete was inexperienced, naive and undertraveled (only one trip to Latin America, and that, to Costa Rica, a country perhaps not in the same league on the culinary continuum as Peru or Mexico). Either way, I won't settle any more. Not when there's Bloody Clams (pictured above) or Guatemalan Ceviche, both virtual libraries of oceanographic data and citrus. On another note, the ceviche, justly, gets all the hype at this place but the fish tacos, drizzled with the appropriate amount of diablo sauce, have given me less incentive to make the drive to the aforementioned Tacos Baja Ensenada. 
10. Brooklyn Bagel (Lower Echo Park, Historic Phillipinotown?)-Best bagels in LA.
11. Sapp Coffee Shop (Thaitown)-Can't stop ordering the chicken with bamboo shoots.
12. Golden State (Fairfax)-As good as Umami? No. But still worth a stop.
