LA Times Food Bowl Is a Month-Long Celebration of the Los Angeles Food Scene

Fiona Chandra

The Los Angeles Times is introducing a different kind of food festival. The Food Bowl will last the entire month of May and celebrate L.A.’s cuisine scene while promoting awareness about food waste and hunger. In addition to The Food Bowl’s special events, the festival will also highlight relevant food happenings throughout the city.

The month-long activity opens with Chef’s Fable at The Wiltern. Food and film will meet at this opening event, starting with grub by Kogi BBQ, Pasta Sisters, and Mariscos Jalisco. It will then be followed by a Q&A panel featuring stars of recent food films including chef Roy Choi, Jon Favreau (actor and filmmaker of “Chef”), chef Niki Nakayama, and others. After the panel, there will be a screening of Jon Favreau’s “Chef.” General admission ticket is $25, and VIP ticket is $30.

Another series of events will feature the farm-to-table movement in Los Angeles. For example, The Farmer and The Chef Festival at Manuela will pair ten chefs with ten farms to create seasonal dishes. Bartenders will also be paired with local farms to create signature cocktails using the farms’ produce. Tickets to this festival will be $235 per person and all profits will be given to the farms.

The Los Angeles Times Night Market will be a free outdoor street food market, taking over Grand Park for five nights from May 10-14. The market will feature 50 food booths from L.A.’s favorite restaurants, food trucks, bars, and artisanal vendors. Guests can also purchase $10 tickets to The Super Market which gives access to additional food vendors, seating areas, premium lounges and entertainment.

The WPChef’s Series has Wolfgang Puck partnering up with chefs Massimo Bottura and Roy Choi at Wolfgang Puck at Hotel Bel Air on May 3. Dinner costs $500 per person and proceeds go to Chefs to End Hunger and Food for Soul. On May 8, Chef Wolfgang Puck will accept the inaugural Los Angeles Times FOOD BOWL Jonathan Gold Award with a celebration at his iconic Spago. The Gold Award Dinner will include a menu of dishes that highlight Chef Puck’s four decades of career-defining work. Many other special dinners will also take place during the festival. Chefs Wesley Avila (Guerrilla Tacos), Octavio Benitez (Ceviche Project), Katsuji Tanabe (“Top Chef” alum), and Esdras Ochoa (Salazar) will come together for a rare collaboration dinner at Salazar.  Citi and No Kid Hungry will also be putting on a series of dinners featuring at Otium, Ink, Broken Spanish, and more.

During the month, various restaurants in the city will also feature special “Things in a Bowl” on their menu, in keeping with the theme of the Food Bowl. Participating restaurants include Animal, CUT, 71 Above, The Ponte, Cassia, and more.

This is just an idea of the events highlighted by Food Bowl. Between a butchery class at Chi Spacca, a downtown food bike tour, and a never-ending list of special lunches and dinners, May will be a food-filled month for Angelenos.

LA Times Food Bowl will run from May 1-31.