The Knife

Mirror, mirror: Vote for the prettiest restaurant in L.A.

The Los Angeles chapter of the American Institute of Architects is preparing to select the winners of the Restaurant Design Awards. (Among the jurors: Nancy Silverton.)

However, you and me and everyone else we know are also empowered to select the People's Choice award. Choose your favorite in each category: restaurant, cafe/bar and lounge/nightclub. (At left: The extraordinary strip-mall resident that is Lou.)

The awards -- juried and public -- will be announced at the 3rd annual Restaurant Design Awards Oct. 25, to be held at Poliform, the chic and wildly expensive Italian furniture store on Beverly Blvd. Red wine, presumably, will not be served.

10 Reasons Why Lou is My Favorite Restaurant in Los Angeles

1. It’s in a minimall. Next to a laundromat. With a stark-white sign that says, LOU. It's not even centered, which makes it look like either a mistake or like Lou ran out of money.
2. Heavy, floor-length curtains make it feel dark like a speakeasy and make you forget you're next to a laundromat.
3. Great wallpaper and lighting fixtures. Even the ceiling is cool. You'd never believe this was next door to a laundromat.
4. The city’s best wine list.
5. The menu is small, changes often and everything is good. Everything. The pig candy, the house-smoked duck breast, the salad plate, the macaroni and cheese, the cauliflower gratin, the burrata with proscuitto and wild arugula.
6. But especially the frisee salad with housemade bacon and poached egg. And the egg is perfect every time.
7. The waitstaff is just... nice. No attitude. Smart.
8. Monday nights are wine dinners; Tuesday nights are leftovers.
   
9. About that wine list: It’s not the longest or the rarest. There’s maybe 30 wines at any given moment (plus a couple of beers, like Hopf Dunkle Weisse). But they’re wines you’d be hard pressed to find elsewhere and owner Lou Amdur has a thing for stellar examples of lesser grapes like Carignane, Lagrein and Cabernet Franc, with a special fondness for biodynamic producers; he'd also like to restore Chardonnay's good name. And most of all, his wines taste and smell fantastic.
10. Best seat in the house: At the bar, where Lou is prone to pour you a little something he’s about to put on the list. And where you wind up sitting next to people like this guy, who beg you not to tell anyone about this place: “It’s hard enough to get in as it is.” Sorry, Tate.
    
    Lou, 724 N. Vine, Hollywood. (323) 962-6369