The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles, ranked

Welcome to the 10th annual L.A. Times guide that attempts to answer a delicious, impossible question: What are the 101 restaurants that best embody excellence and convey the essence of our food culture?

No matter what fresh flavors and hot openings the year brings, a guiding premise holds fast: L.A.'s astounding dining scene is a sum of California's farmlands, the region's pluralism and the city's unique shimmer of possibility — the sense that an original personal narrative expressed through noodles or a stew's secret ingredient is waiting just off the next freeway ramp.

Restaurants appearing for the first time comprise more than a quarter of the 2022 list. Among them are a Malaysian cafe in Alhambra where the power play is coffee and toast; a streetside taqueria in Highland Park where a quesotaco's first bite delivers eight flavors at once; and a sprawling bilevel space in downtown L.A.'s Arts District where two chefs, who are married, explore Korean American identity via congee pot pie with roasted abalone and biscuits smothered in curry gravy.

Three other newcomers announce the city's golden age of pizza, and that's not counting the label-defying sports bar in Silver Lake where the saucy, cheesy pies can arrive crowned with tandoori onions or chicken tikka.

Some places that previously dropped off have returned. This is a living document. It happens. The occasion is particularly joyful when a favorite like Here's Looking at You in Koreatown bounces back; it reopened in January after the pandemic forced a 17-month hiatus.

Feeling thirsty? Here are the 10 best places around Los Angeles for drinks.

And yes, the restaurants are ranked again for the first time since 2019.

Jenn Harris joins me in naming 10 places we’re excited to be drinking right now. After a two-year break we’ve also brought back our Hall of Fame, with 14 new inductees so intrinsic to our dining culture that they deserve their own category.

These restaurants are so defining of what it means to eat and live in Southern California — that they’ve earned a place of honor for all time.

Is that cheating? So be it. This is my fourth year agonizing over the 101, and the fixed number feels shorter every go-round. There's simply too much to celebrate.