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50 places to dine in the L.A. area for under $50

October 20, 2025 | View in browser

By Kevinisha Walker

Multiplatform Editor, Newsletters

Good morning. Here's what you need to know to start your day.

50 L.A.-area restaurants where you can dine for $50 or less per person, including tax and tip.
Last year's flu season was California's worst in years. How bad will this one get?
The new dining spot to show your out-of-town guests why we love L.A.
And here's today's e-newspaper.

Eating in the L.A. area without breaking your budget

Collaged grid of ramen, sushi, fried chicken

Living in Los Angeles comes with a lot of challenges, but finding a good meal is not one of them.

Finding a good meal that won't break the bank? That can be difficult. So much so that many people have been eating at home, leading to a drop in sales growth for U.S. restaurants and bars during the first half of the year.

With a little help from The Times' Food team, it's more than possible to have a standout meal at some of the city's most exciting restaurants without breaking your budget.

In their new guide, my colleagues put together a list of 50 L.A. restaurants where you can dine for $50 or less per person, including tax and tip.

They include places that require specific hacks to stay within budget, as well as more casual options where $50 lets you sample a wide swath of the menu. There's something for everyone.

Here are four recommendations. But dive into our list to discover more.

Bestia (downtown L.A.)

Yes, it is possible to eat for $50 a person (including tax and tip) at a restaurant that offers a $185 Wagyu ribeye and $80 veal chop. At Ori Menashe and Genevieve Gergis' always-in-demand Bestia, you could order one of the restaurant's live-fire-blistered pizzas — which range from a $25 classic Margherita to one topped with soft and spicy 'nduja sausage, San Marzano tomatoes, mozzarella, spring onion, garlic, arugula and avocado cream for $29.

With a friend, you could share the whole grilled branzino ($52) or slow-roasted lamb neck ($56), which comes with smoked anchovy crème fraîche plus herb-adorned gem lettuce for wrapping the meat. Or you could share the $25 pizza and add an appetizer such as the herby Caesar salad with squid ink breadcrumbs ($24) or the buttermilk ricotta ($21) with aged balsamic, fennel pollen, herb oil, lava salt and a hunk of grilled bread.

And if you have enough left for one of Gergis' fantastic desserts, the $14 buttermilk panna cotta with roasted huckleberries and stone-ground-wheat cookies should keep you within a $76 budget for two people, even allowing for $6 drinks for each person.

Sushi:K (Beverly Hills)

Despite being in one of the wealthiest ZIP Codes in California, Sushi:K is one of the most affordable sushi restaurants in Los Angeles.

Chef Tomohiko Kawamura offers a $32 K Lite menu that showcases his well-seasoned shari and a daily selection of fresh fish. The set comes with a small sunomono salad and a bowl of miso soup. Next are five pieces of nigiri, followed by a blue crab or spicy tuna hand roll.

If you're still hungry, you can opt for an additional cucumber hand roll ($5) or another spicy tuna ($6). There's ice-cold Sapporo Premium ($6) and matcha green tea ($4). And, for dessert, maybe a scoop of the yuzu sorbet ($4.50).

Ruta 15 (Long Beach)

One of the most exciting meals you'll find in Long Beach is at this ceviche bar where mariscos dominate. You can try plenty with a $50 budget: charred ceviche verde ($18) paired with mix-and-match seafood shooters bobbing with octopus, clams or oysters ($18); or Culichi-style shrimp ($25) sautéed in garlic and served with cilantro rice, butter-roasted onion puree and julienned veggies, all doused in a creamy green sauce.

Sample the "land" section of the menu with guacamole con chicharrón ($15), try churros acanelados ($11) for dessert, or have the rest of your meal with a margarita ($13).

Rosty Peruvian Eatery (Highland Park)

At this Highland Park mainstay, the portions are generous, making nearly everything shareable — such as the bowl-like "cup" of comforting aguadito de pollo soup served with crusty bread ($6) or the platter of lomo saltado ($24), its seared steak and sautéed vegetables piled atop thick house-made French fries and accompanied by rice and sauces. Order both and a refreshing chicha morada, or purple corn drink ($6), to wash it all down within budget, or swap in sides such as black beans or a salad, also priced at $6.

The Peruvian neighborhood restaurant also specializes in wood-fired rotisserie chicken: The quarter- and half-chicken plates ($14 and $23, respectively) include two sides and also make for great sharing.

Today's top stories

Last year's flu season was California's worst in years. How bad will this one get?

Although flu, COVID-19 and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, are currently at low levels in California, there are signs that respiratory-virus season is starting to gear up as temperatures drop and people spend more time indoors.
Experts are sounding the alarm about continued lower uptake of the flu vaccine.
There's also the possibility of a seasonal COVID-19 wave as well as a simultaneous rise in RSV.

This exclusive Hollywood private club and workspace shut down. What went wrong?

NeueHouse, the exclusive Hollywood co-working club that hosted celebrity-filled premieres and parties, abruptly closed last month after filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
The swanky members-only space was undone by overspending, expensive leases, failed restaurant ventures and debt that ballooned to $83.7 million by March.
Former executives cite fundamental mismanagement, including spending $40 million over budget on expansion plans.

JPL's rough ride: Can California's shining star of space science recover?

JPL laid off 550 employees Tuesday — the fourth round in a series of layoffs that cut a quarter of its employees over two years.
The lab has struggled since Congress pulled funding for its flagship Mars Sample Return Mission because of a ballooning budget and timeline.
Now, an institution with an illustrious record of solving the hardest problems in space faces a daunting task here on Earth: reclaiming its place at the vanguard of exploration and innovation.

What else is going on

How the military's "safe" plan to fire munitions over Interstate 5 went off the rails with a CHP cruiser hit.
L.A. has declared uncleared Pacific Palisades properties a "public nuisance," including a mansion from HBO's "Succession."
LGBTQ+ youth's mental health struggles are getting worse, according to a new survey.
The NBA's new $77-billion media deal tips off this week, spreading games across NBC, ESPN, ABC, Amazon Prime Video and Peacock.
Here are the best looks from the 2025 Academy Museum Gala red carpet.

Commentary and opinions

This Las Vegas Republican had high hopes for Trump. But a "Trump slump" made life worse, columnist Mark Z. Barabak writes.
"Operation Midway Blitz" feels like déjà vu of L.A.'s immigration raid summer, argues Fidel Martinez, De Los editorial director.
As "No Kings" rallies took over streets across the United States, the California state Capitol was not spared from the resistance, writes columnist Anita Chabria.

This morning's must read

Another must read

What makes us human? Plays asking that eternal question reveal how AI magnifies our best and worst traits.

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For your downtime

Going out

Haunted experiences: 12 Hollywood haunts that saw real-life horrors includes the Hollywood Roosevelt, the Mama Cass House and Greystone Mansion.
Food: Columnist Jenn Harris' search for jambon beurre in Paris led her to the best sandwich in L.A.
Dining: The new dining spot to show your out-of-town guests why we love L.A.

Staying in

Television: "Hal & Harper" — a new series on the cinema-centric streamer Mubi — is a dramatic reflection of a family that feels natural.
Books: Gish Jen and her mother never got along. In "Bad Bad Girl," she tries to figure out why.
Recipe: Here's a recipe for sweet potato chili.
✏️ Get our free daily crossword puzzle, sudoku, word search and jigsaw games.

A question for you: What frustrates you the most about parking in L.A.?

Michael writes: "It drives me up the wall when I see big SUVs parked in spots clearly striped for smaller cars. Or when someone has such poor skills that they park with part of their car edging into a second parking spot."

Email us at essentialcalifornia@latimes.com, and your response might appear in the newsletter this week.

And finally ... your photo of the day

Today's great photo is from Times photographer Carlin Stiehl at a downtown L.A. "No Kings" protest against President Trump's policies on immigration, healthcare, the environment and federal agencies.

Have a great day, from the Essential California team

Jim Rainey, staff reporter
Hugo Martín, assistant editor, Fast Break desk
Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor
Andrew Campa, Sunday writer
Karim Doumar, head of newsletters

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A gutsy move to increase housing and oil drilling. But not high-speed rail

October 20, 2025 | View in browser

By George Skelton

Capitol Journal Columnist

Gutsy move to increase housing and oil drilling. But not high speed rail

Some witty person long ago gave us this immortal line: "No man's life, liberty or property are safe while the legislature is in session."

Humorist Will Rogers usually is credited — wrongly. Mark Twain, too, falsely.

The real author was Gideon J. Tucker, a former newspaper editor who founded the New York Daily News. He later became a state legislator and judge, and he crafted the comment in an 1866 court opinion.

Anyway, Californians are safe from further legislative harm for now. State lawmakers have gone home for the year after passing 917 bills. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed 794 (87%) and vetoed 123 (13%).

I'm not aware of any person's life being jeopardized. Well, maybe after the lawmakers and governor cut back Medi-Cal healthcare for undocumented immigrants to save money.

One could argue — and many interests did — that what the Legislature did to increase housing availability made some existing residential neighborhoods less safe from congestion and possible declining property values.

But kudos to the lawmakers and governor for enacting major housing legislation that should have been passed years ago.

Public pressure generated by unaffordable costs — both for homebuyers and renters — spurred the politicians into significant action to remove regulatory barriers and encourage much more development. The goal is to close the gap between short supply and high demand.

But legislative passage was achieved over stiff opposition from some cities — especially Los Angeles — that objected to loss of local control.

"It's a touchy issue that affects zoning and is always going to be controversial," says state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who finessed through a bill that will allow construction of residential high-rises up to nine stories near transit hubs such as light-rail and bus stations. The measure overrides local zoning ordinances.

Wiener had been trying unsuccessfully for eight years to get similar legislation passed. Finally, a fire was lit under legislators by their constituents.

"The public understands we've screwed ourselves by making it so hard to build homes," Wiener says.

But to win support, he had to accept tons of exceptions. For example, the bill will affect only counties with at least 15 passenger rail stations. There are eight: Los Angeles, Orange, San Diego, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Alameda and Sacramento.

"Over time it will have a big effect, but it's going to be gradual," Wiener says.

Dan Dunmoyer, who heads the California Building Industry Assn., calls it "a positive step in the right direction."

Keep up with California

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Yes, and that direction is up rather than sideways. California could accommodate a cherished ranch-house lifestyle when the population was only a third or half the nearly 40 million people it is today. But sprawling horizontally has become impossibly pricey for too many and also resulted in long smog-spewing commutes and risky encroachment into wildfire country.

Dozens of housing bills were passed and signed this year, ranging from minutia to major.

The Legislature continued to peck away at the much-abused California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). Opponents of projects have used the act to block construction for reasons other than environmental protection. Local NIMBYs — "Not in my backyard" — have resisted neighborhood growth. Businesses have tried to avoid competition. Unions have practiced "greenmail" by threatening lawsuits unless developers signed labor agreements.

Another Wiener bill narrowed CEQA requirements for commercial housing construction. It also exempted from CEQA a bunch of nonresidental projects, including health clinics, manufacturing facilities and child-care centers.

A bill by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) exempted most urban infill housing projects from CEQA.

You can't argue that the Legislature wasn't productive this year. But you can spar over whether some of the production was a mistake. Some bills were both good and bad. That's the nature of compromise in a functioning democracy.

One example: The state's complex cap-and-trade program was extended beyond 2030 to 2045. That's probably a good thing. It's funded by businesses buying permits to emit greenhouse gases and pays for lots of clean energy projects.

But a questionable major piece of that legislation — demanded by Newsom — was a 20-year, $1-billion annual commitment of cap-and-trade money for California's disappointing bullet train project.

The project was sold to voters in 2008 as a high-speed rail line connecting Los Angeles and San Francisco. It's $100 billion over budget and far behind its promised 2020 completion. No tracks have even been laid. The new infusion of cap-and-trade money will merely pay for the initial 171-mile section between Merced and Bakersfield, which the state vows to open by 2033. Hot darn!

Newsom muscled through the bill at the last moment. The Legislature should have taken more time to study the project's future.

One gutsy thing Democratic legislators and the governor did — given that "oil," among the left, has become the new hated pejorative sidekick of "tobacco" — was to permit production of 2,000 more wells annually in oil-rich Kern County.

It was part of a compromise: Drilling in federal offshore waters was made more difficult by tightening pipeline regulations.

Credit the persistent Sen. Shannon Grove, a conservative Republican from Bakersfield who is adept at working across the aisle.

"Kern County knows how to produce energy," she told colleagues during the Senate floor debate, citing not only oil but wind, solar and battery storage. "We are the experts. We are not the enemy."

But what mostly motivated Newsom and legislators was the threat of even higher gas prices as two large California oil refineries prepare to shut down. Most Democrats agreed that the politically smart move was to allow more oil production, even as the state attempts to transcend entirely to clean energy.

Let's not forget the most important bill the Legislature annually passes: the state budget. This year's totaled $325 billion and allegedly covered a $15-billion deficit through borrowing, a few cuts and numerous gimmicks.

Nonpartisan Legislative Analyst Gabriel Petek last week projected deficit spending of up to $25 billion annually for the next three years.

In California, no state bank account is safe when the Legislature is in session.

What else you should be reading

The must-read: Sen. Scott Wiener to run for congressional seat held by Rep. Nancy Pelosi
California vs. Trump: Federal troops in San Francisco? Locals, leaders scoff at Trump's plan
The L.A. Times Special: One of O.C.'s loudest pro-immigrant politicians is one of the unlikeliest

Until next week,
George Skelton

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50 places to dine in the L.A. area for under $50