This clubby Afro-Caribbean spot on Fairfax has the best-dressed crowd in the city, with gorgeous Sezane-wearing couples sipping okra martinis at the bar and groups of girlfriends piling into booths shaped like miniature Hollywood Bowl shells. Despite all that—and the DJ spinning 90s hip-hop in the corner—the experience is ultimately about the food. Come for shareable, crowd-pleasing dishes like craggly, coconut-crusted fried chicken and braised oxtails cooked down with warm spices.

After closing in 2020, Marix in West Hollywood is back with one of the neighborhood’s best patios and most mediocre Tex-Mex food. Lines form well before opening and wrap around the corner by 5pm. Why? Because spending a night at this treasured outdoor restaurant is still a great way to take advantage of the fleeting sunlight. Every party is drinking at least two pitchers of margaritas.

Even at 5pm on a Wednesday, it seems like every Mar Vista resident from the ages of 8 to 80 is eating carbonara at Beethoven Market. This corner-store-turned Cal-Italian spot lives in a quiet neighborhood but has the energy of a swanky Hollywood spot at max capacity. The chatter will reboot your social batteries and everyone looks like a sunglasses model lounging on their patio with an olive oil vesper. Get the smoky grilled pork collar, tiramisu scooped tableside, and any of the pastas.

The margaritas at this Sherman Oaks cantina aren't your typical salt-rimmed cocktails. Daisy Margarita Bar goes wild with the Mexican classic, like mix tequila blanco with sweet marzipan and salsa macha, make boozy mangoneadas topped with mango boba, and blitz avocado into guacamole-inspired slushies. The food is just as entertaining, like guacamole sprinkled with fried fatty tuna bits, and a fancied-up take on chicharrones del parque with thick slices of yellowtail.

Nights on the Hermosa Beach boardwalk can be so much more than shots and Donkey Punch at Baja Sharkeez. Dinner at this clubby Mediterranean restaurant from the Ryla people is a bit more refined. Attagirl mixes bumping house music, vespers tinged with clarified pineapple, and an all-around solid Mediterranean menu featuring smoky kebabs and warming lamb bolognese.

The back patio at Alba has the same energy as Caesars Palace in Vegas. Espresso martinis fill every table, bowls of orecchiette with burrata are tossed tableside, and you'll see a few dudes with one too many shirt buttons undone. It’s a scene even by Melrose standards, but thankfully dishes like the agnolotti and chicken alla diavola hold their own. Even if your only goal is to get dressed up, people-watch, and maybe send a risky text to an old flame later, this is where you want to be.

A night at No Bar Bar is frenetic and a bit lawless. Walk into this pizzeria-cocktail bar from the Dudley Market people in Santa Monica and you’ll find dates smooshed up against the bar and groups packed into booths. On Friday and Saturday nights, you’ll probably have to wait in line for a little bit while DJs spin throwback Euro disco over the hi-fi. A spacious table is never a guarantee, but the reward is excellent tiki-inspired cocktails and bubbly-crusted pizza.

Somerville is located on a kind of sleepy street and looks like a cozy wooden barn, but the moment you walk inside, you’re met with a live jazz band riffing on R&B covers, dressed-up people toasting Hennessy cocktails at the bar, and plush booths filled with couples stealing sips of each other’s drinks. The menu isn’t far from what you’d see at a neighborhood steakhouse, but you can match the excitement of the place by ordering adventurous dishes like the collard greens lasagna.

At Rasarumah, you’ll share plates of butter-rich beef cheek rendang and sweet-tangy mango salad, clink glasses of barley shochu, and smear hot red sambal on every dish like you’re at one of those paint-and-sip classes. Rasarumah is a sexy, well-oiled dinner machine, the kind you’d expect from the team behind Found Oyster. Leaving your burnt orange banquette at the end of the night won’t be easy. Get the pandan sundae for dessert to buy some extra time.

Bar Sinizki specializes in a kind of European fantasy: checkerboard floors, copper tile ceilings, a lot of white marble, and people who look like they take month-long holidays every summer enjoying brown butter pierogies and Fernet spritzes. The good news is it can easily be your fantasy, too. This bubbly all-day bistro in Atwater from the Elf Cafe people is walk-in only, so elbow up to the bar or find a table on the leafy patio where you can debate Sartre versus Camus over steak frites.

This dark and moody bistro on Melrose doesn’t shy away from Old Hollywood touches. There’s a long bar where Manhattans flow, booths the size of jacuzzis, and a wedge salad buried under a metric ton of bacon. But don’t mistake The Benjamin for a living museum. By 6pm most nights, the place packs in a crowd dressed like they’re auditioning for a Stüssy print campaign. Huddle in the corner over strip steaks and caviar baked potatoes, or join the neighborhood scene at the bar.

At this neighborhood izakaya in Virgil Village, an infectious energy hits you the second you walk through the door. Friends huddle in dimly lit booths snacking on shareable dishes like fermented Thai sausage and wagyu yakisoba. A fluorescent Orion beer sign casts a pink glow over dates ordering shochu cocktails at the walk-in-only bar. Lauryn Hill and 90’s Kylie blast over the speakers. We love that drinks arrive in adorable little penguin mugs, and servers will pull up a chair to discuss the re

Donna’s in Echo Park doesn’t make you choose between a good time and a great meal. Groups crowd into leather booths and use their outdoor voices to discuss friend-group gossip. Complimentary limoncello shots flow like water. And the Italian American comfort food is just as considered as the nostalgia-core backdrop. So if you’re in the mood to take down a plate of chicken parm in a loud room covered in teal floral wallpaper, a night at Donna’s will make you very happy.

Checker Hall feels like a bar and a Mediterranean restaurant wrapped in one, which is why a night here always goes late. It’s located on the second floor of an old masonic lodge in Highland Park and will please all your friends who want to chill in a booth and eat branzino and whipped feta. But no one will feel out of place spending the night drinking good cocktails (like the spicy, tequila-based Carmen #6). In reality, everybody in your group will probably partake in both approaches.

This Korean tavern in Ktown is late-night LA canon. It's where one hour turns into three in the blink of an eye. Meats sizzle and knives scrape on the grill. Smoke hangs over the dark, wooden booths, and groups of friends pound Hite with an exorbitance typically reserved for the end of the world. As for the food, the menu has over 100 different anju designed for snacking while you drink. We recommend loading up on kimchi pancakes, sweet and spicy tteokbokki, and more skewers than you can count.