Before you enter The Georgian Room, you’ll have to buzz a mysterious doorbell, walk into a closet-sized waiting room, and put a privacy sticker over your phone camera. Let that be your first indication that this Italian steakhouse is only partially about the food. Mostly, you come to this revitalized Old Hollywood dining room underneath The Georgian Hotel for the experience. It’s the kind of martini-soaked nostalgia den that makes people-watching at other "speakeasies" seem like a waste of time.

This is a chaotic nightlife complex on the eighth floor of the Moxy DTLA. Just getting inside feels like participating in space travel. First, you'll be escorted down a hallway of pulsing psychedelic lights and then into an elevator that shoots you up to a maze of restaurants and bars (plus a pool deck open to anyone). You could very well swim, drink, and watch aerial burlesque in the same night. But we recommend starting with dinner at the crowd-pleasing South American steakhouse, Qué Bárbaro.

This Central American street market in Koreatown will keep you occupied all afternoon with chicken soup, blood oysters tossed into ceviche, and pupusas sizzling on hot grills.In between the soccer jersey sellers and people snacking on green mangoes dusted in sour achiote powder, you'll see a ton of different Salvadoran stands. Our favorite is Pupuseria Jazmin’s #2, where you sit at long banquet tables and eat crispy-edged pupusas with equal parts frijoles, cheese, and chicharrón.

If you wanted to plan a bus tour of LA's best Thai spots (sign us up), the food court at Wat Thai food court would be a mandatory stop. Every weekend, the Thai Buddhist temple right on the border of Sun Valley and North Hollywood hosts a street food market in its parking lot. Each vendor opens around 8am, and popular dishes can sell out as early as noon. Wat Thai serves juicy BBQ pork skewers, beefy boat noodles, creamy mango sticky rice, and papaya salad that you can grab in one walk-through.

While you won’t eat anything remarkable for lunch at Restaurant 917, you will get front-row seats to a thrilling car show. This daytime spot is located on the second floor of the Porsche Experience Center in Carson, the official driving school of the luxury car company. As you eat dishes like crab spaghetti or a wagyu beef burger in the casual dining room, sports cars will whizz by at 110pmh on the track down below.

Dinner at Hansei in Little Tokyo begins not at a hostess stand, but with a tour of the Japanese American Cultural & Community Center’s lush gardens followed by shochu-infused drinks and small bites. From there, the multi-course experience takes you through various other locations around the center, including an interior "chef's counter" where you’ll be served dishes like teriyaki wagyu steak and a play on the California roll that involves fried seaweed.

Most West Hollywood lunches involve standing around waiting for an $18 custom-made salad to arrive. If you’re looking for something completely different—and whole-heartedly nostalgic—go to Tail O’ The Pup. The legendary hot dog stand (that’s shaped like a giant hot dog, no less) has recently reopened on Santa Monica Blvd. with a full build-out that includes two separate patios and an interior that looks like a suped-up In-N-Out.

Cicada Club is one of those places that reminds you there’s always more to downtown LA than meets the eye. This Art Deco supper club across from Pershing Square feels as if you’re eating in the grand ballroom of the Titanic (sans iceberg), complete with a live brass band that gets the dance floor heated up early. You can go all-in for the dinner setup, or just buy separate tickets to just come and dance. The dress code is suits and cocktail dresses.

A night inside MainRo is like hanging out on the set of The Voice, if it were filmed inside a spaceship rocketing towards galaxies unknown. In other words, it’s complete chaos from the moment you walk in. If you’re in the market for an over-the-top clubstaurant experience, though, MainRo is the best show in town. You’ll see trapeze artists, aerial acts, and girls coming down from the ceiling belting out Adele songs.

Finding enough space in your apartment for your crochet button collection is hard enough, let alone hosting a proper dinner party. That’s what makes Ilé, a Nigerian fine dining pop-up in Hollywood, so impressive—it’s actually held inside the chef’s luxury loft apartment. You’ll make a couple of new friends, eat some delicious and dramatically presented food, and enjoy an intimate experience highlighting West African cuisine.

To call The Magic Castle merely a restaurant would be doing it an injustice. It’s a private club, home to the best magicians on the planet, with a restaurant that’s better than you’d expect. Getting into this massive Victorian mansion in Hollywood takes some effort (you need to secure an invite from an actual club member), but once you’re inside, you’ll embark on a night of up-close magic, strong Old Fashioneds, and mechanical owls that’ll talk back to you.

Old Place is in the Santa Monica Mountains, located on the grounds of a 19th-century general store-turned-saloon and steakhouse, complete with a Wild West aesthetic that reminds us of the movies our dad loves to watch. The menu is packed with American comfort foods like bone-in ribeyes, glorious apple crispy, and something called a “noodle and cheese bake,” a mac-and-cheese type dish that’s made with thick egg noodles smothered in parmesan, goat cheese, and mozzarella.

Opened by the legendary American trumpet player, Herb Alpert’s Vibrato Grill is anything but low-key. As soon as you enter the Bel-Air spot (from the parking lot filled with Aston Martins and Porsches), you’ll be greeted by a glittering ballroom and the live jazz band up front. People are wearing suits, jackets, and dresses they found in the “evening wear” section at Neiman Marcus, and everything tastes perfectly acceptable, sometimes even good.

A meal at this high-end sushi bar in the San Fernando Valley can only be described as a transcendental experience. The bar is filled with regulars, the walls are a strangely soothing bright orange color, and fluorescent lighting flickers overhead. It seems like a casual experience, despite the $200 price tag, and everyone’s having fun. The chef behind the counter is as calm as a Headspace instructor, carefully constructing ahi tuna four ways or shrimp tempura with a hint of yuzu.

The Tam O’Shanter is one of those extremely European places that Southern California seems to love so much (see also: literally all of Solvang). Wrought iron chandeliers swing from the ceiling, there are about five miles of carpet on the floors, and you can find fireplaces in nearly every room. The menu’s stacked with foods that feel like they should be eaten in candlelight, like a funky Scotch rarebit or Toad In The Hole that’s essentially a filet mignon stew.