Los Angeles - the Lazy Life

Nobody Walks in LA
After living in New York and Paris I've come to value a city's "walkability."  I like to be able wander out of my front door on foot, eating, shopping, jumping on a subway if needed.  It's a quality that Los Angeles lacks, or worse - mocks.  Nobody walks in LA.  You want breakfast?  Drive out of your hotel and keep driving. We lucked into a great place, not too far away by LA standards, in Santa Monica.  It's called Amandine and by all accounts, is a French patisserie run by Japanese transplants.

Against all odds, it was raining.  We canceled our plans to visit the beach and drove to the farmer's market instead.  We filled up on sausages, gourmet popcorn, and other goodies and then drove through Mid-Wishire to a cafe.  Later in the afternoon as the sun began to set we drove to Westwood, on the outskirts of the UCLA campus, for the most famous burger of all - In n Out.

During my college years in San Diego we used to drive for two hours to Orange County just to eat these.  They're still as good as I remember.  We shared a double-double with cheese and some fries.