90021, Downtown Los Angeles

Inside Church & State

Dear ——–,

Leah and Neal know their way around restaurants, so when they suggested Church and State, we happily said yes. The bistro was in the National Biscuit Company building — whose title finally explained to us how the cookie company Nabisco got its name — in a warehouse-to-loft part of downtown. It was pretty noisy so we had a little trouble hearing each other, but maybe that was intentional on the part of the restauranteurs. The better to get guests to lean into each other and feel “intimate.” The gem lettuce salad was boring, but the mac and cheese and salmon main course were fantastic. The salmon was wrapped in ramp — which Leah informed us is a wild leek that is rare because it can’t be cultivated. It was sitting in a basil veloute that made me want to tip the bowl and drink the stuff like soup. I restrained myself just to sopping it up with bread. Bryan and I considered for a moment ordering the a.o.c. butter from Normandy because it’s the first time we’d ever seen butter on the menu. But while it was the cheapest item ($3), special ordering butter just seemed so excessive.