Yelp! It is a platform that we’ve used for years, but have never really talked about on the blog. Why? It has always been a bit taboo, I suppose. Yelp doesn’t like their users doubling up their reviews. They see it as a conflict of interest. They have some control issues. As a result, we’ve always said no to their annual invites to be Yelp Elite. We play it safe by avoiding be too far in Yelp. Still, we love to use it for the following reason.
The blogging community is a wonderful, supportive community. We started six years ago (wow!) and boy has it changed since. Back then, there weren’t many “social media influencers” and Instagram was barely a thing. It was much easier for bloggers because the market wasn’t flooded with them. People blog as a full-time gig now and they have to work hard to stay on top of things like SEO, market changes, and outreach. But still, it’s mostly a great community where bloggers support one another. For better or for worse, Hungry & Fit is still around to throw food and workouts at you. We wanted to take a moment and share with you blogs that inspired us to blog and also ones we have recently followed. Some are food blogs, some are health blogs, some are somewhere in between like us.
Next up on our must-visit restaurants of Los Angeles, we visited a breakfast joint! We went to Division 3 which is a tiny hole-in-the-wall place in Hollywood. It was suggested by Alton Brown, a culinary great we have followed, respected, and admired for a long time. He said the biscuits were to die for, of something of that vein, so we decided…we must try it!
There’s a good chance that the only time you’ve heard about Yelp, it didn’t help you build trust in their brand. They’ve had a ton of bad publicity and we’ve actually had plenty of negative experiences with them, but let’s focus on the positive. Here in LA, Jonathan Gold’s 101 list is the “gold standard” for where to eat. LA Weekly just came out with a 99 Essential Restaurant list, and we can’t help but think that whoever compiled that list was GREATLY influenced by Gold. Sadly, even here in LA, very few people outside of the food industry know who he is.
It can be hard to find good places to eat and most people aren’t willing to do a ton of research. They don’t want to Google “best food critic in LA” and then read through Gold’s hundreds of reviews over the year. Instead, we look for more convenient options. Whether it is a reflection of our laziness or desire to save time, services that compile reviews have become extremely popular. Rotten Tomatoes is a great resource for movies, Amazon for consumer goods and Metacritic for video games. While Yelp is far from a household name, it does provide that similar service for businesses… especially places to eat!
There are two ways to use Yelp. You can either check out reviews as a guest or you can become a user and review businesses. Technically, a third way exists, as a business owner but we’re not going that direction today. As a guest, you can quickly type in “sushi” in New York and get an idea where the restaurant is, how much it costs, when it is open and what the population thinks about the food. While we don’t necessarily agree with the aggregate scores of certain places, and while we don’t necessarily trust Yelp’s filter, you’re much better off using Yelp than just walking into the first place you see.
We hope Chef Jazz doesn’t get mad at us for telling her secret, but we can’t help but want to bring more people into the Jitlada family. That is, after all, exactly what it feels like after you’ve been there a few times. When you’re sweating bullets while eating her southern curry (nowhere near the hottest on their menu) and Chef Jazz comes over to fill up your water, there’s nothing more endearing than the look on her face. Half of it is a sort of admiration, based in the fact that you’re going for it, halfway through the bowl without complaining, and half of it is a grin, knowing that it is a “2” out of 10 on her spice-meter.
Up next on our Must-Visit LA Restaurants of 2018 is actually a dessert spot! Surely, if you’re reading this review, you’ve checked Holy Roly out on Yelp. If you haven’t, we’ll summarize the criticism on Yelp in two words: overpriced and parking. Nearly all of the complaints come from a lack of familiarity of the LA food scene, especially Koreatown. So, to debunk those myths… any dessert under $10 is normal and never think you’ll find parking in K-town.
Maybe we have an unfair advantage, having lived a few blocks away. We knew where to park and when to go. As a result, we didn’t spend thirty minutes parking and wait in any line here, so we weren’t in a bad mood before we started eating. We found out about Holy Roly from Maneet Chauhan, since it didn’t actually exist yet when we lived here. We actually discovered our love for rolled ice cream, in all places, at a Thai-owned and operated location in Montgomery, Alabama.
What foodie in LA hasn’t heard of Jitlada? Whether you read Jonathan Gold’s 101 best restaurant list every year or watched his movie City of Gold, watched Chef Jazz compete on Food Network, or have taken a tour of Thai Town with Jet Tila himself, you’re sure to know about Jitlada! When we were making the list, it was one of the first we mentioned… a top priority for all of the reasons above and then some!
It’s a very dangerous game at play when you declare that your goal is to go out to eat every week at a different place. Why? Because temptation. Desire. Lust, if you will. While fighting off all of those primal feelings, and avoiding ordering our favorite pizza, we ventured into areas surrounding Culver City to find new eateries. Why? Maybe we were feeling adventurous or maybe we thought we’d been slacking as food bloggers. Either way… this happened.
Stumble to Humble. I can’t remember how this happened. I think we were wandering around Washington, knowing that it is full of amazing eateries. While Humble Potato wasn’t on our list before, despite a very chilly meal there, it is now. Why? Because they have the best burger and fries in LA. But don’t take my word for it; we want you to go and tell us if you think we’re out of our minds. (We already know that we are!)
3 stars given on Yelp
Having worked a few buildings over for two and a half years, I saw the lines outside of Tsujita, a ramen eatery on Sawtelle. I knew it was heavily hyped because of its presence on Gold’s 101 List multiple times. I think he even claimed it was the best ramen in LA. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case the only time I visited.
We made it! We finally arrived after 12 hours of flying and another of customs. We’re a little groggy (Chris is actually sleeping on the couch right now), but we’ve made it! Just in case you wondered where we’ve run off to…we are here in New Zealand for two weeks for a cousin’s wedding and to explore both islands! Some of you know I’m half-Kiwi, meaning that my mum is from New Zealand. We are very excited for this trip. My mum, dad, brother, and his girlfriend will be arriving tomorrow. My aunt picked us up and we are just getting acclimated. This post is going to be picture-heavy. Just of things we did in California and things we’ve just done in New Zealand! Here goes…
In NZ at a park across the way!
Let’s start with Christmas in Santa Monica, California (my hometown). We arrived Christmas Eve and boy did it go fast. We saw lots of family and friends, ate tons of good food, and got in fun workouts. Christmas loot was incredible this year, some of the standouts were the Jawbone UP, a mixer, Star Wars CCG cards, Amazon gift cards, oh and…A GOPRO!!!!!! Yeah Chris went a little overboard this year in terms of presents, so so excited to use the GoPro in New Zealand. We actually got footage of us “surfing” (there were no waves that day), and you’ll see it once I learn how to edit it.
Just arrived in Cali
Star Wars cards…super rare!
Jawbone UP…records movement, sleeping, and eating. A wrist band.
GoPro!!
Joys of opening packs
This was at a delicious Christmas Eve party with my family…Chris eating children of course
Gotta love Santa Monica..
In N Out…
Bay Cities!!
Mum’s homemade breakfast
Japanese food with Sophie and Kai
Epic Tekka Don
Time to move onto workouts…we did some improvising home workouts
Some at the beach with friends…
Rope climbing!
He got all the way up
And don’t forget the surf!
Beautiful picture from the GoPro camera
The five days in California went by incredibly fast, but I’m not surprised. Then on Sunday night, we loaded our stuff into a car, Dad dropped us off at the airport and we were on our way to New Zealand! We arrived to New Zealand Tuesday @ 5:30am. Yes, Tuesday…we skipped Monday! 18 hour time difference plus 12 hour flight will do that to you I guess. Here’s a few pictures from the journey so far…
Mum and I with travel pillows
Had to get this journal for the trip
Food at LAX
Airplane food, not bad!
Little itty bitty beginning of sunrise
They don’t refrigerate eggs here!
Chris’ epic kiwi breakfast
Going for a walk
New Zealand is just pretty
We hope to update you as often as we can, depending on internet of course. Probably the hardest part of all of this is being away from the cats for so long, but it helps to know that they are in good hands in Boulder. We are in Auckland now but will soon be travelling south. So excited to be here with Chris and my huge kiwi family for this trip. We are going to have lots of great food and find fun creative ways to workout on the road. Happy New Years!! As always…stay hungry and fit!
