Besha Rodell Has Fierce Love for Atwater Village's Wild at Canelé

This week, Besha Rodell explores Wild at Canelé, a Wednesday through Friday lunchtime pop-up by husband and wife and former Sqirl employee duo Ria and Matt Wilson. The lunch service at the Atwater Village hotspot has a reliable central menu with a "heck of a" fried chicken sandwich that also made Eater LA's 15 phenomenal fried chicken sandwich list:

Canelé's fried chicken sandwich appears on the Wild menu, though it's been tweaked significantly. The chicken itself has been marinated in the style of lechon manok, a Filipino roasted chicken that's heavy on lemon grass. From there it's fried, piled onto a house-made pan de sal (also Filipino) and topped with a green papaya pickle. It's a heck of a sandwich. [LAW]

However, the LA Weekly critic goes on to recommend the "less obvious" parts of the menu, and concludes, "Wild at Canelé is better than you'd expect it to be and better than it needs to be:"

There's a terrine of the day, and it's almost always delightfully unexpected. It could be composed of smoked yellowtail and Saint Germain-pickled strawberry, the fish ever so lightly cured but retaining all its lush, fleshy qualities, the strawberries adding a punch of bright flavor. Or a chicken terrine might come with English peas and carrots, a puckery mustardo and warm biscuits on the side. It's here that you begin to realize that these chefs are capable of far more than the simple protein-plus-salad lunch. [LAW]

---

The Elsewhere: The Eastsider discusses the new vegan patty at Haché LA, LAist visits The Larchmont, Food GPS enjoys beltfish with green garbanzo beans at West LA's Il Grano, and Sara Rashkin runs down where to eat Jamaican food in LA.