Will Highland Park Ever Have Enough Speciality Coffee Shops?

Over-caffeinated Highland Park

Is there such a thing as an entire neighborhood being overcaffeinated? You’d think so, if not for places like Los Feliz where speciality coffee shops populate just about every corner, and still more spots like Alcove offer coffee as part of a larger service package.

Highland Park may well be on its way to that level of saturation. The Eastsider reports that a new “cycle-inspired” coffee shop is coming to the York stretch, with the likes of Kindness & Mischief, Civil Coffee, and Mr. Holmes Bakehouse (among others) doing coffee over on Figueroa. It’s called à bloc, apparently, and is pretty close to opening up, with an aesthetic similar to what you’ll find at Wheelhouse in the Arts District — another highly caffeinated part of the city.

Sidecar Doughnuts are life

Chef Brooke Williamson can’t get enough of Sidecar Doughnuts, it seems, a fact she willing shares with pop culture site The Ringer. Seriously, listen to how she waxes poetic about her love of doughnuts.

Even more rooftop vibes

There is yet another rooftop drinking option coming to Downtown, as Urbanize LA hints at a big new deck landing at the Milner Hotel in South Park. The plan is for an overhaul of the entire property, with a posh new light snacks and drinking space up on the top of the building. Not 73 stories up, by tall nonetheless.

Battle of the baos

LA Weekly chimes in on the growing battle of the baos in Downtown, between SF expat The Chairman and Eddie Huang’s own Baohaus. Apparently there has been some historical tussling between the two over the Chairman name (which was for years a signature item at Baohaus in NYC, and predates the SF spot), but tensions have since cooled off. The winner? Everyone in LA who likes bao.

Preorder report

You can now officially preorder the upcoming Starry Kitchen cookbook by Nguyen Tran, though the actual tome won’t drop until June. Still, head to Amazon to at least check out the cover, and get a bit of a teaser on the upcoming 88-recipe strong book.

The perfect Taco Tuesday

Bon Appetit is back with another video installment on LA food icons, this time shining some love on Wes Avila of Guerrilla Tacos. He takes the team through the process of making a hard-shelled ground beef taco, and along the way details his family’s history in Southern California.

Update: A previous version of this story had the à bloc coffee shop opening on Figueroa, but it is opening on York.