LA Weekly Cancels Essentials Event One Day After Dropping 99 Best Restaurant List

LA Weekly seems to have cancelled its marquee Essentials restaurant experience in Downtown Los Angeles, just days before it was scheduled to take place. The loss of the Sunday Essentials event also comes one day removed from the launch of the publication’s annual 99 Essential Restaurants list, which drew its own, separate ire online almost immediately after going to print.

While there has been no public announcement from Weekly staff and nothing to indicate the cancellation on the alt-weekly’s splash page for the Essentials event, Ticketfly is no longer listing tickets for sale, instead saying below the introductory information that the Essentials has been cancelled. A call to the California Market Center on 9th Street, where the event was scheduled to take place, confirms that it is no longer happening there. Eater reached out for comment, but LA Weekly food editor Michele Stueven declined.

Ticketfly

Just yesterday, the Weekly also published its annual list of best restaurants, and both the format and the inclusion/exclusion of some important restaurants have caught many off guard. First and foremost, much of the list is a repackaging of entire paragraphs of writing from former Weekly staffers like Besha Rodell, Garret Snyder, and Katherine Spiers. Rodell declined to comment publicly on the use of her words and name for this year’s list as she is now working for the NY Times in Australia, but others like Spiers (who was fired in the sale to Semanal Media) have been actively campaigning against LA Weekly online for months. Spiers and freelance writer Tien Nguyen have even gone so far as to offer their own Rogue 99 list of restaurants in anticipation of the forthcoming 99 Essential Restaurants issue.

What’s more, this year’s 99 Essentials list seems to offer a few curious exclusions and at least one or two surprising inclusions. The alphabetical ranking is meant to be an up-to-date representation of the most truly essential restaurants in greater Los Angeles, but did not mention many popular and award-winning spots like: Rossoblu, Dialogue, Vespertine (Jonathan Gold’s pick for best restaurant for the LA Times), Cassia, Q Sushi, Gjusta, Aburiya Raku, Kato, and David Chang’s new Majordomo, to name a few. Upscale Japanese kaiseki restaurant n/naka was also not named, despite being anointed the #1 best restaurant in the city by outgoing Weekly critic Besha Rodell in her last act for the very same paper.

Of those included for the first time, there is Hock + Hoof, a Downtown pan-Asian restaurant that hasn’t even opened its doors yet. Asked for comment on why the Weekly would choose to include a restaurant that no one from the public has actually dined at (and won’t for another month or so), Stueven told Eater:

“I’m all about what’s new and their food is great.”

At least two restaurants not on this year’s list have also privately stated to Eater that they were told by Weekly staffers they would be included in the Essentials rankings if they participated in the in-person event. Both declined.

[Ed. note: Eater has confirmed that LA Weekly emails were sent to at least five restaurants, congratulating them on being included in the 99 Essentials list. Those restaurants declined to participate and were asked to reconsider. After still declining, they ultimately found themselves left off the Essentials list, despite the original email informing them of their inclusion. These restaurateurs believe that they were left off of the list as a consequence of not participating in the Essentials food event, which they felt pressured to attend. They shared those feelings and emails with Eater.]

Other surprising adds include Swork, a longtime local coffee shop in Eagle Rock, Michael Voltaggio’s fast casual STRFSH on the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, and Javier’s, an upscale chain Mexican restaurant at the Westfield Century City.

As previously reported by Eater, LA Weekly claimed in their FAQ section that they would not be issuing refunds, so it remains unclear what will happen now that the Essentials event appears to be cancelled.

Update: A legal representative for LA Weekly tells Eater over the weekend that refunds for ticketholders were approved and processed once the event was officially cancelled.

Across Twitter some of the founders of the Boycott LA Weekly movement, including many former staffers cut during the sale, have been cheering the loss of the event after helping to stage an agitation campaign that saw more than a dozen restaurants and sponsors back away in recent weeks.

For a full look at this year’s LA Weekly 99 Essential restaurants lists, head here.

• The Eater Guide to Dining in Los Angeles [ELA]