Classic French fare always tastes better on a whim, like a Monday night dinner in the Valley. Ludo Lefebvre’s enduring bistro has both the look and the charm of a Parisian restaurant, with hefty fare like steak frites, escargots, and trout almondine pairing with the excellent cocktails and wine list.

Pasadena can’t get enough of Union, the Italian spot known for its locavore approach to vegetables and its comforting menu of basics. The restaurant survived the pandemic thanks to the strength of its local clientele and now is back to pushing out plate after plate of pasta both inside and out on the long streetside patio built turning the pandemic. Because this place is so hard to get into on weekends, Monday night may be your best bet.

For more than two decades Talesai has stood as a Thai restaurant for the San Fernando Valley and beyond. The Yenbamroong family has long excelled at creating great menus, but at this location, it’s the retro-cool decor, white tablecloths, and upscale presentation that make it ideal for a Monday date night.

Wolfgang Puck always knows how to make a room feel like it contains all the energy in the world, like the towering fish bowl that looks out into the Southland from its Sunset Strip perch. Merois feels like an indulgent thing for a Monday, but with easier tables and an unexpected formality, the menu is a crowd pleasing, Asian-inflected thing only Puck could pull off.

Longtime neighborhood favorite Alimento is and has always been the kind of place where Silver Lake has gathered for excellent pasta and terrific wine. It’s a bonus that they choose to open on Monday, a night for locals for pop in and have a great food from chef Zach Pollack, like chicken liver mousse or handmade tortellini.

The venerable Angelini Osteria is 20 years young, a legacy Italian restaurant that has given rise to countless chefs and cooks across the city. Monday nights are perfect for a more laid-back night of housemade pasta like sea urchin linguine and lasagne verde.

For refined Japanese cooking, it’s hard to think of a better place than Tsubaki. The diminutive Echo Park restaurant (and attached sake bar and snacks spot Ototo) is perfect for a Monday night celebration, dining over dry-aged sashimi, silken tofu, and grill-kissed meats.

Koreatown’s most ambitious restaurant is back after a long pandemic hiatus and a near closure that was saved when owners Lien Ta and Jonathan Whitener crowdsourced funds to pay for a reopening. The seasonal food is an example of the LA’s global dining lens at its finest.

Bavel is among LA’s hardest-to-score reservations, and there’s good reason for that. The perennially hip Arts District destination has some of LA’s best food and makes for great people-watching on weekend nights. Realistically the Middle Eastern-leaning spot is still hard to get into even on Monday nights, but at least there’s a chance to check it out without waiting months.

Chicago chef Stephanie Izard has a way of working with international flavors and putting them into truly unexpected combinations, like a shrimp and kumquat salad with crispy greens or sticky glazed pork shank with honeynut squash. It doesn’t hurt that the dining room and patio are always packed with eager diners.

Main Street Santa Monica should count its lucky stars that a delightful Southeast and South Asian spot would open in its neighborhood. With everything from butter chicken and hamachi crudo to a fantastic yellow curry grilled branzino, this is the reasonably priced, easy to get into Monday date spot the Westside always needed.

There’s not a lot of pretension at the Arthur J in Manhattan Beach, it’s just that the small-ish dining room and high-quality food make it hard to score a weekend table. On Monday nights the steakhouse is a different place almost entirely, a beachside option for locals to celebrate with grilled steaks and wine.

With its vibrant rooftop and award-winning Italian food, Michael’s on Naples is perhaps the best spot to take a Monday night date in all of Long Beach. There’s an air of class to the place, but without the pretension, that makes this water-adjacent option worth the trip from anywhere in LA.