I was excited to try this restaurant after seeing a bit about on reddit and then after they received their 3 stars (the first 3-starred restaurant in LA) after their reincarnation from when they had closed during the pandemic. . And then after our visit to Disfrutar in Barcelona, I had a renewed interest in Somni’s contemporary Spanish cuisine. It was somewhat tricky getting a reservation, but I happened to randomly snag a reservation for the day after Christmas. So Andrea and I decided to make a long weekend of it and neither of us have been to LA proper recently (we’ve had trips to San Diego, Orange County, Ontario, but not much in LA itself for quite some time).

We were staying at the nearby Kimpton La-Peer which was 5 minutes walking distance from the restaurant. It was good that all of the rains had stopped. We arrived about 15 minutes early and there were a few groups already waiting there out on the sidewalk. We were told that they would open up right at 7:30pm and again, it was good that it wasn’t raining. As we were finally let in through the main gate, we each in turn checked in at the desk outside and then were ushered to our seats. The restaurant has two main communal tables, the one closer to the door appeared to seat 6 and the one closer to the kitchen seated 8. We were seated at the latter at the two seats closest to the center. In front of us was a large counter space that would be used for some of the final prep.

Tokyo Fizz and “Truffle” bump
We were first provided a beverage to start called Tokyo Fizz that was made with sake and yuzu. We are also soon provided the their “Truffle” bump which was some kaluga (my favorite) caviar with a bit of truffle served on a wooden hand so that you could pick it up by the wrist and eat the bump which saved you from having to put truffle on your own hand so it was a playful fine dining way to eat a playful caviar bump. It is admittedly slightly awkward to eat caviar off of a large hand that is not your own (it would be kind of funny to go to Truffle Day and bring an extra hand for you to do your bumps off of, lol). The truffle in it was an interesting choice…and I’ll definitely say that I’m a purist for bumps, so it was a unique and different caviar presentation from any other we’ve experienced.

Fried almond, Tarragon tart, Sardine, “Tigre”, Trufflini, and Parmesan feather
Then came an array of canapés. I really enjoy this at the start of a meal (most recently had that kind of start to a meal at Auro a couple weeks prior). The dishes consisted of the Tarragon tart, Sardine, Fried almond, “Tigre”, Parmesan feather, Trufflini, and Fried almond. The. Tarragon tart was a meringue with a raspberry in the middle and dried raspberry chunks. The raspberry was topped with a tarragon swirl with a tiny sprout of tarragon. Andrea loved the flavors of this bite, but I don’t really care for meringue so I liked it less than she did.

I was really looking forward to the Sardine. I loved the presentation of it with the finely sliced marinated sardine with it’s silvery skin set atop a fish shaped cracker. It certainly has a sardine flavor to it which of course, I love, but Andrea definitely does not which just meant that there was more for me to eat, haha. The Tigre was served in mussel shells with the edible part being a dark colored tart shell colored by squid ink with a filling made with the lips of mussels (the rest of which would make a later appearance in the meal). The Paremesan feather was one of Andrea’s favorites. The Truffulini was made up of several thin wafers in the shape of a mushroom sandwiching a truffle cream and some mini array of scalloped potato discs to decorate the cap of the top mushroom wafer. This was had a nice mushroom flavor to it all, but it just a bit too much rich cream for me.

The fried almond was a reconstructed almond shell made of almonds with a lemon curd filling. I you look closely at the photo, you can see a dot with a bit of liquid where I am assuming they used to inject the filling. It was a good thing I ate it all in one bite since it was the lemon was fairly liquid and of course sweet (unexpected so early in the dinner). (if you look closely at the photo, you can see a dot with a bit of liquid where I am assuming they used to inject the filling.

“Pizza Margherita”
Next came the “Pizza Margherita”. So this certainly looked like a slice of pizza with a thick crust which was in fact a meringue made with clarified tomato water. I already mentioned from the Tarragon tart canapé that I’m not overly fond of meringue, so I was not very impressed with the crust and did not finish that part, but the rest of it was delicious and was made with some great ingredients. The tomato had a nice flavor to it, the semi-solid burrata and the very fresh truffle shaved tableside to top. (This dish in contrast to the meringue dish at Disfrutar, which took a lowly dish like a cheese sandwich and recreated it out of something totally unexpected, wheras this was just a pizza with a meringue crust?)

Gazpacho “blanco”
Next came the Gazpacho “blanco”. This was a deconstructed tomato gazpacho. The blanco, referred to a white gazpacho which does not contain tomato but has components like almond and garlic which were added, so this dish was a play on gazpachos. The broth was poured tableside. The vegetables were fresh and flavorful even here in the middle of winter.

Coco crab
Next came the Coco crab. This was local dungesness crab served topped with citrus fruit vesicles (yeah, I had to look up the word for that. but when they are all separated out like that, they did deceptively look like something from the sea) served in a crab shell shaped dish. It was topped with a spiced crab foam served tableside and a side of a kohlrabi spread on the left side of the dish/shell.

Shiso puff tartare
This was a beautiful dish. They main component was the shiso leaf which when deep fried with a light batter, the fin hairs from the shiso leaf raise which causes the batter to puff. The puff was topped with a some beef tartare hidden by an adornment of flowers. Andrea doesn’t like fresh shiso (flowers are ok), but in this case since it was fried, she didn’t mind it at all.

Tuna & spruce tip
The next dish called Tuna & spruce tip. The tuna was buried beneath a layer of kaluga caviar and then this was topped with a sauce, served tableside.. The starch carrier to go along with this dish was a crisp made in the shape of a maple leaf. The sauce gave it a sweet and savory component. I didn’t love that flavor, but then again I am a purist and I did appreciate something different. It certainly was all beautiful to look at, there was a lot going on with the caviar, the tuna, and the sauce.

Croissant
The Croissant was made of a strip of potato wrapped into the shape of a crescent and fried. This came with a side of truffle sauce into which the croissant was dipped. What’s not to like…fried potato and a truffle dip…a perfectly classic pairing in a new presentation.

Mejillones
This dish consisted primarily of mussels with their lips removed (don’t call them circumcised, haha). The mussels were cooked very gently keeping them incredibly tender, in fact the most tender mussels I’ve ever eaten. This was topped with both a saffron sauce and tarragon foam.

Spanish turbot
The next dish was the Spanish turbot from Galicia (really need to visit there some time), the first of two dishes that would use the turbot. This one featured a thin stripe of dry-aged turbot bisecting the dish with fruit (pressed apple), vegetables and greens arranged in a line parallel to the turbot strip on the right hand of the dish. The peas (we always love peas) were spooned onto the left of the turbot and then a fish broth (made from the bones) poured to the right. It was all topped with some Alba white truffle (love me some tartufo bianco) shaved table side (that would make 3 components served tableside for this one dish!). This all had the look of a delicious spring dish and tasted very like that.

Engawa
The Engawa was the second part of the turbot was a small piece of the turbot still attached to the bones which were wrapped bundled and wrapped into a handle. The fish was roasted teriyaki style and topped with just a bit of shiso leaf.

Ensaimada
The Ensaimada made me think of a pan fried bao. In this case it was a stuffed rolled pastry shaped into circles. I enjoyed it, but I have to admit it made me think of a fancy Poppin Fresh dough.

Iberico pork
The next dish was the Iberico pork, which clearly was an ode to pork which could clearly smell as soon as it was served. This dish featured pork several different ways include the roasted pork including jamon iberico, the jus, and a little bean shaped gummy as well as some jamon stuffed morels. There was also some cheese foam, a jus, and a bit of the morel sauce. A porcine Darth Vader would say “The Pork is strong with this one”.

“Cow and her milk”
The cheese course was called “Cow and her milk”. This amusingly had a black and white cow cutout wafer set atop the cheese and candied hazelnuts. The cheese was a Brillat Savarin (which was one of the cheese we really enjoyed when we were in Burgundy. There’s also époisees, comté and of course delice de Bourgogne )

Silent d’hiver
The first dessert was called Silent d’hiver. The theme for this dish was definitely white (and off white. It made me think about the savory blancmange dish at Alinea). There was a yuzu panna cotta with a daisy carved and painted onto it and some vanilla ice cream

Sweet little things
The dessert finale was called Sweet little things. There was an array of bites, but I don’t really recall much about them since it was late in the meal and much wine was consumed and with all the courses many things become a blur (I seriously debated bringing my meta ray-bans for this meal and just video recording every time they dropped food and explained it). The most interesting one was the golden kiwi, topped with a bit of shiso flower, in a green kiwi sauce. This was served in a teacup with a mini clothesline pin holding a small sprig of leaves. The rest of the dishes included spoons of strawberries (constructed to look like that is) and cream, raspberry gummies in the shape of raspberries, passion fruit madelines, arroz con leche mochi dumpling, and a doughnut that was deceptively a chocolate shell filled with cream.

The large service team was very professionally distant just executing their jobs with precision for the bulk of the meal. It was somewhat awkward that after each dish was served to us, there were always some of them who were standing behind us. No doubt they were there to be responsive to things and I really didn’t notice them for the bulk of the meal, but once I did realize they were just standing behind us, and I think Andrea was slightly creeped out by it. We did end up enjoying the service team once they warmed up a bit after chatting with them a bit more through the meal. First was MJ. I think we started chatting about the ensaimada course and we were talking about how Filipino ensaymada is a totally different thing and then at one point we were talking about restaurants and I asked him is recommendations, so he ended up writing up a list for me. Also, we ended up having a great conversation with Caroline, the somm. As it turns out she previously worked at Lazy Bear and even lived in the same neighborhood as us! Also at the end of the meal, chef came by to talk to us to ask us about what we liked (and other members of the team spoke to every diner to get feedback).

Overall, there was a lot to enjoy. There was certainly a lot of technique (sometimes with deconstruction and/or a bit of playful deception), meticulous plating, and and liberal use of high end ingredients. There were a few too many foams and I mentioned I’m not a fan of meringue in general and service was very impressively coordinated, a bit professionally detached until they warmed up a bit after talking to them. I did very much enjoy the overall experience, although there were moments I just appreciated rather than loved. I think of this comes from being on the hedonic treadmill a bit (this was the 30th Michelin starred restaurant I had eaten this year) and the last Spanish molecular gastronomic restaurant we ate at was Disfrutar, so take my opinions as just that. There isn’t any reason for most anyone to be simply wowed by the experience here.

https://www.somnirestaurant.com