The Best Dishes Eater Editors Ate This Year in Los Angeles, 2025 | Eater LA

"Eating at Gjelina in Venice in 2025 feels like stepping back in time to Gjelina in Venice in the early 2010s. There are still locals waiting for tables on a mulchy wooden bench out front, $1,200 sweaters draped on their shoulders. Servers flit around in monochromatic oversized clothes that add color to an otherwise gray-washed backdrop. Gaping front windows pour natural light into the dining room, rendering iPhone flash irrelevant if you have the right table at the right time (before 7 p.m. in March). The food is as Gjelina as it ever was — meaning technically great, even if maybe a little tired-feeling 17 years into its tenure on Abbot Kinney. Amid the charred vegetables, blistered paper-thin pizzas, and mains like roasted chicken with kale and harissa, find something truly refreshing in the Tai snapper crudo made in the style of an aguachile, tucked at the top of the menu laundry list. Delicate slices of snapper rest in a green chile bath with cucumber and sesame salt. The aguachile is slightly thicker than one you might find at your local mariscos joint and earthier from the sesame infusion. — Nicole Fellah, Eater editorial manager" - Matthew Kang