WHY Jidori chicken, cornmeal pancakes with grilled shrimp and chipotle cream, Mexican Coke, $5 burger night, and bargain wines.

WHAT One of the leaders of the Echo Park boom (it’s not evil gentrification, it’s a renaissance!), the Park is stylish in a barren, homespun way, with empty frames on stark walls and a simple patio that’s the place to be for weekend brunch. Young chef/owner Joshua Siegel serves eminently affordable modern home cooking—composed salads, artful burgers, pot pies, roast chicken—that is just the thing for this era of modest consumption. We love this place.

WHO Carefully scruffy young families and silver-haired Silver Lake adventurers.