Category: Things to do with kids: Kid-friendly Eats

Los Angeles is home to Mexican restaurants to suit every taste and budget, but if you’re looking to please a crowd of hungry children, you can’t go wrong with La Parrilla. Festive in atmosphere and more than reasonable in price, La Parrilla has three locations in the L.A. area. The menu is as overstuffed and brilliant as the décor. Adventurous adults should try the molcajetes, stone urns full of cooked meats, cactus leaves (nopalitos) and cheese, or any of the amazing molé dishes. Children may just want to stick to the giant combo plates of enchiladas, chile rellenos, and other Mexican favorites. Strolling “musicos” add to the cheerful ambience.

Contact number: (323) 661-8055

Location: “3129 West Sunset Boulevard at Silver Lake Boulevard

Los Angeles, CA 90026-2131”

Learn more here.

Open for lunch since 1917, this bustling market houses stands selling fresh cheap produce and cuisines spanning the globe. Treat children to a delicious horchata, a traditional Mexican beverage made with cinnamon rice-milk. Try a carnitas torta from the taco stand, Hawaiian BBQ, or a Japanese bento box. There’s even pizza for finicky eaters. Make sure to leave with a bag of fresh avocados, mangos, or papayas.

Contact number: (213) 624-2378

Location: “317 South Broadway

Los Angeles, CA 90013-1229”

Learn more here.

Despite an unassuming exterior, Clifton’s Cafeteria is a magical redwood-themed restaurant inside. Inspired by California’s national parks, Clifton’s is a wonderland of fake trees and river streams surrounding its two stories of tables. If the food is not particularly innovative, it owes to the fact that the menu remains largely unchanged from the forties, when Clifton’s first opened. But the cuisine is somewhat beside the point, as anything your grandkids order is sure to taste good while admiring the recreated majesty of nature. Be sure to look on the second floor for Nature’s Cathedral, a hollow redwood with a recorded sermon on earth’s beauty that plays when you press a button.

Contact number: (213) 627-1673

Location: “648 South Broadway

Los Angeles, CA 90014-1807”

Learn more here.

 

A Japanese import by way of France, Beard Papa’s is a truly cross-cultural dessert experience. Their specialty is a giant cream puff; a flaky pastry stuffed with a custard cream. They can be ordered by the box like donuts, or individually for a perfectly sweet treat that can be consumed out of hand while cruising the shops on Sawtelle Boulevard, or walking around the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Hollywood Boulevard with your children.

Contact number: (323) 462-6100

Location: “6801 Hollywood Boulevard Suite 1

53

Los Angeles, CA 90028”

Learn more here.

Some foods are more fun to eat than others. There is perhaps nothing more satisfying than slurping up slippery udon out of a bowl of miso broth. Most of the offerings at Asahi Ramen, located on a strip of Japanese shops on Sawtelle Boulevard in West LA, involve some combination of noodles, broth, and meat, though there are also salads and non-soup items. But it’s the steaming bowls of ramen heaped with veggies and shredded meat or tofu that remain the real draw, sure to delight you and your children.

Contact number: (310) 479-2231

Location: “2027 Sawtelle Boulevard at LaGrange Avenue

Los Angeles, CA 90025″

Learn more here.

A Japanese import by way of France, Beard Papa’s is a truly cross-cultural dessert experience. Their specialty is a giant cream puff; a flaky pastry stuffed with a custard cream. They can be ordered by the box like donuts, or individually for a perfectly sweet treat that can be consumed out of hand while cruising the shops on Sawtelle Boulevard, or walking around the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Hollywood Boulevard with your children.

Contact number: (323) 462-6100

Location: “6801 Hollywood Boulevard Suite 153

Los Angeles, CA 90028”

Learn more here.