My 2 Cents, a soul meals bistro that anchors a piece of West Pico Boulevard that’s residence to a number of Black-owned eating places, is about to shut completely on July 31. Opened by chef Alisa Reynolds in 2013, the restaurant grew to become a neighborhood favourite because of a Southern consolation menu that’s knowledgeable by Reynolds’ L.A. upbringing, together with turkey meatloaf, grit fries and BLT sandwiches with fried inexperienced tomatoes.
“It’s something that I’ve been thinking about for the last few years,” Reynolds stated of the restaurant’s closure. “For me, I think the best thing to do is to be able to feed people in their homes, do pop-ups, do collabs, and make the city excited again. I can do more as chef Alisa than I can do at My 2 Cents.”
Shifting ahead, Reynolds, who was a non-public chef for the Dodgers and rapper-actor Frequent earlier than opening My 2 Cents, will concentrate on increasing the restaurant’s catering arm, along with collaborations and pop-ups with native cooks and eating places. She can also be growing a product line.
“I want to inspire the world through my food,” she stated. “Sometimes you have to make such decisions, especially during times when everything is changing.”
1. Shrimp and corn grits and oxtail tacos from My 2 Cents. (Silvia Razgova / For The Occasions) 2. Tyrene Mills, sous chef at My Two Cents, prepares a turkey meatloaf sandwich. (Silvia Razgova / For The Occasions) 3. Fried inexperienced tomatoes with a aspect salad and remoulade from My Two Cents. (Silvia Razgova / For The Occasions)
Listed on The Occasions’ information to the 101 Finest Eating places in L.A. for 2 years working, My 2 Cents joins a rising record of notable restaurant closures this 12 months, together with fellow 101 awardee Right here’s Taking a look at You in Koreatown final month.
Reynolds cited a number of causes for the closure, together with vital monetary loss following the COVID pandemic, Hollywood business strikes, January wildfires and, most not too long ago, ongoing raids from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“I just kept going. I was like, ‘Nothing’s going to stop us. We have to,’” stated Reynolds, who referred to as the choice to shut My 2 Cents one of many hardest she’s ever needed to make. “I had so many great customers and clients that believed in this restaurant. Because I think that it was more than a restaurant. It was like a little movement of love.”
Chef-owner Alisa Reynolds friends out the window of her restaurant on Pico Boulevard.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Occasions)
This isn’t the primary time My 2 Cents has been beneath risk of closure. In 2017, Reynolds launched a crowdfunding marketing campaign to settle a lawsuit introduced by former backers of the restaurant. Multi-hyphenate entrepreneur Issa Rae joined forces with musicians Solange and Earl Sweatshirt on a fundraising dinner that helped hold its doorways open.
When pandemic shutdowns compelled the restaurant‘s closure in 2020, Reynolds launched Tacos Negros, a takeout and delivery menu featuring tacos that took inspiration from pan-African foodways, including a six-hour-braised oxtail taco that the Food team listed on its guide to the 101 Best Tacos in L.A. The tacos became so popular that after restaurants reopened for dine-in, she added the most-ordered options to the permanent menu.
My 2 Cents is located in a shopping plaza that belongs to a single landlord, who Reynolds says is under immense pressure from developers.
“That’s the toughest half as a result of I really like the neighborhood a lot,” Reynolds stated. “But I don’t want to invest any more money there because it could be gone any day.”
Only a couple doorways down from My 2 Cents sits Stevie’s Creole Cafe, a long-standing storefront that serves what late restaurant critic Jonathan Gold as soon as referred to as “the best bowl of gumbo this side of New Orleans.” A couple of blocks east of that’s Sky’s Connoisseur Tacos, a Black-owned taco store that popularized a distinctly soulful method to tacos that has since proliferated throughout the town.
“I just wonder if we’re going to recognize Pico in 10 years,” Reynolds stated.
When it first opened in 2013, My 2 Cents helped lay the inspiration for an L.A.-inspired tackle Southern consolation meals to flourish throughout the town. Host of the Daytime Emmy Award-winning “Searching for Soul Food” sequence on Hulu, Reynolds says the restaurant was one of many first in L.A. to place shrimp and grits on its brunch menu.
“My goal in opening [My 2 Cents] was, and the name is, my perspective on soul food,” stated Reynolds, who’s set her menu aside with scratch-made sauces, native produce and loads of vegan and gluten-free choices, together with a six-cheese mac and cheese with brown rice penne. “I thought that it would be my love letter to Los Angeles as a French-trained chef and yet, a Black girl who also remembers her mom made pork chops on Thursday.” At My 2 Cents, Reynolds coats her grilled pork chops in a candy agave jerk sauce, an homage to the origins of Jamaican jerk seasoning, which was first used on wild boars.
1. A server delivers lunch to clients at My 2 Cents. (Silvia Razgova/For The Occasions) 2. The inside of My Two Cents is an homage to Black meals tradition with cookbooks, seasonings and vibrant artwork. (Silvia Razgova/For The Occasions) 3. A pair of diners take pleasure in a meal at My 2 Cents. (Carter Hiyama/For the Occasions)
Within the homey eating room, vibrant artwork hangs on the partitions and seasoning blends widespread in Black households — Previous Bay, Slap Ya Mama — stability on cabinets subsequent to cookbooks, with an array of eye-catching desserts, all of them baked by Reynolds’ sister Theresa Fountain, organized on the counter behind them.
Diners have loads of alternatives to make reminiscences at My 2 Cents earlier than the restaurant closes its doorways for good. Each Wednesday starting this week, the restaurant will host a wine tasting alongside a Southern-inspired tapas buffet. A two-drink minimal grants clients entry to the bottomless unfold and the menu modifications weekly primarily based on Reynolds’ whims, with previous bites together with jerk rooster sliders on pretzel bread and goat cheese with sizzling honey on naan. My 2 Cents can even proceed to host its widespread ‘90s brunch on Sundays, with a live DJ and guests encouraged to dress on theme.
Though the restaurant will close its doors at the end of this month, its final celebration will take place in the shopping plaza’s parking zone on Aug. 1, full with meals, drinks and a dwell DJ. As for the long run, Reynolds says followers of My 2 Cents can keep up to date about occasions and pop-ups on Instagram.
“It’s been a 12-year run,” Reynolds stated. “It’s going to be a wild ride, but we are not going anywhere and that food is still going to be here forever.”
