Kali Steak — Restaurant in Los Angeles

My overall opinion of my dining experience at Kali is a mild disappointment. I ordered the Seasonal Tasting Menu which is a five course dish at $140 / person.

This tasting menu includes • Duo of the Sea • Local Rockfish Crudo • Summer Truffle Agnolotti • Dry Aged Flannery Beef Ribeye • Meringue Gelato

While not listed on their website menu, there is also an optional eight course Chef’s Menu that is an extension of the seasonal tasting menu, including three additional items for $190 / person.

If you would rather order individual items, there is the a la carte menu available including appetizers, various dishes, and dry aged meats.

The restaurant features a cozy interior with a eye catching blue color scheme. They feature both indoor and patio dining, where all parties are spaced apart by at least one table due to covid. They also feature a fully stocked bar with seats at the bar.

(I had to cut out my review of the first three items, and part of the fourth, due to Google’s character limit on reviews.)

The main entree is the dry aged flannery beef ribeye. Based on the items on their a la carte menu, this restaurant prides itself on its various selection of aged beefs. This ribeye was served with a layered potato side, mushroom, grilled onion, and a black garlic glaze. The beef was well cooked, having a perfect medium rare inside, and a crispy seasoned outside. The flavor had a good balance, and was neither too fatty or too bland.

The dessert of this tasting menu is perhaps my favorite dish. It is a meringue gelato made from a local family farm cream. However, this item was more like a frozen cream, a literal iced cream, more than a gelato in my option. It was very creamy and you can taste the freshness of the cream as the ingredient. However, an interring paring was the sugar cured egg yolks. This is the yellow sprinkle topping on top, and provided a very interesting combination of flavors. It had the sweetness of the sugar but the saltiness and distinct flavor of egg yolk. Together with the cream, it provided an excellent combination of sweetness and saltiness, and also a flakey like texture that melted in your mouth along with the gelato. An excellent dessert all around, and the most memorable dish of the night in my opinion.

As a thank you gift with the check, we are served a very very rich dark chocolate truffle treat.

All in all, the quality of the food was great, and the presentation was also eye catching. However, there are two main disappointments with my meal. The first is the feeling that this tasting menu could have done with perhaps just one more item. Throughout the entire meal I couldn’t help but feel underwhelmed. While most dishes were great, there was nothing that wowed, and I left feeling that number of dishes didn’t make up for that feeling to make the dinner feel worth it.

Also notable is the lackluster service to go along with the meal. From the wait staff, it felt as if there was no enthusiasm towards the dishes being served or for our guest experience. Each dish was accompanied by an exceedingly brief description, and that was it.

What makes a Michelin Star restaurant memorable is the quality of food, presentation of dishes, selection of ingredients, and dinner service.

While the first two were present, the latter two were not. I already touched on dinner service, but I wanted to make one final remark on ingredients.

Most times, you justify the cost of a meal through the wide selection of unique ingredients. At other Michelin restaurants, I have been impressed by both the wide selection of ingredients, but also the creativity and uniqueness of said ingredients. However, in this case, all of the ingredients were similar and felt rehashed except one. The sugar cured egg yolk served with the dessert. This is the one ingredient that caught my attention and felt creative and innovating that made the dish stand out and become memorable.

Overall, a good meal, but I couldn’t help but feeling mildly disappointed both throughout the meal...

We were slightly worried after booking a dinner here for our belated honeymoon after reading some of the other reviews here, but Kali pulled out all of the stops. I've eaten at places owned by celebrities that taunt how many stars they have, and they don't hold a candle to Kali.

We had the nine course tasting, which some complain is over priced, but this blew a $350 tasting I had elsewhere away. Decadent doesn't feel like a powerful enough descriptor for the menu the chefs put in front of my partner and I. The dishes were playful and expressive while being refined and clearly made from a place of love for the craft. I'm sorry but the 9 course tasting is and insane value for the amount of labor that goes into that meal. I'd be shocked if they're turning a profit with the army of staff they have.

Anyway, every course was timed well with enough time between each plate to discuss it with my partner, enjoy our drinks, and anticipate the next plate. This type of meal is not for those in a rush, set aside two hours minimum. It was around two and a half hours from seating to check for us. Be prepared to have some of the best chefs in the game flex their skills for you.

The cured egg yolk gelato was elegant in it's simplicity. I feel sorry for those who didn't understand that dish from other reviews. The entire meal was full of so many different techniques on display. I'm only a home cook, but I could tell the amount of prep that went into some of the dishes they served us. There was only one dish that didn't live up to the rest, and at any other restaurant it would have absolutely slayed. The new York strip steak was expertly cooked, and on it's own was a truly special bite of food, but it was lost on that plate full of flavors that masked the subtle smoke flavor and beefiness of a grass fed steak. Don't get me wrong the beet 2 ways on that plate were so good, but the steak was put out to pasture. That said, any time there are risks taken, there will be missteps. That dish was only a misstep because of what proceeded it. Every component of that plate is a star, but they outshine each other. It was a welcome change of pace considering I've had tastings at other restaurants for more money than Kali that put inedible A5 wagyu in front of me.

The wagyu tartar was another wow moment for me. I'm no stranger to tartar or wagyu, but to somehow elevate an ingredient that most serve with minimal handling takes so much courage. Kudos on making me actually like scallops for the first time in my life. Every dish was practically licked clean.

I will scrape my pennies together and hopefully dine at Kali again the next time I visit LA. I have told my local friends they MUST try it. Thank you to the staff for giving us a memory that will last my partner and I another...

I ordered their seasonal tasting menu, a 5-course menu. I also did wine pairing. The first dish was the famous crowded beach. All seafood was really fresh and the seasoning did not overshadow the freshness. I extremely like the way they handled scallops. It reminded me of my favorite bean crackers back in my hometown. Most of the seafood was raw but I love raw seafood. The second dish was also scallops but seasoned differently. I like the way they also added cucumbers to the dish. The sweetness from the cucumbers and the sweetness (umami) from the scallops were indeed a great combination. The third dish was veggie risotto. In most cases I'm not a fan of green beans but the way they handled the beans was so perfect that I ended up eating all the beans on the plate. The risotto itself was slightly underwhelming though. Since the dish itself was already lightly seasoned, the truffle flakes did not add too much. However, this was in general delightful to eat. The fourth dish was the duck breast. The duck breast itself was impeccable. One of the best duck breasts I have ever tasted in my life. The skin was fried crispy and the meat was at a perfect medium rare. I like the carrot sauce a lot. It mitigated the grease coming from the duck and the sweetness also worked well with the rather salty seasoning of the duck. However, one mistake I found was the asparagus. It was overcooked and really hard to chew. I also complained to my server but since I liked the duck breast so much, I would believe that was just a rare mistake. So all I had done was to make sure the server did let the kitchen know so no other customers would need to have the same experience. The final dish was ice cream with salt cured egg yolk. It was an interesting experience and a good way to end the course. All the wines were also selected perfectly with the dish and they were also very generous in giving the wine. To conclude, I would want to visit the restaurant again just for the first dish and also the duck breast in spite of some room for...