Holbox Los Angeles

Holbox is on South Grand Avenue, a twenty-minute walk from the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. It holds a Michelin star and sits at number four on the Los Angeles Times 101 Best Restaurants list. The room runs smart and elegant, serving a menu of Mexican-fusion seafood.

Most restaurants earning this level of critical recognition lean into formal white-tablecloth service, but Holbox chooses the opposite. You order at a counter and find a seat among the bustle, prioritising the quality of the raw bar over the artifice of traditional fine dining. It is a more demanding experience than its sit-down neighbours in the city, but the trade-off is the precision of the kitchen, which feels sharper and more immediate than any of its formal rivals nearby.