Just down from Howlin' Ray's, sitting on the ground floor in the corner of Far East Plaza, there's a new treasure trove of cookbooks, international food mags, high-end chefs' tweezers, ceramics and handmade pots and pans. Shut up and take our money.
Now Serving opened last week at 727 North Broadway, and it's already proving to be L.A.'s boutique food-accessory destination: a cozy and curated lifestyle-meets-cookware store for both the professional chef and the home cook with a great eye.
“It really is to fill the gap,” says Ken Concepcion, who owns and operates the shop with his wife, Michelle Mungcal. “We felt like there was this vacuum in L.A. As a chef, some of my favorite cookbook stores were either in New York or San Francisco or Seattle and I felt like L.A. really needed its own thing.”
Having spent time as a chef in Wolfgang Puck's kitchens for roughly 12 years, Concepcion amassed favorite products and titles from around the world, and now he's sharing them with L.A. Cookbooks are organized by region and country, including the U.S., Central and Latin America, Southeast Asia, India, Australia, the UK, Italy, France, Spain and the Middle East. There are shelves devoted to baking and pastries, cooking reference, beverages, meat, vegetables, food writing and even children's cookbooks.
Photograph: Stephanie Breijo
There are Japanese knives, locally made ceramics from Mt. Washington Pottery, meat thermometers, hand-forged carbon steel pans from Blanc Creatives out of Virginia, JB Prince cookware out of New York, aprons, mandolins and spice blends used in the Wolfgang kitchens. There are vintage Kilim rugs repurposed into knife rolls. There are ceramic fermentation crocks. There are cutting boards and even the same type of wooden tortilla presses used in the acclaimed Noma pop-up in Tulum. R.I.P. our bank accounts.
Next spring or early summer, look for a second Now Serving concept: the daytime restaurant next door that will seat approximately 40 and serve as Concepcion's Modern American luncheonette with a focus on vegetables. At night, it will host chefs and cookbook authors for talks, signings and dinner events.
Until then, stop by this Sunday for chef Josef Centeno's Bäco cookbook signing from 2 to 3pm, or drop by sometime to peruse the newsstand full of food mags from around the world, whether it's the Chips zine from Johannesburg, an HojaSanta magazine from Mexico, or The Carton, a Middle Eastern food-and-culture mag made in Beirut.
“It's really just a mix of cookbook store meets Los Angeles lifestyle,” says Concepcion. “But everything is pushed through this prism of food and culinary goods.”
Photograph: Stephanie Breijo
Photograph: Stephanie Breijo
Photograph: Stephanie Breijo
Now Serving is now open at 727 North Broadway in Far East Plaza, from 11am to 7pm Thursday through Saturday and on Monday, and from noon to 5pm on Sunday, with availability for private appointments on Wednesdays.