The Best Upcoming Fall Restaurants, Bars And Cookbooks In Fall 2014 | Tasting Table LA

Fall is just around the corner, and here in L.A., the culinary calendar is packed. On our radar: new restaurants, bars, cookbooks, food fests and everything in between.

Here's our guide to the best of fall. 

RESTAURANTS

"There's something fun and really soul-satisfying for me and Quinn about eating food that's been cooked on an open wood-burning fire," says Karen Hatfield of the centerpiece of her and her husband's Odys & Penelope, set to open in West Hollywood. The power couple—the restaurant's gets its name from the Greek king and his wife in Homer's Odyssey—go back to the basics with grilled meats, fish and seasonal vegetables. "There's this real tangible, deep connection you get from preparing food like this. It's elemental."

Joshua Drew also pays homage to the grill at Cordoba, which will take a cue from Argentina. "The style of dining, food, furniture, design, layout are dictated from that region of the world," says Drew. Weathered leather, wood and metal fill out the Los Feliz space, set to open in December, while California produce dictates the seasonal menu of the Farmshop and Ad Hoc alum.

BierBeisl Imbiss is back. Bernhard Mairinger's much-mourned restaurant will take on on the imbiss—stand-up, street food stalls of Mairinger's native Austria—at Downtown's refurbished Spring Arcade Building. The young Austrian chef also imports young talent Rene Selbermayr to outfit the café/bakery with to-go and dine-in salads, sandwiches and updated traditional breads and viennoiserie such as "a proper croissant and other things that people don't know of or have forgotten."

For those lucky enough to catch Belcampo's pop-up earlier this year, the test-run was just a sneak peak to the full-service restaurant at a new, expansive Santa Monica location. Come late fall, carnivores can stop by the butcher counter for humanely raised and processed chops and steaks, or sit down for meat-centric dishes. Though the menu will be rejiggered, we're hoping the meatloaf blue plate and dry-aged, grass-fed burger make an appearance.

Clockwise: Head Bartender Cameron Dodge-White of The Nice Guy, Belcampo Meat Co., Stir Market (Photo: Jesus Banuelos)

Continue the meat theme at AOC's former Third Street location. Chef Vic Casanova makes room for his version of an Italian steakhouse at Pistola. Expect nouveau, gussied-up versions of traditional classics from la cucina rustica.

The rectory of a restored cathedral sets the scene for Neal Fraser's gorgeous Redbird. With the final touches of the DTLA, 140-seat dining room in place, dinner—which, according to Fraser, will be "not expensive or inexpensive"—options include an extensive lounge menu that includes beer by the bottle and tap and cocktails from Julian Cox.

Fans of Scratch|Bar can head to Phillip Frankland Lee's second restaurant, The Gadarene Swine, in Studio City this September. Expect bites that are refined as they are whimsical (Scratch|Bar's bite-size chicken and waffle, and the literal Squid in a Box), but don't expect meat on your plate. "This will not be a vegan restaurant, just a restaurant that does not serve animal products." Sit at the chef's counter for a ten-course tasting menu of eggplant, carrot and more that you never knew could be so exciting.

Between Commissary and The Gadarene Swine seems vegetables are en vogue for fall. And at Le Comptoir, Gary Menes will compose seasonal plates using produce grown from the restaurant's own garden and his fine-dining, French training. Now a permanent fixture at Koreatown's revamped Hotel Normandie, the pop-up turned brick-and-mortar will have a permanent home by late September.

BARS

John Terzian, Brian Toll, Adam Koral and Markus Molinari will defend their titles of nightclub kings with two sure-to-be hot spots—The Nice Guy and Blind Dragon, both set to open off the Sunset Strip.

The duo behind Black Market Liquor Bar, Scope, and the recently opened Chestnut Club will be back in Venice at Old Lightning. Steve Livigni and Pablo Moix's 25-seat bar ditches mixology for purist cocktails.

With seven bars under their belt, Jonnie Houston and Mark Houston are taking on their next target: Butchers and Barbers. The brothers team up with Seoul Sausage's Chris Oh for their first restaurant venture. Though they're mum on the project (Sweeny Todd meets Blind Barber?), we can look forward to old-school cool with vintage finds with the Hollywood set.

COOKBOOKS

Flipping through Zoe Nathan's Huckleberry, out September 9, is like being wrapped in a warm blanket: recipes for pastries, pancakes, hand pies and things on toast are the stuff of feel-good mornings you want to wake up to every day.

Yearning to reconnect with his roots, Hans Röckenwagner pens Das Cookbook—a collection of German recipes by way of Californian. The Röckenwagner chef takes readers through breads, breakfast, lunch, dinner and dessert (familiar plates from his eponymous restaurants), as well as dishes to entertain and staples to stock your Bavarian pantry.

Clockwise: Huckleberry, Das Cookbook, BierBeisl Imbiss (Photo: Jill Paider), The Taste (Photo: Marie Astrid Gonzalez)

PROVISIONS AND THINGS

SFV dwellers can fill up on turkey meatloaf and short rib sandwiches this time next month at Joan's on Third. The upcoming Studio City location will have the same "friendly neighborhood feel" and comfort-food menu as the original retail shop/café/bakery.

After shuttering Lou in 2012, owner Lou Amdur reincarnated the beloved wine bar into Lou Wine and Provisions. And a year later, the second iteration includes a larger space and wine selection for the soon-to-open Lou Wine Shop & Tastings in Los Feliz. Says Night + Market's Kris Yenbamroong, "The thing I miss most about Lou Wine Bar closing is the experience of having Lou pouring me a glass while talking about it. Because he's allowed to have tastings at his new shop, I'll be able to experience this again."

The name is ICDC, and the offerings are ice cream, doughnuts and coffee. Neal and Amy Fraser will set up shop next to BLD, showcasing the sweets that the restaurant is known for. The ice cream: eight rotating flavors such as mint chocolate chip on house-made waffle cones. The doughnuts: eight flavors made to order. The coffee: Verve. The spoiler alert: a triple-threat coffee ice cream–doughnut sandwich.

With Stir Market, the food hall lands on Beverly Boulevard. Baked goods, charcuterie, cheese, wine, craft beer, espresso, rotisserie chicken and build-your-own salads fill out this retail space with dine-in food stalls set to open mid-September. And within Grand Central Market, the Eggslut guys are slated to open a ramen joint in late September. Eggs and ramen, so happy together.

Don't be surprised if the Salty Pimp and Bea Arthur become regular appearances in L.A. Come October, Big Gay Ice Cream takes its NYC-born soft serve, paletas and ice cream sandwiches to the streets of Downtown. Kitty corner to Alma, so Ari Taymor anticipates, "it'll round out the neighborhood nicely." The largest outpost yet, the massive Ninth-and-Main Street storefront will feature a sit-down soda fountain counter serving frozen treats in custom-made Heath ceramic bowls.

We're counting down the final days until the L.A. debut of PDX import Salt & Straw. The Larchmont storefront will sell handmade ice cream made with local ingredients. Upgrade the usual scoop for flavors such as tomato and Ojai olive oil sherbet.

FESTIVALS

A long list of chefs will congregate for the food benefit of the season. L.A. Love Alex's Lemonade fetes its fifth year on September 20 with bites from Michael Anthony (Gramercy Tavern) and Marc Vetri (Vetri) to Donald Link (Cochon) and the L.A. event's founders Suzanne Goin and David Lentz. There'll also be cocktails and wine on hand from local barmen and vintners.

The chef sightings continue at The Taste, back for its annual three-day fest at Paramount Studio's backlot. From August 29 through August 31, Jonathan Gold and other L.A. Times staffers host tastings and demos from Sunday Brunch to Flavors of L.A. You may spot Thomas Keller, Nancy Silverton, Michael Cimarusti and more.

If you ever doubted Angelenos' love for Sriracha, let the L.A. Sriracha Festival be proof to naysayers. Sqirl, Eggslut and Guerrilla Tacos are among the lovers of the local hot sauce, cooking up bites at this October 19 themed tribute.

As we count down her 2015 Helms Bakery opening, Sherry Yard counts down the days to Good Food Pie Contest on October 5. Says Yard, "For the flaky person in all of us—more than 250 pies, 20 judges and Pepto-Bismol." Home bakers bring in their best pies as Evan Kleiman and a panel of judges eat their way through pies, pies and more pies.

MORE OVERHEARD

"I'm looking forward to the new Laurel Hardware spot with Mario Alberto that's being built in the old Lola's space." – Phillip Frankland Lee, Scratch|Bar, The Gadarene Swine

Chad Colby (Chi Spacca) is looking forward to Mozza alums "David Rosoff and Chris Feldmeier's upcoming project with Bill Chait."