Edible tweets

Merrill Shindler
Posted: September 3, 2010

Los Angeles—Until recently, Grace Restaurant on Beverly Boulevard has been known for its stylish mid-20th century design by decorator Michael Berman, for its early 21st century market-driven locavore cuisine by chef/owner Neal Fraser, and for its Wednesday night multiplicity of doughnuts for dessert, freshly baked by pastry chef Mariah Swan. But now it’s also finding fame as one of the first truly interactive restaurants in Los Angeles. Or at least, it’s truly interactive on Thursday nights, when co-owner Amy Knoll Fraser says, “The Plat du Jour is your big idea.” She’s blanketed the blogosphere with an invitation for diners to tweet an idea for a dish to chef de cuisine Diana Stavaridis @BLDchefD. If Diana uses your idea, you and a friend eat for free. The restaurant wound up with a heap o’ tweets. And the first Tweet-a-Dish winner was diner Aaron Tell, who suggested “braised lamb with herbes de Provence, lemon/potato puree, grilled asparagus, sautéed fennel, and lamb jus.” Which may well be the first time the phrases “herbes de Provence” and “lamb jus” were ever used in a single tweet.