One of things I love most about L.A., or any city for that matter, are the restaurants. There are the little, cheap places that you go back to time and time again, trendy places to people watch and those unfortunate disappointments where you wish you d stayed home and entertained instead.

On Saturday night, we visited Cinch. It s the new, trendy, L.A. hot spot. The best part of Cinch, the desserts. The bread pudding may be even better than my grandmothers. It s smooth, delicious and reminded me of a wonderful cr me brulee. We also shared an apple pie a la mode that was more like a delightful apple tart. Crisp pastry, hot, not-to-sweet filling, cool vanilla bean ice-cream.

For a Franco-Japanese fusion restaurant the French style desserts were the best. The entrees were good, but just good, not great. I had soba noodles with twice cooked pork. It was a comfort food type meal no real zing, though. Adam had venison which he also dubbed good. Kyle the short ribs. It was just okay food.

Before dinner, in the packed (yes, even at 6:30) bar we each had a martini, Kyle Apple, Me Creamsicle, Adam Banana Split. Why, oh why, do I continue to get caught up in the martini menus? Ten dollars and I m usually disappointed. This is the last time. I ll be sure to get a nice Syrah next time.

The best Cinch food the sashimi roll. If the Atkins diet tasted like that . . . man oh man, we d all me skinny minnies!

The worst about Cinch. The service. Try getting a reservation almost impossible. We get there, and lo and behold the restaurant is EMPTY. Also, we had to close out our bar tab before dinner just annoying. Lastly, the rush to get us up from our table. Just plain rude.

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