Over a year ago, when I heard a few of my food blogging peers were invited to the Carondelet House for a 5-course meal, a Culinary Exploration by Chef Neal Fraser, I eagerly awaited my invitation. After all, an episode of Masterchef Junior, where I served as a guest judge just aired. How could they not want me to attend?

Days went by and no invite arrived. I tried to reassure myself, “sometimes invites to tastings are last minute”. When more time passed, my thoughts turned into “maybe I’ll be a back-up blogger in case someone can’t make it, I’m sure they’ll rush me out.” The day of the event came and an invite never came through.

I was stumped as to why Girls on Food wouldn’t get an invite. We have the expected amount of followers required to be considered a “social media influencer” and we have great relationships with LA PR and marketing. We have been making positive changes to our social media like adding an Instagram link in bio that streamlined our follower’s experience and we have been posting at peak times. I felt like the kid in class not invited to the most popular girl’s party. Is my blog just not cool enough? A friend of mine even suggested that I look into getting help from a social media marketing service similar to SidesMedia (https://sidesmedia.com), however, I pointed out to her that I wasn’t struggling with getting an audience to my blog, our social media reach was okay.

I started GOF in 2012 when I lived in Seattle with Tiffany who lived in Sacramento at the time. We just wanted to write about food and drinks that make us happy. Although I have put in my time in the food service industry, I’ve never claimed to be an expert on any cuisines or drinks. This project also served as a tool to help us grow as writers, which we both aspired to.

When we started up north, media events and tastings set up through restaurants weren’t even a thing. We dreamed that maybe some day chefs and restaurateurs would invite us in, not realizing how slowly that would come to fruition.

Since our launch, we’ve both relocated to LA. Tiffany has been working consistently as TV producer and playwright, so I took over this site as editor-in-chief. Running this site in LA is a drastic change from being in Seattle. Restaurants and chefs started randomly approaching me to blog about their spots. How could I say “no”?

As the editor-in-chief of this site, I feel like I’ve come far enough with my readers to admit: Blogging about food in LA is definitely a “scene”. It can be really hard to stand out which is why I am so grateful to have a reliable web hoster like Hostiserver that I can trust to give me the platform I need in order to blog. Not only is reliable hosting essential, but blogging would be in vain without a professional-looking website; Web Design Stoke services can get your platform up and running, ready to impress the online masses. It’s a scene packed with bloggers, Yelp Elites, private Facebook groups and Instagrammers. Although I’ve made a handful of pals among this scene, I’ve found that it’s easy to fall into a sort of “foodie social anxiety”. I feel like the top LA food bloggers/influencers are lying if they say they don’t feel some sort of peer-pressure to be “liked”, “re-posted” and “followed”.

I want to keep up with the Instagrammers and bloggers but how can one do this and still maintain a job and a life? Frankly, if I ate the way the most-popular foodie influencers perpetuate their image I would gain 30 lbs.

Then there’s the rising culture of calling out food bloggers as being suck-ups to PR that can give a blogger the blues. In some circles, bloggers and influencers are considered fake, or just wanting a free meal.

When these pressures weigh me down I have found that reminding myself of why I started to write this blog get me through the fog.

It’s simple- I love writing about good food. I write about places I go to that I love and try to learn new things along the way. Being able to engage and geek out with our followers is so much fun for me. If actually sitting down for hours to write a piece isn’t as cool as an Instagram image of a Unicorn Frappuccino with freshly manicured fingers, so be it.

The Culinary Exploration event took place and I started to see reports that- SURPRISE!- Chef Neal Fraser hosted this party in association with McDonald’s. On this particular menu, Neal used all McDonald’s ingredients to prepare his food. This event was filmed as a commercial for McDonald’s. Food bloggers and social media influencers were invited so they would talk up how fantastic (or AMAZEBALLS!, if they were Yelp Elite) the food was and then the reveal would leave them shocked but amused with this experiment.

The guests I knew were not amused. When the news got back to me that my peers had been fooled, all of that stupid stress of not being invited vanished. Not because the food was from McDonald’s though. I’m pretty open about being a kid raised on McDonald’s and other fast-foods, maybe I would’ve appreciate the dishes in some childhood nostalgic sort of way. (and maybe that open-book quality of mine was why I wasn’t invited). I honestly felt bad for them, as they were excited just to have been invited and felt “duped” by the commercial aspect. Even though Neal never directly lied about what the menu would be, he just never confirmed what it would entailed.

For those of you tired of my whining, you’ll be relieved to know it’s time talk about where I stand with Neal Fraser today. I finally made it to Redbird for his much talked about brunch. No, this wasn’t a personal invite from him and his team, I’ve just been very excited to check out the spot.

Redbird
114 E 2nd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012
http://redbird.la

Redbird is located in Vibiana, originally the Cathedral of Saint Vibiana, Los Angeles’ first Archodiocese Catholic cathedral established in1876. The cathedral was heavily damaged in the 1994 Northridge earthquake sparking a legal battle between the archdiocese and the historical preservationists. After a long legal battle they reached a compromise in 1996 and Cathedral of Saint Vibiana was turned over to the City of Los Angeles. In the late 2000’s it became Vibiana, an event venue and most recently, Neal, his wife Amy Knoll Fraser and their partners own the building. This cathedral structure is one of the last remaining buildings from the early period of Los Angeles history. The name Redbird pays homage to Vibiana’s past life. (cardinal… get it?)

When you first arrive, the interior features a large circular bar with plenty of cushy, lounge seating. The main dining area is actually outdoors beneath a retractable canopy, during the daytime, this provides beautiful natural lighting for the food and your date.

I love that Redbird’s bar program includes a Brunch Cocktails menu, with cocktails specifically tailored to brunch flavors. Normally I would’ve gone with the Bartender’s Choice, because I love surprises but the Russian Spring caught my eye. This cocktail is shaken with vodka, lemon, raspberry, cassis and champagne. Although the cocktail is fruity and tart, I could not get over the tall cylindrical ice cubes! They melt slower and maintain a cool temperature evenly throughout the cocktail.

What I love about the brunch menu is that the items are classic American dishes with elevated touches.

I consider the Tartine to be a superb avocado toast. This toast (fresh baked in-house) is topped with avocado, lobster, pancetta, radish, chive sprout and salsa macha. Although all the ingredients look packed on top of the toast, it’s light enough to pick up and eat. (I’m not a fork and knife person if I don’t have to be.) All these different flavors stand out in each bite. I love that the avocado is so creamy and smooth, it was almost like an aioli. The salsa macha was an unusual flavor, it tasted smokey and had a preserved spread-like texture to me.

It’s easy to say something like “of course a waffle is good, you can’t screw that up” but believe me, if you’ve brunched out as much as I have, you can screw up a waffle! Thankfully, Redbird’s Waffle is crisp, and it maintains that crispiness even when covered with buttermilk crème fraiche, blueberry compote and maple syrup. This is a classic breakfast dish at its finest.

If you’ve been paying attention to trending foods in LA, you’ve probably noticed shakshuka, a dish of eggs poached in a peppery tomato sauce, popping up on menus all over town. Redbird’s Basque Baked Eggs, feels like a more American take on that Middle Eastern dish. Short rib, morcilla, piquillos, potatoes and ossau iraty are baked with the eggs and is accompanied with a side of toast for dipping. This dish is rich and hearty one, I recommend ordering it on its own. I had enough leftover to reheat with rice for dinner.

The Steak Frites are an item you cannot go wrong with. The cut of steak is Colorado beef tenderloin, fries and a bèarnaise sauce. The bèarnaise sauce is a buttery dream. Dipping fries and steak bites into this sauce is a match made in heaven. The fries were also the perfect size, extra crispy and salted generously.

As you can see, good things come to those who wait. Even if Neal isn’t ready to prank me yet, I’m ok with that.