Now Open: Cortez Brings a New Menu Every Day to Echo Park

Photo: Javier Cabral/Grub Street

By Lesley Balla

Marta Teegan and Robert Stelzner, the brains behind Echo Park's favorite eco-conscious market, Cookbook, have finally started serving at their new restaurant, Cortez nearby. The restaurant follows the market's sensibility, which spotlights local, sustainably raised, mostly organic ingredients, from the seafood to the meat and vegetables. Cookbook has a huge following for its prepared foods, so this seems like a no-brainer.

According to Grub Street, the opening menu sheds some light on the thinking here, dishes like rabbit escabeche with field greens and fennel, line-caught Pacific halibut with tahini and roasted lemons, flatbread topped with merguez sausage, yogurt, arugula and pickles, and grilled polenta with marinated radicchio and taleggio. There is small but growing wine and beer list, as well. The menu changes daily, pretty much the enitre thing, and while it isn't posted anywhere, you can call to see what's happening that night around 4 PM. Right now the restaurant is open for dinner nightly at 5 PM, with lunch and weekend brunch happening sometime in November.

1356 Allison Ave.; 213-481-8015