There was plenty to parse: the extravagantly reported-on wait times (which have lessened greatly in six months, unless you show up at noon on a Sunday); the community utility of the everyday diner (which exists to sustain, usually absent the heights of Silverton\u2019s precision-tuned recipes); and the actual quality of the food (the waffle, with its three-day fermented batter, veers into a new category of griddled pastry).<\/p>\n
![\"Chef](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1777129459_987_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Chef Nancy Silverton, Phil Rosenthal, Lily Rosenthal Royal and Mason Royal at Max & Helen\u2019s in Larchmont.<\/p>\n
(Ron De Angelis \/ For The Times)<\/p>\n
Making sense of Max & Helen\u2019s for myself meant revisiting the long-standing L.A. diner to which I\u2019m most drawn, Pann\u2019s Restaurant in Westchester<\/a>.<\/p>\n In dense cities like New York and Chicago, one\u2019s relationship to a diner might hinge on proximity: the block on which you live or work, or once lived or worked, or the place with the decent banana cream pie you scarf down in rebellion after a trip to the dentist. Translated to the realities of Los Angeles (navigated a few years back when Jenn Harris, Stephanie Breijo and I compiled a guide to the city\u2019s best diners<\/a>), that might mean a short drive. For me, that would be Nick\u2019s Cafe in Chinatown<\/a>, where I ask for the signature plate of ham steak and eggs, squiggled with salsa always served on the side in squeeze bottles plus a couple extra shots of hot sauce.<\/p>\n Pann\u2019s is worthy of a trek, though, and for visiting friends who aren\u2019t insistent on Gjelina<\/a> upon arrival, the restaurant is four miles from LAX and lightspeed entry into Southern California culture.<\/p>\n Step inside Pann\u2019s<\/p>\n If you\u2019ve gazed at Pann\u2019s \u2014 standing on a triangular patch of land amid the intersections of South La Tijera Boulevard, West Centila Avenue and La Cienega Boulevard since 1958 \u2014 but never stopped, let its canary-yellow neon sign and tilted, wildly angled roof finally beckon you inside. The terrazzo floors, flagstone walls and mid-century modern geometries are gleamingly preserved landmarks of L.A.\u2019s nearly vanished Googie architecture style<\/a>. There\u2019s a great story about Helen Liu Fong<\/a>, a prominent architect of the 1950s and 1960s who worked with the firm Armet & Davis, which designed Pann\u2019s: She felt like one of the restaurant\u2019s original white-tiled walls was too dull, so she painted some of its squares with red nail polish so they would pop.<\/p>\n The exterior of Pann\u2019s Restaurant, which opened in Westchester in 1958. <\/p>\n (Bill Addison \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n Googie is synonymous with post-World War II futurism, an expanding American middle class visualizing the Space Age in present tense, though books like \u201cOrange Roofs, Golden Arches: The Architecture of American Chain Restaurants\u201d<\/a> by Philip Langdon make the point that the design had practical purposes. Coffee shops and diners were cropping up everywhere. Competition demanded eye-catching enticements, even if the menus traded in the sort of sameness that equated to comfort.<\/p>\n George and Rena Panagopoulos commissioned the space and eventually shortened their name to Poulos. Jim Poulos, their son, continues to run the restaurant.<\/p>\n Only in the most ubiquitous iterations can you find references to the family\u2019s Greek heritage: a \u201cGreek salad\u201d with chickpeas, feta, cucumbers and olives numbering among its ingredients, the sharpness of feta again appearing in the \u201cGreek omelet\u201d filled with spinach and tomatoes.<\/p>\n The interior of Pann\u2019s Restaurant in Westchester. <\/p>\n (Bill Addison \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n What pulls me to Pann\u2019s is a subtler Southern thread running through its menu. Fried chicken over waffles, sure, but also salmon croquettes, macaroni and cheese crowned with crumbled bacon, downy and slightly sweet biscuits, fried catfish easily ordered with a side of grits and collard greens that are occasionally swapped for wonderfully peppery green beans served in tomato sauce with carrots and potatoes. <\/p>\n The restaurant resides at the cusp of Los Angeles\u2019 historically Black neighborhoods of Ladera Heights and Inglewood, and I\u2019m guessing these dishes, among flapjacks and tuna melts and chicken salads, might have been tailored over time to individual tastes among generations of Black customers.<\/p>\n The real caloric nostalgia tripwire for this transplanted Southerner: country-fried steak, spread nearly to its nubbly edges with cream gravy suspending bits of sausage.<\/p>\n And in the way of diners and coffee shops, it\u2019s all soothingly fine \u2014 no revelations, no dramatic pronouncements about best this or greatest that. I take a bite out of a patty melt (Swiss cheese subbed for American, zero issues), sink a fork into a soft stack of lemon-scented pancakes, saw into the battered crust of the country-fried steak. <\/p>\n The highest value of diners is their beautiful thereness, but admittedly Pann\u2019s is something more: a place where past and future collide, not in theories of relativity but in curving red booths and in swipes of milky, meaty gravy.<\/p>\n The patty melt at Pann\u2019s Restaurant.<\/p>\n (Bill Addison \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n You\u2019re reading Tasting Notes <\/p>\n Our L.A. Times restaurant experts share insights and off-the-cuff takes on where they\u2019re eating right now.<\/p>\n By continuing, you agree to our Terms of Service<\/a>, which include arbitration and a class action waiver. You agree that we and our third-party vendors may collect and use your information, including through cookies, pixels and similar technologies, for the purposes set forth in our Privacy Policy<\/a> such as personalizing your experience and ads. <\/p>\n Also … Eat your way across L.A. <\/p>\n Like what you’re reading? Sign up to get it in your inbox every week.<\/p>\n By continuing, you agree to our Terms of Service<\/a>, which include arbitration and a class action waiver. You agree that we and our third-party vendors may collect and use your information, including through cookies, pixels and similar technologies, for the purposes set forth in our Privacy Policy<\/a> such as personalizing your experience and ads. <\/p>\n ![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1777129459_603_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1777129460_232_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/1777129461_407_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"tasting](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1768675811_498_.png\")
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There is no one perfect time of day to visit a classic diner or coffee shop in Los…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":285632,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[11720,11714,9182,11719,11718,2303,48,52,51,11721,47,50,49,63,11715,1410,1457,11716,430,11717,72],"class_list":{"0":"post-285631","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-counter","9":"tag-custard-filled-french-toast","10":"tag-customer","11":"tag-fried-rice","12":"tag-hong-kong","13":"tag-l-a","14":"tag-la","15":"tag-la-headlines","16":"tag-la-news","17":"tag-liu-sha-bao","18":"tag-los-angeles","19":"tag-los-angeles-headlines","20":"tag-los-angeles-news","21":"tag-los-angeles-times","22":"tag-needle","23":"tag-place","24":"tag-restaurant","25":"tag-ryan-wong","26":"tag-week","27":"tag-wong","28":"tag-year"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285631"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285631\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/285632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}