Botanica, the new restaurant in Silver Lake, is owned and operated by two women who were ? and still aspire to be ? food journalists. Heather Sperling and Emily Fiffer worked in New York for years, writing about food for Tasting Table, Daily Candy and StarChefs. Botanica was conceived as a way to bring their food dreams to life, both physically and on the page. They refer to the endeavor as a restaurant, marketplace and magazine, and while the magazine has yet to materialize it's still very much a part of the plan. That means this is an intellectual pursuit as well as an aspirational fantasy. The look and feel of the place are massively important, in the same way that a glossy food magazine is judged on the visual package it presents. We read Saveur and Bon Appetit to fall into the beauty of their pages, and Botanica scratches a similar itch. You could go there simply to eat gorgeous plates of food that look as though they were lifted from the pages of a fabulous food magazine, in a room that might be featured in the pages of a fabulous design magazine. Botanica is a restaurant, but it is also a lifestyle. Read Besha Rodell's full review. ? ?
Photos by Anne Fishbein