Why Destroyer is still crushing it at breakfast and lunch

“This is so 2017 of me,” I texted my journalist friend Meghan McCarron earlier this week, “but I’m spontaneously going to Destroyer today. Any chance you’re free for a meal?”

I was referencing an old inside joke, a nod to when Meghan and I were still colleagues at Eater. Jordan Kahn opened his daytime restaurant in September 2016, serving intricately layered breakfast and lunch dishes that were usually as pleasurable to eat as they were astonishingly beautiful. I hadn’t yet moved to Los Angeles but was visiting every couple of months. Meghan jokingly lamented for a year that anyone in the food world who came to town and knew she lived near Destroyer asked to go there. She may have grown a little weary of it back then, even if the rest of us were fascinated.

A return to Destroyer

Fast-forward to 2024, when I realized it had been a couple years since I’d had a meal at Destroyer. Last week I reviewed Kahn’s polarizing fine-dining magnum opus that reopened in April after four years. The ways that the food has evolved at Vespertine — moving away from extreme abstraction to dishes that, while still outrageous in their imagination and presentation, yield far more recognizable delight — made me curious about the ways Destroyer has also changed.

Koshihikari rice porridge with caramelized broccoli (among many other ingredients) at Destroyer in Culver City.

(Bill Addison / Los Angeles Times)

“I definitely see some familiar items,” Meghan said as we studied the menu projected on the wall to the right of the ordering counter. She pointed out the koshihikari rice porridge blanketed with caramelized broccoli flower buds, roasted leeks, puffed rice and other ingredients that teetered between sweet and savory. I’d last eaten the creation from a carryout container. No aesthetic flourishes in cardboard, and Kahn’s particularly suffers.

Now I was again plunging my spoon into the dish assembled in a smooth black ceramic bowl, its rightful vessel. It brought me right back to Kahn’s specific relationship to tension, to the chemistry of opposites. The creaminess comforts. The garnishes crunch, and gently sting, and challenge. The intellect engages. So do the emotions. There’s nothing else like it in California. Maybe anywhere.

Smoked fish, under a layer of savory granola and a poached egg, at Destroyer in Culver City.

(Bill Addison / Los Angeles Times)

Each item on the restaurant’s dozen-plus options pushes the diner across a similarly thrilling high-wire walk. To get to the other side, you have to respect balance. For example, smoked fish arrives obscured under strata of whipped yogurt, pickled celery root, dill and savory onion granola. It sounds wild and weird, until a few bites in your brain is signaling “everything bagel with lox,” but with more entertainment for the teeth.

The savory and the sweet

Kahn has tinkered with galette-style tarts at Destroyer over the years. He’s nailed his recent one: ribbons of zucchini tangled among salad greens, dressed in brown butter-miso vinaigrette, atop a tart spread with mildly tangy farmer’s cheese. In the melee are bite-size hunks of chicken sausage, smoked dates, shishitos and toasted almonds. Dried herbs appealingly fleck the crust and nicely contrast with the fresh greenery. This alone would make a spectacular solo lunch.

French toast occupies the other end of the flavor spectrum, a study of sweetness and its supporting flavors. An autumn version features a golden, custardy slice of crusty bread alongside a bowl full of sliced, ripe persimmons — so satisfying in their floral complexities — crowned with a scoop of whipped crème fraîche and underneath it all a hidden slick of papaya jam. To pour over: maple syrup infused with vanilla and its big-personality flavor cousin, tonka bean.

Courgette and goat cheese tart, piled with greens, at Destroyer in Culver City.

(Bill Addison / Los Angeles Times)

It is, in short, an excellent time to return to Destroyer. It isn’t as if the place fell into secrecy: The tables (all outside seating these days) were consistently full during lunch with Meghan, and a line trailed out the door in the early afternoon during a recent weekend visit. I was happy to spot manager Megan Sokol, who was Vespertine’s front-of-house manager in its first iteration, and who I hadn’t seen since the days of pandemic-era takeout meals, when cars would line up with open trunks for contactless pickup.

Recognizing her closed the gap in my mind between Destroyer and Vespertine. Destroyer, on one basic level, serves the Hayden Tract community and the tech companies that fill its Eric Owen Moss-designed buildings. You can swing by to pick up a pain au chocolat or a handsome mini sesame-carrot bundt cake (Kahn began his career as a pastry chef and his chops are on fine display here) with a sparkling espresso or sweet potato latte.

Destroyer is a counter-service operation; Vespertine, service-wise, has never been more gracious, and it needs to be for its $400-per-person price tag. But if you’re never going to spend that kind of money on dinner, I’ll nudge you toward the rice pudding and the smoked fish and perhaps a bowl of berries and other assortments over coconut yogurt and tell you: It’s a window into Kahn’s unorthodox virtuosity for a fraction of the cost.

The interior of Destroyer, where customers order pastries, dishes and drinks from the counter.

(Bill Addison / Los Angeles Times)

Also ...

• Jenn Harris considers one of the great condiments of the known universe: toum (as in the whipped garlic sauce that’s essential to Arab foodways).
  
• Stephanie Breijo has the latest details on new restaurant openings, including a welcome new haven for Uzbek cuisine and a restaurant and wine bar from the team behind one of L.A.’s great bottle shops.
  
• Cindy Carcamo writes about Mayor Karen Bass’ second extension of the Al Fresco Temporary Authorization, which was initially set to expire in July.
  
• Tiffany Tse has a roundup of 20 L.A. restaurants open for dine-in and takeout on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
  
• The Food team finds the best holiday cookies at bakeries across L.A.
  
• Finally, Ani Duzdabanyan surveys L.A.’s thriving Armenian bakery culture. He names 10 standouts for traditional and inspired pastries.