Crossroads Kitchen

Since it first opened I've eaten here just twice, most recently this week. Here's my Crossroads Kitchen review.

Chef Tal Ronnen is well-known in the vegan/vegetarian world, and his investors/partners have put created a posh space for dining. The place is gorgeous, rich colors with hints of wood. Seating is divided into vinyl booths, tables, and bar stools in front of a wide full bar. Everything glistens, and large windows let in natural light. The high ceiling added to a feeling of spaciousness even though guests seat closely together.

On both visits staff were attentive, and our food arrived quickly as we knew to eat our dinner early. Portions are on the smaller side. Prices are moderate for being in this fancy part of town.

I've tasted so far the: cheese platter, caviar and fried oyster mushroom over artichoke leaves, crab cakes, day's special house made pasta, lasagna, spinach salad, kid's pizza, panna cotta with berry spread, and cannoli. All pretty good.

If you come during mealtime, expect to pay. Or eat early or just make a reservation.

Updated from previous review on 2013-05-20

Praise Legba, (Haitian God of Crossroads) this place can have whatever immortal spirit I may have left to promise in exchange for a couple more impossible burgers. Their take on the ImBo is by far the most unintentionally funny. You walk into this upscale, dress-up, restaurant with two hosts and half a million in dining room furnishings in a 10 million dollar location and sit down at the bar and order a motherfucking plate of In-n'-Out.

Amazing how perfectly this captures all of the pleasure and hedonic indulgence of a fast food burger, without the horrifying reality of how murder-corps come by the same product. The impossible burger for me, can be a little too lifelike and gives me flashbacks to yucky meat mouth feelings when I eat it because it is so similar in texture to a meat-burger, however this prep at Crossroads analogs a well-done burger which was markedly appreciated by me and maybe anyone else who has long forgotten any pleasant associations with the texture of dead animals in their mouth.


The impossible meat taquitos were similarly fresh and delicious as was the service friendly, polite and cute.



Updated from previous review on 2017-03-26

We went there to celebrate my 10 year veganniversary. I love the way they are revolutionizing vegan food. We loved everything we ordered and the cocktails were awesome. It's pricey, though.

I really enjoyed Crossroads! It's definitely a fancy special occasion place, but the food doesn't disappoint. Really tasty - loved the bolognese pasta the most. We were full with 5 dishes btw the 2 of us.

When I visited, I was instructed to order the vegan eggs benedict, because it's something you can't always get elsewhere. The server was right, and I don't regret getting it at all. The food was great and I liked the potatoes that came with it as well. It did get a little expensive, however.

I likely would save a visit here for a date night and get dressed up instead of arriving in a t-shirt for brunch like I did.

A couple of nights ago we were in L.A. so we went here. Not knowing much about it. The place was packed with trendy 30 somethings and the ambiance looked great. However I've been vegan for 40 years and never paid $ 75.00 for 4 tapas and one glass of wine for my husband. Plus we left a $12.00 tip.
What we ate. Lentil pita with three dipping sauces. Very good. Then we had stuffed blossoms., 2 blossoms for $14. I must confess my Italian grandmother made these with her authentic and home grown tomato. Vegetarian but not vegan. My husband was more impressed than I was. I couldn't get over that there was only 2. Then we had Romano beans. The best dish to me. Very tasty if you like black garlic which I do. Then we had a pasta dish with uneatable stringy broccoli and veggie sausage, My least favorite, taste wise. Lack of flavor really. Service was very good but not warm and friendly

Great experience and amazing food. Prices did not seem particularly high, despite what other reviewers wrote. The server told us that serving sizes are small - like tapas - and that we should order two-three per person. It was a delight to try so many vegan delicacies. Truly a fantastic experience.

Tapas style vegan food concept is nice. Food in crossroads is generally O.K., some things are better than others. However, nothing that great compared to other vegan places in LA. Yes, they want to give this place the environment of sophistication to plant-based food, but honestly for what you end up paying you will have much better vegan food in nice environments elsewhere (e.g. Shojin, Little Pine).

The locations itself is very nice, has great decor and friendly service. Menu is filled with great options to choose from and they also have a nut free menu for those who have an allergy.

However when ordering a $18-$25 dish of food and it comes out to the size of your palm, you think to yourself..."Okay this must taste out of this world!" Unfortunately, Not! It would have taken 3-4 dishes to feel remotely close to satisfied and after my first dish being a bit of a disappointment, I was not interested in a $200 meal for the two.

Sure the food is great to appeal to non vegans, it's very convincing. However if you are trying to sway non vegans to go vegan, this is the reason they say "I can't afford to be vegan."

It's not that the food was bad, it was very good. However my complaint is with the price vs the amount and quality of the food. With the price point and such small amount of food, you need to blow peoples minds or give them $18-$25 worth of good food.

We also ordered a few desserts. They were good, but nothing that stood out to me. The cheesecake kinda tasted sour and fermented.

I was actually genuinely sad after leaving the restaurant. We had traveled 4 hours to visit this location for my birthday and I felt like it was huge waste of time and money. I couldn't stop apologizing to my boyfriend for suggesting this location. We ended up leaving and headed over to Veggie Grill :)

I kept asking myself, "is this really vegan?" It was that good. I ordered the French Toast which was incredible, the only french toast I've had as a vegan. It had a "cream cheese" layer which was divine. My boyfriend ordered the chicken + waffles which he kept saying tasted just like chicken. Wish we had a Crossroads in NYC!

Ive been here a few times and took my mother on Mothers Day, the food is always amazing and the service is just as good. This is not a place to go if your on a budget but it is worth every penny, good food like this is always worth the cost.

We've heard fantastic things about Crossroads. To be honest, it's very much a 3.5 in my opinion, and there are many other (better) vegan restaurants in LA. Service was good but not terribly friendly. The menu feels like they're trying to cater to a non-veg crowd to make them like vegan. While some dishes were creative, many were spins on typical dishes you'd get anywhere, rather than being truly inventive vegan.

We started with the spring pizza. We prefer red sauce to white on pizzas, but the dish itself was quite good. There was no shortage of toppings, and they all worked nicely together.

We then had the grilled maitake mushrooms. The mushrooms were prominent on the dish, but there were so many things on the dish that they didn't shine. They tasted almost fried and crispy, yet they weren't oily as a fried food. The celery root puree on the dish also stood out, creamy like a mashed potato but not quite as hearty. Also, the flavor had a strong, bitter taste to it.

We got the tortellini special, which ended up being $20 for 8 pieces!! That's outrageous to me. The tortellini was cooked well, almost like pillowy blankets, and the sauce was my favorite part of the night, creamy with great pea flavor, but the price left a bad taste!

We weren't quite full, so we split the lentil flatbread. We expected this to be like a small pizza, but it was a pita with dips. The pita was made of lentils, giving it a crunchy and earthy texture, but still an underwhelming overall dish. The display was nice and the bread warm, it was served with small bowls of pea pesto, smoked white bean hummus and spicy tomato banana pepper jam (the best, sweet & spicy). The dips were very strong in their flavors, but the hummus was too earthy and the pea pesto was off compared to the pea in our tortellini.

We also split the ice cream sundae. It was okay but paled in comparison to other vegan sundaes we've had. The top had coconut whipped cream, nuts, brownie pieces (stale/hard) and hardened chocolate sauce. Toppings were minimal, leaving you with mostly an absurdly cold vanilla ice cream. The vanilla tasted okay but was plain.

We also split a bottle of sparking water, and considering the amount of water in it, it was expensive at $7 for the bottle. We went this route, as $10 for non-alcoholic cocktails seemed too much, especially given the regular cocktails aren't priced considerably higher than that.

The ambience here is trendy and well-decorated, but we won't run back.

I haven't felt like I've over eaten or had too much heavy food since going vegan but this place has done it a few times. Flavors are strong and a little heavy on the oil in the sauces.

I have tried everything on the menu because I try something different every time with confidence. Thank goodness they made brunch daily and chef is a mad scientist with vegan cheese. I think this will always be my favorite and I've eaten vegan everywhere.

Finally! An upscale place for dinner. This place is wonderful, service is great and the food is amazing. I enjoy the small plates approach, it allows me to try a variety and then come back for more. I've stopped by for lunch and their mushroom sandwich is scrumptious!

If this were a non vegan restaurant, this would not have been very interesting.. But because it was vegan, it was great. A bit pricy (I mean, you are in Beverly hills) but we were full with an appetizer, main and dessert. Highly recommend the calamari. The seitan mains were both excellent. Desserts were were good, but just solid. Not to set, which was nice. Definitely a great meal.

Also, reservations are recommended. While the restaurant was empty at 6pm on the Monday we visited, by 7pm it was nearly full.

Been here a few times when friends are visiting, and everything's impressively delicious. The Tuscan frittata is a must try. But it is pricy, and the servers have tried to upsell us on stuff...e.g., we accidentally paid for fancy water last time. But this place is perfect if fancy is what you're looking for.

wonderful service, exquisite menu, beautiful dining set up.
Vegan all around and it was amazing!

Definitely coming back!