ink by Michael Voltaggio and Cole Dickinson

If you are a fan of Bravo's TV show Top Chef, you'll know who Michael Voltaggio is. He is the winner from season six, but he's definitely more than just a renowned title. You'll see by looking at all these mouth watering pictures below.

A picture is worth a thousand words, especially when these words are actually coming from my rambling. Just a few details and conclusions here and I'll leave you with food pictures to dig in. 

There is "ink," where the fine dining happens during dinner hours. And there is "ink sack" for a more casual bite, offering both lunch and dinner.

For the upcoming food and beverage pictures, I'll just add the descriptions straight from the menu. Also I'll put up a * sign and "highly recommended" on the bottom of the picture for the ones I'm deeply in love with. Less of my rambling remember?

The overall dining experience was wonderful. Very good service, clean and trendy ambience, great food, just one little glitch - the restroom flooded. Luckily ink sack is just few stores down the street where all the guests can take a detour to mind their own businesses.

On top of individual dishes, ink also offers tasting menu for $85, $50 more if paired with wines.

For a party of six, we've decided to skip the tasting menu and ordered everything on the menu instead. Well..except the carrot.

Our waiter did warn us that it might be a daunting task due to large amount of food. Frankly speaking, we OC people rarely drive that far to dine in LA, especially with our ages hiking up, we just got lazier and lazier. So just bring it on! The more the merrier!

Cocktails, beers, non-alcoholic -

Spirits -

Old school specialties, new school sparkling, sakes -

*Cocktail - Pisco -

Pineapple, coconut water, falernum, lime.

See the large rectangular ice cube inside? I would love to order this drink again. Not overpowering and definitely refreshing.

Japanese whisky (on the left) -

Dinnerware -

Sparkling water -

Still water -

Wine -

Barnstable oysters $18 -

Burrata, bottarga, little gems, lemon dressing $14 -

Cuttlefish, green papaya, peanut-coconut cream, black lime $15 -

Shishito peppers, almond-bonito sand, tofu mustard $9 -

Hamachi, caesar dressing tempura, breakfast radish $18 -

Duck rillette, waffle, mustard, griddled pear, banyuis vinegar $14 -

Beef tartare, hearts of palm, sea beam chimichurri, horseradish, rye $15 -

La quercia berkshire ham, manchego biscuit, marcona almond butter $16 -

Pei mussels, sourdough sabayon, egg, mussel jus $12 -

Revealed -

*Corn porridge, miso, chanterelles, house-made doritos $10 -

Highly recommended!

*Potato charcoal, house-made sour cream, black vinegar $10 -

Highly recommended!

Basically you eat it just like baked potatoes. A spread of sour cream and spray some of that black vinegar to highlight the flavors -

*Brussels sprouts, pig ear, lardo, apple $13 -

Looks like fried gobo root at first sight. Goes very well with alcohol,
Highly recommended!

*Baja scallops, egg yolk gnocchi, mushroom hay $17 -

Highly recommended! Hands down my top three favorite gnocchi.

My round two beverage, house made hibiscus citrus flavored soda $4 -

Octopus, ink, shells, young fennel, pimenton $20 -

*Halibut, buckwheat noodles, tomato fumet, yuba $27 -

Highly recommended!

Poutine, chickpea fries, yogurt curds, lamb neck gravy $15 -

*Pork belly, charcoal oil, bbq flavor, petrified yams $24 -

Highly recommended!

Lamb shoulder, beets, vadouvan, yogurt $23 -

Beef short rib, carrots, tendon, horseradish tofu $28 -

Other view -

Sadly no more room for dessert..

Our bill came in an envelope -

Moment of truth -

About $100 per person, not bad at all considering we ordered food for sure can feed at least 8 people, perhaps 10. On top of that, we all got one or two beverages accompanying our meals. I suppose if you don't go as crazy as we do, you'll probably end up with around $60~$80 per person. With these amount of details and works that go into our food, I think ink is definitely worth to pay a visit with a few $20 bills.


ink
8360 Melrose Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90069
*Between North La Cienega Blvd and North Fairfax Ave

323-651-5866 (ink)
323-655-7225 (ink sack)

Website: http://mvink.com/
email: info@mvink.com
Twitter: mvinkla

Cindy's Rating: 8