Since its opening in April 2013, Trois Mec has been one of the hottest new restaurants in LA. Trois Mec uses a ticketing system that is similar to Alinea and Next Restaurant, making it a pain to get reservations to. New tickets are released every other Friday at 8am, and tickets tend to sell out within minutes. I’m not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination, so it took a while for me to even start attempting to purchase Trois Mec tickets. Finally, at the behest of one of my coworkers, I got to work early and booked our dinner adventure at Trois Mec.

On the day of our dinner, I took an Uber to the restaurant. Uber driver: “So you’re going to Rafallo’s Pizza?” All of the people standing outside of the pizza parlor wearing fancy clothing must have looked odd to him. My response: “No, there’s actually a nice restaurant inside. It’s just not marked.” Restaurants without signage seem to be all the rage these days.

When I stepped inside, the restaurant was a little bit of the expected (trendy, intimate atmosphere) and a little bit of the unexpected (hip hop music selection from the 90s). Trois Mec offers a set menu for $75 per person (not including a service charge and taxes), so there wasn’t much choice there, but we did have a choice of adding a supplemental squid dish for $15 per person. Of course we went for it. We also went for the $49 wine pairing, which I thought was reasonably priced for the quantity and quality of wine that was served. We were spoiled, though, as our server mistakenly poured us an extra glass of wine each. When we told him that we had already tried the particular wine in question, he apologized and then smilingly told us to drink up. Not bad advice.

Taken as a whole, the menu was strong and original, albeit with a couple of misses here and there. That didn’t prevent me from having a terrific meal overall though, and I wouldn’t hesitate to go back to Trois Mec again. Our servers informed us that they rotate their menu seasonally, so diners can expect that the menu would be almost completely different three months from their previous dine date.

Overall judgment: 4 of 5 stars

Below are pictures of our Trois Mec dinner adventure, starting off with a few “snacks”:

Buckwheat popcorn. These kernels of popcorn were tasty, but the texture of the popcorn was so resistant to my bites that I gave up fairly quickly.

Crispy tapioca with passionfruit butter. On the contrary, biting into this tapioca snack was pure joy. My typical order at boba cafes is passionfruit tea with tapioca pearls. This was the combination of two of my favorite dessert flavors into one fried cube of perfection.

Garlic bread. This snack was packed with sharp garlicky flavor that seeped into the bread below, resulting in one of the tastier incarnations of garlic bread I have had.

Dijon mustard creme brulee. From our server’s description of the snack, I wasn’t sure if it would work. Luckily, the savoriness of the dijon mustard balanced quite well against the sweetness of the creme brulee.

Avocado, citrus, crab ceviche, buckwheat popcorn. The dish was solid but unimaginative.

Tomato pulp, charred eggplant, jamon iberico de bellota, smoked tomato. The tomato was exquisite and oozing with juiciness. Unfortunately, the jamon’s intense saltiness and flimsy texture clashed with the tomato.

Radish, burnt bread, fromage blanc, furikake. This radish was downright unpleasant. I found myself cutting it up and moving it around on my plate a few times, struggling to finish.

Confit squid, white asparagus, caper puree, mascarpone. I’m glad we opted for the additional course. The squid was oily and firm-textured, as confit squid should be, and the white asparagus was succulent and delicious. The muted purees worked better than the creamy mascarpone.

Veal belly, crispy artichoke, parmesan. The veal belly was perfect, with tender meat that splattered out juices when cut. The crispy artichoke, unfortunately, detracted from the plate. The artichoke was awkward atop the veal, as it prevented easy access to the delicious meat underneath.

Strawberry cake, meringue, chantilly. This was the one plate that I kept on sneaking peeks at when other diners were being treated to dessert. The chantilly cream was a bit heavier than I expected. The dessert was still tasty overall, but the mix of different textures did not make for a cohesive dish.

Overall, I had a solid meal at Trois Mec. The reasonably priced menu, along with the inviting atmosphere, make Trois Mec a restaurant worth going to again and again.

Trois Mec, 716 N. Highland Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90038