Colin Marshall sits down in Culver City with Matthew Kang, food writer, editor of Eater LA, author of the blog Mattatouille, and proprietor of the Scoops Westside ice cream shop. They discuss the difference between eating on Los Angeles’ west side and elsewhere in the city; how he manages to sell that health-conscious region on ice cream; the willingness of eaters, nowadays, to get back to the occasional bit of unhealthiness; how he prides himself on introducing unusual flavors to the public through the friendly medium of ice cream, even when kids’ parents insist they “just get the chocolate”; how he got into food writing through Yelp during his previous career as a banking analyst; his explorations of Los Angeles through the Zagat guide and as a “hugely involved commenter” on Eater; what he experienced on his Koreatown days in childhood, an ideal place for him as it provides “Korea, but not in Korea”; what it meant to him when he discovered a time capsule of a greasy spoon buried in a Beverly Hills office building; the parts of town that put up with “a little less B.S.” from customization-crazed customers; the balance between “I want it the way I want it” and “Just give me what’s best”; the conversations he had with his parents and fellow Asian Americans when he left his banking career behind for a life of travel and food; the shift in downtown’s Grand Central Market, and what it says about Los Angeles’ wider social and food cultures; how your background matters less here, and how long that might last; food as his conduit for understanding not just Los Angeles but Seoul, Istanbul, Chicago, and Nagoya; how the current coffee-culture boom manifests itself here, where he divides time into two eras, before Intelligentsia and after; how Angelenos can make sure not to provincialize themselves; the exhilaration he feels at certain perfect “Midnight City” moments in his car; and how Los Angeles offers a seemingly infinite variety of places you should eat, but no one place you must.
Download the interview here as an MP3 or on iTunes.
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