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Jon & Vinny's
By 2015, chefs Jon Shook and Vinny Dotolo already had a strong Los Angeles reputation to trade on, built through their earlier restaurant Animal — so when they opened a second, more casual concept on Fairfax Avenue that same year, expectations were already high. Jon & Vinny's answered with a red-sauce Italian-American menu built around pizza, pasta, and an all-day format that runs from breakfast straight through dinner. The pizza program sits on a thin, well-charred crust, with the Popeye — a white pie loaded with spinach, garlic, and a fried egg cracked on top — becoming one of the restaurant's most-ordered and most-photographed items. The broader menu's willingness to serve pizza alongside a full breakfast menu and hearty pasta dishes reflects Shook and Dotolo's larger approach: comfort-forward Italian-American food executed with real chef-level technique rather than a straightforward red-sauce nostalgia act. The restaurant quickly became one of the Fairfax corridor's most reliably busy spots, drawing both destination diners chasing Shook and Dotolo's reputation from Animal and neighborhood regulars treating it as a straightforward daily option — a dual identity that's not easy for a single restaurant to hold. Since the Fairfax original, Jon & Vinny's has expanded to additional Los Angeles locations, extending the same all-day, pizza-and-pasta format to more of the city while keeping the chef-driven technique that distinguished it from typical casual Italian-American restaurants when it first opened. Order the Popeye at 10am for breakfast or 10pm for dinner — the kitchen treats neither request as unusual.
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Prime Pizza
Prime Pizza built its reputation around a specific, unglamorous format: large, foldable, New York-style slices and pies sold out of a casual, counter-service setup, a genuine departure from the chef-driven, whole-pie-only pizzerias that dominate much of Los Angeles's more talked-about pizza scene. The Fairfax location has become the brand's flagship as the concept has grown into a genuine regional mini-chain. The dough is proofed for a proper crisp-yet-foldable New York-style crust, and the toppings menu leans toward reliable classics rather than chef-driven novelty — pepperoni, mushroom, a solid plain cheese slice — built for speed and consistency rather than a tasting-menu approach to pizza. Late hours are part of the appeal as much as the pizza itself, catering to a crowd that wants a real slice well after most kitchens in the city have closed. That late-night, by-the-slice format filled a genuine gap in a city where good New York-style pizza, available past a normal dinner hour, was historically harder to find than it should have been given the size and diversity of the local food scene. Expanding to multiple Los Angeles-area neighborhoods while keeping prices and format consistent — real by-the-slice and whole-pie counter service, not a scaled-down sit-down menu — has let Prime Pizza build a loyal following among people who want a fast, reliable New York-style slice rather than a reservation-required pizza experience. No host stand, no wait list — just walk up, fold, and eat.
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