Majordōmo – LA
In Los Angeles, experience Southern California's closest approximation of NYC's famed Momofukus
As long-time fans of chef David Chang’s Momofuku restaurants – cookbook buying- and visiting from out of town-level – even we were surprised that it took years for us to visit Los Angeles’s Majordōmo after returning to Orange County. Majordōmo is one of the restaurant group’s last remaining West Coast properties, with Momofuku Las Vegas, Bāng Bar by Momofuku, and loosely affiliated Milk Bars among its few pandemic-surviving brands. Excited for Chang’s signature fusion of Korean, Japanese, and American influences, we visited in 2024 with hopes that the experience would rival NYC’s Ssäm Bar or at least Toronto’s Daisho, but Majordōmo turned out to be its own thing – and not quite up to Momofuku’s past highs.
Some of Momofuku’s classic DGAF madness is obvious at Majordōmo. Occupying a former warehouse on the edge of Chinatown, with a paid parking lot immediately next to actively used train tracks, Majordōmo isn’t in an area you might walk past – you need to go out of your way to find it, then take it on its terms. It only serves dinner (seven days a week, 5:30pm to 10:00 or 10:30), and maintains a loud PA system that squawks take-out orders over the noisy music and conversation of crowded dining rooms. Service recalls other mid-range Momofukus, but with rough edges polished off: servers remain kind, not formal, and though bussing is uneven, pacing is on the right side of prompt, and glasses are frequently refilled.
The concept is apparently to thread the needle between Momofuku’s historic NYC-inspired edginess and LA’s expectations for a business casual-level fine dining experience. Catering to various preferences, Majordōmo offers guests the option of enclosed/heated patio, dining room, or chef’s counter seating, though everyone gets the same single-page, one-side dinner menu. We were seated in a dimly lit room flanked by countless bottles of wine, underscoring a more significant multi-page wine list. A separate card spotlighted seven sakes, five beers, and ten non-alcoholic drinks, including a particularly nice Ruby Red with grapefruit, lemon, sichuan pepper, and bitter Giffard.
Superficially, Majordōmo’s constantly refreshed (and not fully online-updated) menu resembles ones we enjoyed at the aforementioned Ssäm Bar and Daisho: you can choose from three raw items, seven “market & snacks” small plates, four “noodles & rice” dishes, and seven “meat & fish” options. Unique to this location are “bings” – seven items pairing circular bing breads with either vegetable dips or meats such as “whipped bone marrow” or country ham, a Momofuku NY classic. Each includes a single small pita-sized bing, which our server suggested augmenting with additional pieces for multiple people at our table. We’re glad that we didn’t: the semi-spongy, lightly greasy bread would have been forgettable if not for the accompanying ribeye au jus, which was just enough to pair with one bing.
One of the things we loved best about prior Momofuku experiences was the sense that every dish – either because or in spite of its listed ingredients – had been given such a thorough vetting by Chang and his team that you could order anything and be wowed by distinctive flavors, textures, or plating. At Majordōmo, each of the dishes felt like it had never faced that gauntlet; in some cases, items that should have been easy wins were muddled in either concept or execution, and too many others tasted one-note (salty) rather than layered.
Highlights included a well-smoked, small-sliced pork belly with a classically disarming red lentil, mushroom, and szechuan pepper sauce; a sweet and perfectly fresh persimmon and maple salad accented by pecan and pomegranate pieces; and a caesar-like little gem salad that brilliantly twisted the classic anchovy formula with miso paste and smoked trout roe, substituting tempura crunchy bits for croutons. Mushroom crispy rice, only of the only items served with any tableside preparation, mixed broth into a bowl of pan-crisped rice, shiitake mushrooms, and burdock, helping everyone fill up after multiple small plates. And though our “sizzling wagyu skirt steak” wasn’t actually sizzling, the rare- to medium-rare pieces were individually delicious, burnished by green peppercorn and perilla.
On the other hand, soy-soaked tuna carpaccio was presented as an uncut slice – at a table equipped with no knives – with no obvious means to properly distribute its avocado topping. A shrimp tostada advertised with passion fruit, cucumber, and dill had those flavors plus an unexpected creamy mayonnaise that turned off some at our table. And a wagyu beef tongue katsu arrived as three individually battered meat slices that were too breaded and oily to let the premium protein’s flavor or texture through; they were dropped in a bed of egg-and-mustard sauce gribiche, and covered in frisee.
Late in the meal, other items continued to be less than awesome. Crispy potatoes were almost unrecognizably oily, helped largely by Momofuku crispy chili rather than an oversized pool of lemon mayonnaise, and a buttermilk panna cotta – the sort of item we’d previously have trusted Chang to offer only when perfected – was so sour and uneven, despite passionfruit and diced apple, that most of our table begged off from finishing it. We couldn’t bring ourselves to order the $35 “MajorDonut,” a sliced donut flambeed tableside with rum and fruit, though we saw one being prepared for an adjacent table. Thankfully, a serviceable chocolate pie and good but heavily coffee-flavored tres leches cake helped conclude the experience on a good enough note.
Our past Momofuku experiences have never been “good enough.” And at $100 to $150 per person, that’s not the threshold we consider worthy of a second visit. We’re glad that Majordōmo exists, if only to keep Chang’s torch lit in Southern California, but if you want to relive Momofuku’s glory days, we’d recommend doing so at the Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, instead.
Stats
Price: $$$$
Service: Table
Open Since: 2018
Addresses
1725 Naud St.
Los Angeles, CA 90012
323.545.4880
Instagram: @majordomola