Mark Peel and Audrey Saunder’s Tar Pit Opens

Unless Haute Living is the only website you visit (as it should be), you’ll be well aware that Mark Peel and Audrey Saunder’s long awaited The Tar Pit opened over the weekend.  Over the past months, if the powers that be moved even a brick over at the space on La Brea Blvd, LAs diligent foodies took note.  And so, with the opening, Christmas seems to have come early for every journalist, blogger, and alcohol enthusiast within a 25-mile radius of The Tar Pit.

Here’s what you need to know – the ambiance is very 1940s supper club with a large, full bar on your right and charming, creamy white and brown banquets to your left.  There’s a small stage toward the back of the room that invites jazz musicians to improvise all night while you sip from a champagne coupe and hope the cops don’t bust in.  (Sorry, the whole prohibition era thing is really getting to us.)

You’ll recognize the name Mark Peel as one of the chefs LA takes the most pride in – chef/owner of Campanile on La Brea, Peel is a James Beard award winner and has brought his penchant for classic American dishes prepared perfectly to the Tar Pit.  Think Steak Diane, Bibb Salad with Green Goddess Dressing, and Wild Boar Meatballs.

Then, there’s Audrey Saunders – formerly of New York City’s Pegu Club.  Offering drinks like the Palm Frond, Old Cuban, and Agave Bravo, Saunders has brought a very respectable level of dedication to her drinks menu.  Dedication, that is, to fresh mixers, lots of combinations we’ve come to call “infusions,” many an unexpected twist, and reminders that it’s really all about your spirit of choice.  She’s also gone one step further – she nabbed Marcos Tello, mixologist from The Edison, as well as well trained gentlemen who’ve tended bar at The Varnish and Comme Ca.

So put on your t-strap dancing shoes, cinch in that waist, and learn to swing – The Tar Pit is taking us all back to the best (and gin soaked) bits of the 1940s.  Here’s lookin’ at you, kid!

The Tar Pit is located at 609 N. La Brea Blvd. in Los Angeles