La Morra opens takeout pizza window; Wah’s Golden Hen closes in Virgil Village

This week in dining news:

La Morra Pizzeria

Neapolitan pizza pop-up La Morra has opened a takeout window on West 3rd Street. Owners Zach Swemle and Marlee Blodgett are serving a half-dozen varieties of wood-fired pizza, including a vegan pie topped with marinated artichokes and pickled peppers. Parbaked frozen pizzas are available for customers to finish preparing at home.

8022 W. 3rd St., Los Angeles, lamorrapizzeria.com

Mama D’s African Cuisine

Mama D’s African Cuisine is open for takeout and delivery in Boyle Heights. The restaurant, which offers dishes from Cameroon and West Africa, is the second location of a popular restaurant in Maryland owned by Dorothy Wanki (her daughter Claudia oversees the L.A. location). Specialties include ndole, a stew of peanuts and bitter greens, and goat pepper soup.

1240 S. Soto St., (213) 610-5322, infomamads.wixsite.com/food

Yess Aquatic

Yess Aquatic, a seafood-focused food truck run by acclaimed London chef Junya Yamasaki, is open in the Arts District. The menu includes a smoked black cod bowl with horseradish pickled cucumber, a sashimi salad with fried almonds and a seasonal fish katsu curry. Yamasaki also plans to open a larger sit-down restaurant in the Arts District in 2021.

2001 E. 7th St., Los Angeles, yessaquatic.com

Cobi’s Curries

Cobi’s Curries, an international-inspired curry house from chefs Lance Mueller and Cobi Marsh, is open for takeout and delivery on West 3rd Street. The menu features spicy beef rendang, yellow split pea dal with fried curry leaves, curry laksa noodle soup, African peanut curry and chicken masala curry puffs.

8422 W. 3rd St., Los Angeles, cobiscurries.com

La Puglia

La Puglia is open for takeout and delivery in Santa Monica. The all-day Southern Italian restaurant and bakery offers an array of baked goods, espresso drinks and fresh juices as well as bruschetta topped with prosciutto and stracciatella cheese, sausage and rapini pizza, and fresh fusilli pasta tossed with walnut pesto.

1621 Wilshire Blvd., Santa Monica, (424) 303-2624, toasttab.com/la-puglia-1621-wilshire-blvd

Jyan Isaac Bread

Jyan Isaac Bread, the baking operation run by local young baker Jyan Horwitz, is open at a new retail pickup location in the Fairfax District. The menu includes fresh baguettes, Danish rugbrød and whole wheat and sourdough loaves.

8051 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles, jyanisaacbread.com

Closings:

The Golden State

Fairfax burger spot the Golden State will close permanently on Jan. 4 after 12 years in business. Owners James Starr and Jason Bernstein, who also operate Cofax, Prime Pizza and Bludso’s Bar & Que, thanked fans on social media and blamed the closure on challenges brought on by the pandemic: “We tried our best to take [COVID-19] on, but it proved to be a formidable foe.”

Wah’s Golden Hen

Beloved Chinese American restaurant Wah’s Golden Hen will close permanently on Dec. 31 after nearly 50 years of business in Virgil Village. The restaurant originally opened in 1972 and became known as a neighborhood destination for affordable combo plates and homestyle Cantonese-style cooking. In a statement posted online, current owner Lena Louie said she and her husband planned to retire after closing the restaurant: “We thank you for your support over the decades. It has been a blessing to be able to establish our roots here in America, and in this community, for so long.”