Café Metropol has a hip artist clientele. It’s located in the part of Los Angeles that has become the trendy place for Asian-American professionals. The menu is eclectic, but based mostly on Italian cuisine. It’s a nondescript building across from an empty lot. A DJ spins music in the evenings. There is a happy-hour menu that is slightly smaller than the dinner menu. Many dinner items are on that menu - and lower in price to boot.

A few artists were smoking outside the restaurant when I arrived. I ordered the assorted crostini as I waited for my friends to arrive. There was bruschetta with toppings of tomatoes, olives, mushrooms, brie, prosciutto, and Parmesan. They were placed before me right as my friends arrived. We finished those quickly. They were very good, so we ordered the oven-baked fries, which were sprinkled with paprika as well. Those were pretty good, too. My two friends decided on the brie-and-mushroom burger, while I went with the garden burger. Both burgers came with either oven-baked fries or a salad, so we went with the salad, since we had already ordered a side of fries. I had expected the portions to be very small, but the good-sized amounts that were placed before us left no room for dessert. I have to say that it was one of the best garden burgers that I have ever had. This place was great for anyone who likes organic foods or vegetarian meals. The seasonings were excellent.

Since we ordered mostly from the happy-hour menu, our bill wasn’t too bad. We each ordered drinks from the bar menu. I had a watermelon soju drink, while one friend had a mojito soju. (Soju is a Korean liquor that is similar to Japanese sake and tastes a bit like vodka.) The other friend decided on a cosmopolitan. I thought my drink was too weak, while the one who was drinking the mojito soju thought her drink was too strong. There were no complaints from the friend drinking the cosmo.

We had a mix-up with our ordering, but it was squared away without any complaints. I highly recommend this place to anyone who wants to eat healthy.