I have a curse of always wanting to get to the toughest reservations in town. It’s all about supply and demand. Sometimes I do not want something until I have been told that I can’t get it. This phenomena is multiplied many times over when the tough reservation is also (gasp!) a secret experience not generally known to the regular public!

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So when I first heard about Wolvesmouth I couldn’t help myself and had to immediately place myself on the mailing list. I wanted to check it out bad. For those of you who haven’t heard of it, Wolvesmouth is the coolest, most fun, and innovative dining experience going in LA. Born out of private cooking parties by its creator and chef Craig Thornton, it changes everything you’ve probably ever experienced or grown to believe that fine dining is. It is NOT a restaurant. At least, not in the sense that we’ve all come to get used to knowing as a restaurant.

It’s more of a secret underground fine dining party. There is no phone number. You cannot make reservations. For God’s sakes, you don’t even know where it will occur until you receive your invitation email from them. Most importantly, all you can do to get to Wolvesmouth is either 1) know someone who knows Craig who can get you a seat, or 2) sign up on their email list and find one day that you have been invited to a 10-25 seat meal with a fixed multi course menu. Sadly, I have not been to the small formal Wolvesmouth dinner. Yet.

However, I was fortunate enough recently to get invited via their mailing list to a larger food event / art show/ DJ spinning / plate smashing called Ceremony. It was a big fun “appetizer” for the Wolvesmouth brand of intimate dinner parties. And boy was it neat.

For this event, the food was actually in the form of small bites prepared by the hottest chef in town, Ori Menashe of Bestia. There were pork belly sliders, deconstructed chicken tacos, chicken gizzard on endive (Ori is an absolute wizard with the organ meats), wasabi pea salad, and an amazing version of the finest peach cobbler that I’ve ever tasted.

But on top of the great food, it was just a fun evening out. There was a very distinct art display with most of the works for sale. As you can see from the pictures, there was a very gritty, rock n roll, outdoor-nature theme that befits the Wolvesmouth name.

Throw in a great DJ playing early 2000’s alt rock favorites and a plate-smashing area (yes, hundreds of plates were smashed, slow motion recorded by sponsor Samsung) topped off a great evening of food, art, and mingling.

What Ceremony has done is increased my wanting to get to one of the small, intimate Wolvesmouth dinners. Cost, you ask? The word is that you pay what you feel you can afford – there is no “price” to Wolvesmouth. That being said, I think you are probably looking at “donating” $100-150 per person for the level of dining experience that you are going to receive.

Overall, this is just another example of LA leading the way in the fun reinvention of fine dining.

Brian Lee is a transplant from Canada who has been in LA since 2000 to attend grad school. After all of these years, there is no Canadian left. Only Los Angelino remains and he couldn’t be happier.