Yotam Ottolenghi Cooks Vegetarian: At Animal, of All Places

You could file this one under the heading Fusion Cooking or maybe just Irony. Yotam Ottolenghi, the British chef and cookbook author, most recently of the book Plenty, will be in town next month cooking a dinner at Animal.

This is funny because Ottolenghi is justly famous for cooking stunning vegetarian food at his four London restaurants and in his cookbooks, of which he has two, the first one being Ottolenghi: The Cookbook. A fifth Ottolenghi restaurant is set to open next year in Soho (they're looking for help, if you're eligible to work in the UK.) He's also the vegetarian columnist for The Guardian. Why Animal? Why not Animal.

Plenty, about which the novelist Susan Orlean raved, "I haven't been this excited by a cookbook in quite a while," was published last year in the UK. And if you don't yet have a copy, you can get a signed book at Animal if you come for the dinner, which will take place July 14th.

The cost is $70 per person, which includes the book. An optional wine pairing is an additional $25. For reservations, call (323) 782-9225 after 2 p.m. As for the menu, we're not sure yet what it will be, although it will be vegetarian and based on recipes from Plenty. Apparently Jon Shook and Vinny Dotolo do not have a must-cook-bacon-and-pork-belly clause in the kitchen fine print. Good to know.