Little Fish Melrose Hill Is Having the Year Every LA Restaurant Dreams About

Some restaurants have a good year. Little Fish Melrose Hill is having a historic one. In the span of a few weeks, chefs Anna Sonenshein and Niki Vahle earned a Bib Gourmand in the 2026 Michelin Guide plus the Guide's 2026 Most Promising Young Chef Award for California, and were named to the James Beard Foundation's 2026 to 2027 Taste Twenty list of chefs to watch, as reported by Patch.

The origin story makes it sweeter. Sonenshein and Vahle started Little Fish in 2020 after being laid off from Son of a Gun, building a following through backyard fish sandwiches and pop ups before opening a walk up window in Echo Park. The full restaurant at 5035 Melrose Avenue is the culmination. "We love the area, this has been almost four years in the making," Sonenshein told the Larchmont Buzz.

The menu moves from a cult favorite fried fish sandwich at lunch to seasonal, sustainably sourced seafood at dinner, with the duo working directly with local fishermen. As part of the TasteTwenty class, the chefs will headline events on the Foundation's Taste America tour, which kicks off September 16.

Layoffs to laurels in six years. That is as LA a food story as it gets, and FJM will be watching what this kitchen does next.

I hope you're hungry. - Matthew Tropp | FJM.