Jen G.'s Profile

I never knew this place existed till a friendly Griffith Park Ranger told us about it when we were looking for wedding venue.

This private, gated area in Elysian Park has its own private entrance (up the hill from the main road, extremely seclusive), its own private parking lot (for up to 100 cars), private restrooms, BBQ pits, tennis courts, volleyball courts, horse-shoe game area, 21 picnic tables [each can seat up to 12 people easily], and officially allow 500 people per event (but they held events here for up 1,500 people here before).

Recently, they also allowed alcohol in the park for private event. However, they charge A LOT extra for the alcohol permit (cost more than the reservation fee) and required you to pay for an RMI security (to monitor your drunk guests), plus they required the alcohol be provided through their own approved alcohol caterer (which fortunately is at a reasonable price).

Facilities in Montecillo De Leo Politi (previously was called "The Old Lodge") is not open for public use; it's only available for private, reserve events. To use this area, you need to make reservation with the Elysian Park's administrative office.

The administrative office was a pain to work with as they are very incompetent (gave the wrote quote and invoice, then had to correct it multiple time, with last time being a few days prior to the event. ARGH) but luckily, the people in the Park Maintenance office (the people that are monitoring all events in Montecillo De Leo Politi) are friendlier and seem a bit more knowledgeable about the park and their jobs.

It can be a challenge to find this place since Montecillo De Leo Politi does not have an address that people can enter on GPS.  See this map for the exact location of the venue:
http://www.laparks.org...

For those looking for an outdoor venue for a private party or wedding that is beautiful, big enough to hold a big party, private enough that no random people will walk in,  or just a venue that is simply a blank canvas for you to beautify, this place is perfect!

Of course, it's extra nice that it doesn't cost an arm and a leg to rent Montecillo De Leo Politi  (where as many similar venue we visited cost $8,000++).

When it comes to Chinese food, my parents are hard to please. They managed to ruin some of my favorite restaurants I took them to because they find the food too salty or too bland or....

However, they love the food (especially the lobsters) at Newport. But this would never be their favorite because Newport is too pricy (since we always get lobster here)

Magic Jump does not have the best price but they are the most efficient.

We order everything on Magic Jump Rental's website. Got the confirmation email. Then the week of the event, they sent out another email asked us to call in to confirm. On the day of, they delivered everything right on time!

I'd definitely use Magic Jump Rental again.

BJ has the best price on everything.

I was going to rent all equipments for our wedding here but unfortunately their last pick up is 7pm; way too early. We ended up only renting chaffing dishes, bought balloons and fuels.

BJ does not get 5 stars because they screwed up the invoice. Good thing I called to straighten things out. On the day of, they didn't have all things we requested and we have to wait an hour to get all our equipments.

My husband love Porky so we had Porky catered for the BBQ portion of our dinner reception.

Porky delivered on time and everyone at our wedding rave about the food!

I am not giving Porky 5 stars only because the process to finalized the order was stressful due to unable to reach the Porky owner. We found out the lack of communication was due to unfortunate event going on in her life but as a bride, not finalizing the food order till the day before the wedding was uber stressful.

Because Porky came through on the day of, the food are delicious (they have the best mac & cheese, dirty rice, and pork ribs), and the owner was super friendly, I would definitely ask Porky to cater our next party.

My cousin had his wedding banquet here a few years ago and since then, it has been my parent's favorite restaurant. Naturally, for my wedding, we have Top Island cater the Chinese portion of our dinner reception.

Some dishes here are amazing while others are only so so (and their dim sum is inconsistent. Some days are great but other days are  average). To select the right dishes for our wedding, we taste-tested many dishes (Our fav. include: Deep Fried Tofu with Bamboo fungus, Shrimp with Cashew Nuts, and Beef with Ginger and Green Onion).

The manager was very friendly and helpful through out the whole process. Of all the vendor, Top Island was the easiest to work with. The manager even have the delivery person scout out our wedding site (it's hard to find) prior to the day of so they could ensure on-time delivery.

On the day of, they delivered the food promptly. Our guests loved the food so much that many helped themselves to multiple serving. Food was gone by the end of the night. We still have people telling us how much they loved the food.

I been telling everyone to go to Lucky Devils for years; I can't believe I didn't have a review for Lucky Devils yet.

I always think they did great job with burger, but since I was craving for bbq, I got their hickory smoked baby back ribs this time. OMG! I am so happy I did. This is one of the best bbq I ever have. The ribs alone made enduring hour long traffic to Hollywood worth it.

I can't wait to go back to Lucky Devils and eat some ribs. Maybe this time, I'll even try their pull pork and pull chicken.

Lunch price is very reasonable.

Our waiter is super flirty. My friends and I ordered the proscuitto with cheese sandwich, x3. The waiter told us we are lame and suggested 2 other dishes (salmon with cheese and a salad open sandwiche) and he would even cut each one into three so we could share.

He was right, I am very glad we listened to him b/c my favorite of the three was the Smoke Salmon with fresh mozzarella sandwich.

Next time, I am going to try the flight of cheese with sides (with more smoke salmon. Maybe he'll tell me I'm lame again and suggest some more good dishes).

Pro:
-Easy to get to
-patio seating outside of the tasting room
-people watching

Con:
-Next to PCH so the noise from traffic is very loud
-small tasting room
-Mediocre wine

Personally I wouldn't go back since I don't care for any of the wine and it's hard to enjoy the wine when the traffic noise is so loud.

Food is still good. And price on their lunch dishes are cheaper now! YAY!

And did I mention drink is only $3 during Happy Hour!

Double YAY!!!