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Imagine a place where you could order menu items from your favorite restaurants and coffee shops. Located inside the Madhappy clothing store on Melrose Avenue, Pantry is a one-stop shop that offers ready-made foods and drinks from five beloved LA businesses.
A few of them are very famous places that you may already know, and some of them have already been featured on this blog.
Here’s a brief rundown of the vendors Pantry has partnered with:
Awan
866 Huntley Dr, West Hollywood, CA 90069
Tucked away on an alleyway in West Hollywood, Awan offers plant-based Indonesian ice cream using coconut cream as a base. Chef Zen Ong uses vanilla beans imported from Bali to make his signature vanilla flavor. The rest of the flavors rotate depending on what fruits are in season. Their flavor selection is quite small compared to other ice cream shops, but there’s so much intention and care behind each of them.
If you’re not familiar with Awan, I recommend you read my interview with the owner Zen Ong (here). It blew my mind when I first had it! Website and Instagram.
Gjusta
320 E Sunset Ave, Venice, CA 90291
This is one of the most popular bakeries in Los Angeles. I love their croissants! The rustic outdoor patio and the vintage cabinets are like a slice of Europe in Venice. Gjusta is also a restaurant and a market, where you’ll find an array of deli offerings like cured meats and fish.
Beverly Hills Juice
8382 Beverly Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90048
In LA, cold-pressed juice bars are as common as nail salons. But Beverly Hills Juice was one of the OG juice bars in LA. It was founded in 1975 by David Otto, a music agent who left his job and completely devoted his life to making juice and sharing its healing benefits with people. In 2022, David passed away at the age of 82, leaving behind a legacy in the LA juice community that continues to be carried on by his wife and sons.
Courage Bagels
777 Virgil Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90029
Known for their Montreal-style bagels with a crispy and slightly charred exterior, Courage Bagels has been praised by Angelenos and featured in every LA food publication under the sun.
In early 2021, when Arielle Skye and Chris Moss opened the shop in East Hollywood, the hype to get their bagels was at an all-time high. It was reported that some people waited in line for almost 2 hours. Read my full review here.
Jon & Vinny’s
Multiple locations
Jon Shook and Vinny Dotolo have created a culinary empire in LA. When Jon & Vinny’s opened in 2015, it became an immediate success. Their modern approach to Italian food, offering dishes like their famous fusilli ala vodka pasta or marinara braised meatballs, paired with the natural wine selection from Helen’s Wine, has had people flock to their original Fairfax location. As of 2023, there are four Jon & Vinny’s locations. Website and Instagram
Hotel Drugs
This is the only vendor I’d never heard of! Hotel Drugs is a coffee company based in Tokyo, Japan. They have a tiny shop in Shibuya, where you can get their coffee and branded merch, which is also for sale on their website. Hotel Drugs is used in all the coffee drinks at Pantry.
Madhappy is a clothing and lifestyle brand founded in LA in 2017. With stores in NYC, Chicago, Aspen and Miami, they opened their fifth location in LA on November 24.
As soon as I saw the photo of the tree on Instagram, I couldn’t wait to check it out! Since I don’t live too far, I stopped by on the same day. I had just eaten, so I wasn’t hungry enough to order anything and it was already too late for coffee. The first thing that caught my attention when I walked in was the sunken living room in the middle of the store, a nice throwback to mid-century design.
The space where Pantry is located is very simple but tastefully designed. As you can see, you only need a tree and a few cube stools on an open patio to make it visually appealing for social media.
I got excited when I saw the vendor list. Then, I took a closer look at the menu items and my enthusiasm waned. The menu is extremely limited, but it’s understandable since their main focus is the clothing store.
As the name implies, the cafe is a pantry concept where you get premade items — it’s not a full-service restaurant. I also noticed that were was an incense stick of palo santo being burned. I love the smell of palo santo, but not with the smell of food! This solidifies my theory that they wanted this space to be an extension of the clothing store. Madhappy is located right across the street from Verve Coffee, The Butcher’s Daughter and Gracias Madre, so it’s not like the eating options around are scarce.
When I walked to the counter to inquire about the menu, two girls were sitting on the cube stools, spreading cream cheese on their very tempting bagels from Courage Bagels.
The employee at the walk-up window told me that the ice cream from Awan was sold by the pint, not by the scoop. Also, don’t expect to find a smoked salmon bagel as you would at Courage Bagels. Pantry only sells two types of bagels (Sea Salt Sesame and Everything) and a few spreads on the side.
When I saw Jon & Vinny’s on the list, my first thought was, “Do they offer pasta?” But, no. You’ll find a miso white chocolate chip cookie and a maple pecan granola, which can be found on Jon & Vinny’s breakfast menu. Pantry also sells a few nonperishable items from Jon & Vinny’s, like their pancake mix and bottled jam.
A minute later, a girl came in and told the cashier that she had just found the place online and that she was excited to check it out. She ordered a croissant from Gjusta Bakery.
I prefer the experience of driving to the restaurant or coffee shop, where I have access to the full menu, but I liked the concept. The Instagrammable patio is also a really good marketing strategy to lure people into Madhappie. In order to get to Pantry, you have to walk through the store, where employees will ask you if you need help buying anything. Someone with enough disposable income and unfamiliar with the brand, might inadvertently purchase one of their $165 hoodies or $295 cashmere crewneck sweaters.
The cube stools were fun and cute, but if I’m eating a croissant or catching up with someone over coffee, I’d rather sit in a proper chair. However, the two girls who were eating the bagels didn’t have a problem as both of them had the bagel boxes on their laps.
Overall, if you love finding new aesthetically pleasing coffee shops, you should definitely add Pantry to your list!
Please note that Pantry is a no-cash establishment. The store is near the Beverly Hills city limits and parking is notoriously challenging in this area.
Address: 8906 Melrose Ave, West Hollywood, CA 90069
Hours: Monday – Thursday 8AM – 4PM and Friday – Sunday 8AM – 5PM
