Angelenos might be shocked to learn this, but there’s a yacht club in Echo Park, the otherwise landlocked Eastside neighborhood that’s known for its gentle mix of hipsters and low-income Latinos. Granted, there are no yachts at the yacht club, and the closest thing to a marina is a puddle of water at the Walgreens across the street, but it is a yacht club nonetheless. Why? Just ’cause.
Specifically, I’m talking of Allston Yacht Club, a funky neighborhood spot located on Echo Park Boulevard. Run by Bostonians (we’ll try not to hold it against them) Charles Kelly and Bill DiDonna, Allston Yacht Club was named after an old inside joke between the guys who once mused that the most ridiculous venture they could ever embark on would be to open a yacht club in the Boston neighborhood of Allston. That’s why when Kelly and DiDonna had the farfetched idea to stake a claim in Los Angeles’s notoriously difficult restaurant scene, they immediately thought of their own fictional Allston Yacht Club. Hence the name was born.
Last week, I was invited to try the cocktails at AYC as part of a media-comped visit, and of course I jumped at the opportunity. I’d never heard of AYC, but I was immediately intrigued. I mean, how could I resist going anywhere in Echo Park that called itself a yacht club? I was just praying that the servers would have little skipper hats (they didn’t). In fact, if you’re looking for a nautical themed establishment, you’ll have to go elsewhere (ie. HMS Bounty in Koreatown). Turns out the Allston Yacht Club is a modern-looking space (no wooden captain wheels on the wall, sadly) that feels like it was once someone’s small home in another life. It’s not huge, but it certainly can fit many people. And when it fills up (as it did last Tuesday), it can be near impossible to hear anything over the din. AYC ranked as one of the very loudest restaurants I’d been to in LA, a problem made all the more difficult by my drinking companion, Sly, who is a self-professed low-talker. Then again, who needs to talk when you can just drink?
Continue reading “THE QUAFF: Cocktail Hour at the Allston Yacht Club”
