Husband and wife duo, and Playa del Rey residents Harry Posner and Natalie Dial, are proud parents of two wonderful children: Saffi, a one-and-a-half-year-old beautiful baby girl with luscious curls and a sweet smile; and their new addition, Tomat, the recently opened restaurant in the heart of Westchester, featuring seasonal farm-to-table dishes, house-made pastries and cocktails made from locally sourced ingredients. Natalie says it’s the most wonderful family she could ever have imagined.
“It’s really wonderful to be a parent with the person that I’m opening a business with, in the sense that Harry and I are very much mom and dad to Saffi, and we get to bring her to the restaurant and she gets to run around. We also get to be parents in this business together, as well. It feels so important to take care of everybody,” says Natalie.
While the original anticipated opening date of the restaurant coincided closely with Saffi’s arrival, the city’s extensive permitting process led to lengthy delays. Natalie says she’s grateful for the extra time it gave her and Harry to navigate being first-time parents and enjoy all the milestones and lessons you gain along the way.
“We needed some experience before we opened Tomat. Learning patience is maybe the first thing you figure out as a parent, also learning how to pivot and just roll with things. It’s been quite a journey,” she says.
Harry agrees, saying, “The restaurant is definitely kid number two. We’re excited to see how it grows and develops, too.”
Located in the Westchester Triangle, the highly anticipated eatery opened for coffee and pastries on October 15 with dinner service launching on October 30. Tomat has a large, airy dining area, a rooftop terrace perfect for drinks while planespotting, a second-story event space and its own garden, just down the street.
Tuesday through Sunday, the dining area is open for coffee and pastries from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Pastry chef Bex Tilton has created a menu of baked treats that have already created a buzz in the community and five-star reviews online.
If you’re craving something on the sweet side with your Lamill coffee, Harry suggests the pain au chocolat or the seasonal roasted nectarine Danish.
“Over the summer, it was very hot and we drove up to Fresno and picked all these nectarines and peaches. We then roasted them and froze them so they could wait until the restaurant opened,” he says.
If something savory is more to your taste, Harry recommends the tomato Danish or the mouth-watering pistachio croissant. But you may just want one of each. Add a trio of gigantic organic dates from the Coachella Valley for an unexpected pairing for breakfast.
Bold Vegetable Starters
The current dinner menu offers a spectrum of California farm-to-table dishes that will please meat-lovers, pescatarians and vegetarians alike. A unique feature of the restaurant is its open kitchen, giving diners the chance to get a glance behind the scenes while chef Harry and his team work their culinary magic.
While Tomat’s dishes are influenced by their favorite flavors, travels and time spent living in London, Natalie and Harry are thrilled they have a great team beside them.
“We have an amazing Sous Chef named Rohan Pratap–he is a force of positivity in the kitchen. You’ll be able to see everyone at work the moment you walk in, the art and the theater of Tomat is very much about the kitchen,” says Natalie.
Like all good performances, there is nothing static about the menu either.
“It’s a very seasonal menu and we will be changing it with the seasons. We’ve started off with the end of summer changing to fall. We have chili peppers, we’re getting some squashes now and the last of the eggplants. And of course, the end of the summer tomatoes, which are incredible here. So, we are currently starting off the menu with a lot of bold vegetable dishes. We’ve got our tomato salad, we’ve got an awesome cucumber preparation that is really delicious and then a few different types of market green salads,” says Harry.
And, of course, nothing goes better with a salad than freshly baked bread.
“We’re doing a take on a Persian bread with a tomato butter. We have dehydrated tomato around the outside to give it a little bit of a kick, and we smother the bread with ash from the fire that we’re cooking everything else on and it creates this awesome crust on top,” says Harry.
From the Pacific Ocean
On offer are California whelks with aioli, and raw fish of the day served with English mustard that Harry says is reminiscent of wasabi.
“We’re working with some amazing fishermen. At the moment we’re getting Californian halibut, black cod and rockfish. We have a 100-pound tuna in our dry-ager currently, which is probably the last of the tuna of the year. We’ll also have spiny lobsters that are coming into season now,” he says.
Birds of a feather
While the minced chicken skewer with turmeric yogurt sounds fabulous, Tomat won’t overdo chicken offerings.
“The chicken will come and go a little bit–we don’t want to over poultry everyone–but the duck is from an amazing farm up north that we’ve been buying from for ages. We do an amazing pomegranate and walnut sauce with it, kind of reminiscent of a couple of dishes from my background, but we also make it kind of like a mole, which is really fun,” says Harry.
Something a bit meatier
If the beef tendon with daikon, a type of radish with a hint of sweetness and peppery notes, has your taste buds perking up, you may also want to consider the pork chop.
“The pork chop we do with a fennel salad and serve it with roasted apples and tomatillo, which is kind of my take on pork and applesauce, but the tomatillo and a little bit of dried chili gives it more of a Californian twist,” Harry says.
And for dessert…
While Tomat offers a variety of after-dinner treats, including a selection of cheeses, the dark chocolate mousse with candied fruit will certainly pique your curiosity. But if you want something more traditional, Harry recommends a favorite from across the pond.
“I know it’s very British, but we’ve tied it into California in an obvious way. It’s a sticky toffee pudding, which is essentially a date cake, but you cover it in butterscotch sauce and a scoop of burnt milk gelato on top,” says Harry, who grew up in England. “Whenever anyone tastes it, they’re just like, ‘Oh my God, this is so delicious!’”
Locally sourced cocktails
For those who enjoy a cocktail with their dinner, Tomat’s drink menu has some classics, but with a twist.
“What I would say is unique is that we’re trying to thoughtfully source what alcohol we put into our menu,” says Natalie. “For example, we love martinis, especially me. There are some fantastic distillers in Los Angeles.”
One of her favorite gin distilleries is Future, “a woman-owned, queer-owned company that created a London dry-style gin that’s meant for a martini. You can really taste the effort that was put into that,” she says.
Natalie also loves Amass gin, which has a distillery in the L.A. Arts District.
“It’s another gin that’s locally sourced, but tastes completely different, that we’re using for a Negroni that kind of just plays off of the bitters and the punchier flavors,” she says.
Serving Westchester
When it comes to knowing Westchester, Natalie’s family has a long history, with her great-grandmother Ella opening the community’s first commercial buildings in the 1940s. Eventually, Ella and her son, Howard B. Drollinger would found Drollinger Properties. Today, Natalie’s mother, Karen Dial, is the company’s president and the proud owner of The Book Jewel that is nestled next to Tomat. Both Natalie and Harry are working to continue her family’s legacy of keeping Westchester a thriving, family-centric community.”
“I’m fourth generation in this community and it’s gone through so much evolution and different versions of itself,” says Natalie. “I just feel so lucky to be setting down roots here. We are really proud of Tomat, and we hope the community is proud of us, too. Everyone is welcome in here.”
Tomat is located at 6261 W. 87th St. and is open Tuesday through Sunday at 8 a.m. for coffee and pastries. Dinner service and the rooftop terrace are open Wednesday through Sunday starting at 5 p.m.
Visit tomat.la for more details and reservations.
Story by Shanee Edwards. Photos by Zsuzsi Steiner.
