'The Los Angeles Food Scene Is Thriving': Chef Tim Hollingsworth On Otium & CJ Boyd's Fried Chicken

(CBS Local)-- Tim Hollingsworth has eaten meals all over the world, but according to him there's something special about the Los Angeles food scene.

The chef has three restaurants in LA and is best known for Otium, which is next to the Broad Museum. Hollingsworth enjoys the instant gratification that comes with cooking and considered New York and San Francisco before he decided to make Los Angeles his culinary home several years ago.

"I'm more of a California boy at heart," said Hollingsworth in an interview with CBS Local's DJ Sixsmith. "I think LA had at that time the most room for opportunity and growth. That was almost six, seven years ago and the LA food scene has blow up since then. I think LA is a spot where a young chef can still go into a space and cook their food. In LA, you don't have to open a grand restaurant. You can go into a strip mall and open up a fine dining restaurant if you wanted to. The ethnic cuisine is incredible... the Chinese food, the Thai food, the Korean food."

In addition to his restaurants in Los Angeles, Hollingsworth is also known as the winner of The Final Table on Netflix. While the chef has had many success in his career, making a restaurant succeed in a place like Los Angeles is not an easy thing.

"We opened a restaurant built on a bridge. We opened a restaurant in Bunker Hill, which is a little bit of a slower area and not as much of a cooler area," said Hollingsworth. "There's a lot of theater and a lot arts in that part of town. It's not like Hollywood or West Hollywood. It's a different thing, but some of the best restaurants. The Los Angeles food scene is thriving."

FULL INTERVIEW:

Hollingsworth recently tapped into his roots with the creation of CJ Boyd's Fried Chicken. The chef wanted to pay homage to his grandfather with this venture.

"I was approached by the team that was putting the stadium together for LAFC," said Hollingsworth. "The opportunity was there and I've always wanted to do fried chicken. Fried chicken is something my grandfather used to have. One of my earliest memories was my grandpa going to KFC and getting fried chicken on pay day. I named it after him and it was an opportunity to take that southern fried chicken and I grew up eating that kind of food. Those two concepts were both my nod to my family and how I grew up in food."