Celebrate EatingLA's 6th blogiversary Friday at Ricky's Fish Tacos

Thanks to CarolineonCrack, who celebrated her 5th blogiversary this week, I remembered that it's also EatingLA's 6th blogiversary this week. I'm celebrating with lunch Friday at Ricky's Fish Tacos from 12:30 - 2. There will be cupcakes, free fish tacos for the first 25 readers, friends and supporters, and muy special aguas frescas. Please come by Ricky's at 1400 N. Virgil and help celebrate six years of EatingLA, which I started to help people find good food in Silver Lake, the near-Eastside and beyond.

Ricky's Fish Tacos are at 1400 N. Virgil in Silver Lake

Here's what it was like back in 2004..

• It was a time before there was Twitter, Yelp or Facebook, before there was EaterLA, before there were other local.food blogs. Outside of Jonathan Gold and the L.A. Times, there was only Chowhound for more democratic discussion of restaurants.

• Only the very brave ate at taco trucks. In fact, EatingLA didn't mention them until 2006, when I started frequenting the Taco Zone on Alvarado.
• Gourmet cupcakes were unheard-of. When I first saw the fad mounting in 2005, I predicted it would soon die out. Wrong again. 
• There was basically nowhere to get good craft beers that was closer than Father's Office or the Library Alehouse in Santa Monica, and there was no such thing as mixology.
• There was no Pinkberry, and frozen yogurt was thought to be a long-dead fad that would never be revived.
• Some neighborhoods, like Echo Park and Atwater, had basically zero places to eat weren't old-timers that mostly seen better days. It was before The Park, Masa, Allston Yacht Club, Elf Cafe, LaMill, Intelligentsia, Pazzo Gelato, Forage, Canele, Local and a zillion others that have really livened up the eating scene.

Guess we've come a pretty long way...happy next decade!