The former owners of McCall’s Meat & Fish Co., Karen Yoo and Nathan McCall, opened Backbone in Montrose on Wednesday, October 23, 2024. The dinner-only restaurant serving globally inspired “new American” cooking seats up to 35 diners in a 1,600-square-foot space on North Verdugo Road, located 14 miles northeast of Downtown Los Angeles. “There’s so much potential in the Foothills. I think a lot of people are interested in food, but there hasn’t quite been too much turnover in terms of the businesses,” says Yoo. “It’s an exciting time in this area and we are excited to bring something a little different.”

The debut of Backbone was 15 years in the making. Yoo and McCall, who met in the kitchen at chef David Myers’s seminal restaurant Sona in West Hollywood in the mid-aughts, attempted to open an iteration of the restaurant in 2009. The couple had just gotten married, finished a yearlong stint at fine dining stalwart Daniel in New York City, and returned to Los Angeles ready to make their mark on the city’s dining scene. “We had a business plan, we had a concept, we had all this written out years ago, but nobody was handing out money to restaurants at the time,” says Yoo, acknowledging the lingering impacts of the 2008 financial crisis on the industry.

After attempting for six months to get the restaurant off the ground, the couple pivoted to opening a market and butcher shop instead, debuting McCall’s Meat & Fish Co. on Hillhurst Avenue in Los Feliz in 2010. “The price of entry to open McCall’s was so different, so much less than a restaurant. All we had to do was put a walk-in cooler and a handful of sinks and we were good to go,” says McCall. Even though the butchery wasn’t their original dream, the duo invested time in it for a solid decade while raising two young children, applying as many restaurant philosophies to the business as possible. “It’s just a different level of satisfaction. We trained at a certain level and in a certain path for so many years, and then we deviated on this market concept,” McCall says. “Ultimately, it’s not really what we were striving to do.”

When the opportunity arose to sell McCall’s Meat & Fish Co. to David and Michelle Sarraf in 2020, the couple felt ready to move on — even though their next chapter was unknown. While they took a pause during the height of the pandemic — dabbling in laundromat ownership and slinging sandwiches at a wine bar — the couple’s long-gestating restaurant plan came into focus. “To now be here at this stage, opening this dinner-only restaurant, in a weird way, it’s even more proof that this is exactly where we’re supposed to be,” says Yoo. “We’re just champing at the bit to get in the kitchen and start cooking for people again.”

The restaurant’s name, Backbone, speaks to the winding path that Yoo and McCall traveled to arrive at their destination. It’s a nod to the butchery days and to the idea that in “the restaurant world, what we’re getting ready to undertake, you definitely have to have a backbone,” says McCall. Joining the couple in their venture is general manager L.A. Renigen, whom Yoo and McCall met at Sona.

The financial aspects of opening a restaurant have changed dramatically since the couple initially wrote their business plan, but their vision for Backbone’s culinary approach has remained steady. “It’s the food that we’ve always loved to cook and we’re trained to cook,” says Yoo. The restaurant is only open for dinner hours, but McCall envisions diners approaching Backbone in different ways depending on their mood and appetite, whether coming in for a few snacks paired with a glass of wine at the bar or a multicourse celebration meal with friends in the main dining room.

On the menu are small and large plates, which may include things like octopus with fennel or pork shoulder brightened by grilled pineapple from McCall, as well as richly conceived pastries from Yoo. The main menu is divided into three sections: bites, appetizers, and entrees. Influences from France, Spain, and Asia appear throughout, with an emphasis on seafood, since it is less available at nearby restaurants in the Foothills, says McCall. Notable dishes from the bites section include a seaweed waffle with sea urchin and yuzu creme and McCall’s personal favorite, smoked fatty albacore. “It’s almost like a Basque-style ceviche served with a remoulade and a sherry vinaigrette,” he says.

Appetizers like charred beef tartare, seasonal agnolotti, and wild mushroom risotto are portioned for sharing, while main courses feature plenty of red meat; dishes in the starters section range from $20 to $25, while mains start at around $40. To drink are beers and a selection of red, white, and sparkling wines curated by Renigen that cover the spectrum of Old World, New World, and everything in between, says McCall.

Yoo makes use of the season’s ripest fruit for her classic desserts. “There’s a lot of beauty in something really simple, but that you can make quite elegant with the contrast of flavors and textures,” she says. For the gateau Basque, Yoo prepares a citrus crust, Tahitian vanilla pastry cream filling, and a seasonal warm fruit compote. The dessert menu also includes delicate milk chocolate macarons paired with caramelized bananas and hazelnuts.

Following the sale of McCall’s Meat & Fish, Yoo and McCall left behind their cleavers and settled into a steady rhythm of raising their son and daughter without the pressure of running a business simultaneously. But now that their children are older — one just entered high school, the other is in middle school — and their shared vision for the future is clearer, all of the pieces are falling into place. “The other day our son was complaining about having to wait for something so long that he wanted so bad,” says Yoo. “It’s taken me 15 years to get my restaurant. Sometimes, it just takes a long time.”

Backbone is located at 3463 N. Verdugo Road, La Crescenta-Montrose 91208, and is open at 5 p.m. from Wednesday through Saturday for dinner.