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A unicorn is easier to find then a cheap date in Los Angeles, or is it?  I am an LA native and after spending my earlier of age years indulging in the pleasures of Hollywood and living beyond my means like the rest of Los Angeles, I decided to take a step back and become somewhat of an explorer. I decided to explore LA for frugal fun and as the years have gone on, my exploration has definitely led to plenty of treasures.  So facing a new challenge of going on a date for $40, I picked up my girlfriend and we were off on another journey.

It’s Wednesday at 730pm and the first stop of the night was at Yamato a cool nuvo sushi restaurant in the Westwood area on Westwood Blvd. This restaurant not only one that offers great ambiance and great food, but it’s all at a great price. They have a happy hour that starts at 5pm and goes until close. So my girlfriend ordered a pink roll and crab and avocado salad and I ordered 2 rolls.  With each roll and the salad 50% off, like most of the menu during happy hour, we had a superb meal with glasses of water for $19.

After dinner ended we headed to Culver City, to my favorite dive bar Backstage, this is a bar that is great for karaoke Thursday through Saturday. The average beer is $4 the well drinks are no more then $6 and if you really want to experience the good life you can get any top shelf liquor for $8, which in Los Angeles where drinks average well over $10 is equivalent to finding Atlantis.

Every Wednesday at Backstage you can experience the house band.  They go by the name of King Chris and the Groove Thangs and they bring so much personality to the bar it is hard to stay

away.  King Chris is Ragin Cajun from Louisiana with an eclectic band to match.  The band is a great cover band that plays anything from Marvin Gaye to Steely Dan.  After sitting down and listening to King Chris for an hour an each having three beers between us (bringing our total to $33.)

We headed to yogurtland, which is a better version of Pinkberry offering wonderfully flavored yogurts and eclectic toppings.  We shared a cup of peanut butter yogurt covered in captain crunch and called it a night.  Our total for the night was right at $38.  It was a great night filled with new experiences that most of LA seems to never know about.

When thinking of what to do for a $40 date night, a few standards come to mind. A movie is always a safe bet, perhaps a picnic, or a simple walk through downtown Santa Monica. All of these options are fine, but none of them combine Dinner, Drinks and Entertainment on a budget any frugal young professional can appreciate. With the lofty goals of producing an amazing night for $40 or less my girlfriend, Ashley, and I accomplished the following:

Dinner and Drinks:  We started at McCormick and Schmicks. When deciding on dinner, a cheap dinner with poor food won’t cut it. Happy hour must be utilized. Thus, I searched for the best happy hour in LA. I found a great one from Mccormick and Schmicks. Now for those of you that have never experienced the greatness that is Mccormick and Schmicks’ famous happy hour menu lets go through it: The hours are from 4pm-7pm and they have a nice but smaller selection of everything you could want for a  pricey dinner, except for the fact that everything is under $5.00! This includes a Half-Pound Gourmet Cheeseburger for $2.95. The most expensive item is Beer Battered Fish and Chips or Mussels for $4.95. On Wednesdays they have $1 Oysters and Thursdays is $1 Fish Tacos.  Now there is a catch, but you’ll like it. There is a $3.50 beverage purchase requirement per person. However, like the food, the drinks are a great deal, with Coors Light 10z Draft for $2.95 and some great choices for $5.00 or under.  All in all, their happy hour deserves to be famous.

What did we order on our date you ask? I had a grand ½ lbs Gourmet Burger for $2.95 and my date had a blackened Chicken Quesadilla for $3.95. We each had a 10oz Coors Light for $2.95 a peace. So, we made it out of a great dinner and drinks and spent $12.80. Not too shabby.

Entertainment: There is always interesting, fun and inexpensive activity to do in a city on a given night. On this night, we decided to see the Groundlings. For those that are not familiar, the Groundlings is a theatre just off of Melrose that is famous for its sketch comedy. Many familiar faces perform their regularly to keep up on their comedic craft. The Wednesday night we were there, two cast members from Reno 911 were performing with the main stage cast, which includes many recognizable faces from comedy central and other comedy sources of which you have most surely seen but cannot name. The show we saw was called The Crazy Uncle Joe Show, and it was hilarious, as the Groundlings always are. The show lasts about 2 hours and the atmosphere is amazing, with live music and an intimate stage. Now for the price. The first time I had taken a date here, I had convinced her I had spent a bunch on these tickets to get into this exclusive, hip, underground comedy club that not many people knew about. She completely bought it. This time I did not hide how much the tickets cost.  The price of the tickets for the night was $13 a person! If you go after 10pm on a Friday they are $9, and can be as much as $20. So entertainment for the evening was $26 total.

Conclusion: All in all we managed a great dinner, decent drinks, and great entertainment for a grand total of $38.80. That leaves a $1.20 for some breath mints on the way home.

As people pursuing careers in entertainment, and thus, destined to live in LA forever, Damien and I like to focus on the positive features SoCal has to offer. We frequently hit up the beach, are constantly exploring dive bars throughout the city and love to bust-a-move at some of LA’s lesser-known, less-douchey clubs. We aimed to incorporate all of these passions into the challenge to prove that you don’t need wads of money or name-dropping skills to have a good time in Los Angeles.

Enjoying LA’s scenery

Since we live two blocks from the beach in Santa Monica, Damien and I decided that the first part of the Challenge would be spent riding our bikes along the strand that runs parallel to the beautiful Pacific coast. If you ride South, you will pass the famous Santa Monica pier and Ferris wheel, and eventually hit the Venice boardwalk—an amazing spot to people watch. You’ll find drum circles, muscle builders, an array of carnival food (kettle corn is my favorite!) and plenty of spots to buy cheap t-shirts and accessories. If you head North along the strand, you’ll have a more peaceful ride and be able to marvel at the scenic mountains and coast of Malibu.

This particular Saturday, we chose the more peaceful route and rode our beach cruisers through NorthernSanta Monica. We stopped at some rocks that jut out to the water and carefully navigated our way to the end to feel the spray of the water and enjoy the sounds of the seagulls and waves. When you live in the busy city of LA, it’s nice to flee the sounds of traffic and find a spot like this where you can enjoy nature, especially with someone you love.

Eating and Drinking

Eventually, we had enough beach and sun and headed home to clean up and change clothes before hitting up one of our favorite places to get quality food and beer without the usual inflated LA prices—Back Stage Bar and Grill, located at 10400 Culver Blvd. in Culver City. During the week, Back Stage features a quality house

band, and on the weekend, the spot offers karaoke with a large array of popular songs. But we didn’t come to this spot for the entertainment—to us, the main attraction was the restaurant’s famous sliders and selection of beers on tap.

Damien and I each ordered a plate of 2 Back Stage sliders ($7 each), shared a basket of garlic fries ($4) and ordered two Blue Moons on tap ($4 each). And then, much to the crowd’s entertainment, Damien took the stage and appropriately sang his rendition of “Cheeseburger and Paradise.”

Entertainment

After our bellies were full, we had $14 left to spend and were ready to change clothes once again before hitting up our favorite dance club in Los Angeles—Bootie LA, held once a month at the Echoplex in EchoPark. The club features a handful of DJs each Saturday who mash up popular songs together so two to three songs are playing on top of each other at the same time. The result is a killer beat and an amazing time for the dancers on the floor.

For the frugal folk like us, make sure to arrive before 10 p.m., because then cover is only $5, as opposed to $10 each after 10 p.m. And also make sure to stay until midnight, because that’s when the Bootie dancers come out—sometimes they’re throwing out freebies, sometimes they’re dressed up in gold lycra suits, and occasionally they’ll

feature a Lady GaGa lookalike. With its mixes of multiple genres of music, quirky dancers and a group of chill people, Bootie LA is a gem for people looking to let loose and have a good time, for a nominal cover price.

By the end of the challenge, Damien and I were exhausted from our active date and still had $4 left in our pockets. We hope our challenge inspires others in LA to enjoy the amazing weather and scenic views that our wonderful city has to offer, seek out the dive bars and avoid overpriced cover charges at dance clubs!

So Anna and I recently moved to Westlake Village near Thousand Oaks and were very excited to use the Young and Frugal Challenge as an excuse to get out and check out our new town. When we talk about going out its always to a bar or lounge like P6 or Suki 7, a Cheesecake Factory or Chili’s in the promenade or a dinner and a movie and at The Oaks Mall but of course that comes with a price.

With the focus of making the date night enjoyable and inexpensive Annie and I set off to make a plan to meet the challenge. First the food and booze then the entertainment.

With a few clicks on Yelp we came across Cisco’s Mexican restaurant which is only 2 blocks from our apartment and we decided it would be a great place to start The Challenge. When looking at the restaurants website two words caught our eye: Happy Hour, well actually to be more precise $2 Margaritas. Cisco’s in Westlake Village on Westlake Blvd, has a great Happy Hour from 4-7 everyday. $2 Margaritas, $3 shots, $3 Well drinks, $3 drafts, $6 24oz Coronas and Pacificos and $6 Jagger-bombs (an old college favorite) and of course 1/2 off appetizers. Now with dinner and drinks planned for the night the next step was to find some entertainment.

We decided to check the Thousand Oaks City website for an inside look into the upcoming events, concerts and show in our area. When looking for something fun and unique to do remember to check out the calendar on your town’s website. You’ll find a slew of fun stuff to do and great deals in the process.

Thousand Oaks has a lot of art shows, plays at the Civic Arts Plaza and special performances at places like the Thousand Oaks Library. Annie and I decided to check out one of the Bodie House Concert Series at the Thousand Oaks Library. The most important thing to remember when checking out the events in your town is to RSVP in time to get a spot. What’s great about event’s like this is that if you are running short on funds the admittance is free but donations are appreciated.

So after all this planning Annie and I were very excited to hit the town. We sat down at Cisco’s around 6:00PM on Friday evening. The place was already filling up with a bunch of people ready to start the weekend off right, inexpensive drinks, good food, loud music and fun people. We both started with a $2 Margarita, Annie had the chicken flautas ($4) and I had the Cisco’s Nacho’s con carne (that’s about the extent of my Spanish) ($4.50). Going along with the vibe of Cisco’s we decided to get a 2nd round Annie a Margarita($2) and I had Jack and coke ($3). At the end of dinner our bill came to $17.50.

We signed our check, hopped in the car for a short drive to the library for the concert. The library is a great venue, small, intimate and very welcoming. We were happy to donate $20 to the library for the concert. At thi

s concert, like most of the Bodie House Concert Series, they had appetizers and dessert available for all in attendance. We had an opportunity to see Jimmy LaFave, an extremely talented guitarist and singer whose laid back and comical nature really brings you in to his performance. The concert was great and something we both will be doing again together in the future.

So after all was said and done the evening came to a grand total of $37.50. It’s always fun when you have a chance to break your usual routine and try something new. So remember always check out your local resources for fun events and keep your eyes peeled for those two magical words: Happy Hour.

Be sure to read all of the Los Angeles $40 Date Night Challenges before voting, so check them out below!

• Chris’ Date Night
• Greg and Anna’s Date Night
• Natalie and Damien’s Date Night
• Randy and Ashley’s Date Night
• Vote (in footer or on the summary page)