We’ll tell it like it is—if you’re going to initiate a date, you better have a plan.  Sure, spontaneity can be sexy, but really, that should come later in the night.  This is why we’ve created a cheat sheet for your next date night.  Dinner.  Drinks.  And the third spot?  That’s where the spontaneity comes into play.

Dinner: Mantee Café

This Mediterranean café goes against everything you’ve learned about beauty—it’s pretty on the inside but even prettier on the outside.  Reserve a spot on the garden patio, under trees strewn with twinkling white lights, and order a bottle off the wine list (take it from us, nothing triggers seduction like a bottle of wine).  You’ll want to start with slices of baguette layered in soujuk sausage and crowned with a golden quail egg.  Then move onto the eponymous dish, diamonds of beef-stuffed dumplings served in a lagoon of garlic yogurt sauce, then dusted in sumac and red pepper powder.  A bonus?  The entire meal won’t cause you to cash out your 401K, even with that bottle of red.  

Mantee Café, 10962 Ventura Blvd, Studio City, CA 91604. 

Drinks: The Fox and Hounds

In a city that doesn’t walk, we think it’s pretty clutch to choose a post-dinner drinks spot that doesn’t require you to move your car.  Besides, what says romance more than a post-dinner stroll down the boulevard?  Walk down to British pub The Fox and Hounds for a pint or a cold one from their full bar menu.  On weekends you can enjoy the live music, or if your date night falls on a Monday or Wednesday, you can participate in trivia night.  Any other night of the week you and your date can get into a round of darts.  Cue the flirtatious competition. 

The Fox and Hounds, 11100 Ventura Blvd, Studio City, CA 91604. (818) 763-7837.