Dessert Spots for a Date in Echo Park in Los Angeles

El Moro is a family churro business that has been frying churros in Mexico City since 1935, and its Echo Park shop is the first in Los Angeles. Ozzie Juarez, an LA artist, painted the mural by hand that anchors the art deco space. Churros come by the one, four or dozen, or as a bag of bite-size moritos, with dips like cajeta, guava and chocolate-hazelnut. The menu also includes seven hot chocolates, milkshakes and a churro ice cream sandwich.

This spot works well as a late night dessert after a show at the Echo or a stop at a taco truck.

Indigo Cow, on Sunset, makes its soft serve with Hokkaido milk shipped in from Japan. Pick the signature milk, a matcha that isn't too sweet, or a swirl of the two, then add mochi, roasted soybean powder or brûléed Japanese sweet potato puree.

Nick Fisher owns both Fluffy McCloud's, a retro ice cream shop on Sunset, and the bar El Prado across the street. The room mixes a 1950s soda fountain with a playroom. The retro soda fountain look gets quirky: a Saturn-shaped lamp hangs above the ice cream case, a jukebox sprouts deer horns, and the gumball machine hands out Lactaid pills.

We'd start with the banana split sundae, which is the shop's signature, or split a scoop of Thelma's vanilla. Monthly and vegan flavors rotate too.

Valerie Echo Park has been a neighborhood café since 2013, and its standout dessert is Blum's Coffee Crunch Cake. Go for slices here, since whole cakes and pies are collected only at the Glendale shop.

We recommend the petit fours and tea-sized tartines, which make it easy to share a handful of bites in one sitting. Regulars also order soft scrambled eggs with crème fraîche, a curried chicken sandwich and a salted maple latte.