LAST YEAR Genet Agonafer announced her semi-retirement — she’d prepare meals to-go from her Little Ethiopia stalwart Thursday through Sunday, and open her once-bustling dining room only for private events. The decision has meant less cash flow but also less stress for Agonafer. And, as L.A. Times Food General Manager Laurie Ochoa wrote in her selection of Meals by Genet for this year’s Gold Award, “Her customers have adapted as well, grateful that they can still get her cooking through takeout and re-create the shared feast experience in their own homes.” The colors of Agonafer’s vegetarian combination platter, spread over injera, look like an image of California’s shifting geography captured from space: forest-green collards segue to earth tones of spiced lentils and split peas and the soft shades of turmeric-stained cabbage. Lately I’ve been crushing on yebegsisga alitcha, a buttery lamb stew with a mellow thrum of garlic, but let’s never envision a day without Agonafer’s doro wat: She spends two days melting onions and simmering chicken with dusky berbere spices until every flavor fuses into a new, indivisible whole.

• 1053 S. Fairfax Ave., Los Angeles, (323) 938-9304, mealsbygenetla.com