Category: San Diego County

College, La Mesa, San Diego County, Mary

dining at terra american bistro for san diego restaurant week

San Diego Restaurant Week is upon us yet again! This biannual event is a county wide event, spreading into just about every neighborhood in San Diego county and bringing with it the joy of a three course meal (for dinner – or two courses for lunch). SDRW is a great way to explore new restaurants and try out menus for a set price. There are $20, $30 or $40 menus for dinner as well as $10, $15 or $20 menus for lunch.

I was again invited to come out and dine at one of our local restaurants and I choose to visit Terra American Bistro in the outer edge of La Mesa. There was a … slight snafu… involved with my visit, in that there was a miscommunication and the hostess and manager did not know about my visit. Happily, the manager did everything she could to figure out what was going on and Stacey and I were able to enjoy a dinner here. Since it was all kind of arranged “on the fly”, they picked out everything for us, giving us plates and samples from items that will be featured on the SDRW menu this week (all of these are available on the menu – minus a few of the desserts).

fresh-bread-with-chickpea-sauce

[complimentary bread with chickpea spread]

We were offered complimentary bread by our waiter. I was hungry and immediately said yes. I am never one to turn down bread, in any case. Bread, I love you and all of your glutens!

The bread came with “chickpea spread”. Stacey and I quirked an eyebrow at each other and said, “Isn’t that just hummus?”

It wasn’t really seasoned in the same way that hummus is and it was a much simpler spread, so I could see why they called it “chickpea spread” instead. Not knocking it or anything – it was simple and good – but I wouldn’t have complained if it had had a little extra seasoning. Good bread, as well. Tasted freshly made.

the-remedy-drink

[“the remedy” – house infused sage bourbon, ginger lemongrass lemonade, bitters, lime, splash of soda]

Stacey opted to get an alcoholic beverage, while I abstained and just got the ginger lemongrass lemonade, as mentioned above in the description. I had a little sip of this – and it was dangerously delicious.

Dangerous in that it just tasted like sweet deliciousness with barely a hint of alcohol. Maybe just a *tad* too sweet.

spicy-peppery-calamari

[salty peppery calamari – fried garlic, green onion and chile flakes]

I know I said something about always ordering calamari – very recently! – but I didn’t order this! They brought it to our table, put it in front of me in the prettiest presentation I’ve ever seen for calamari and I had to eat it. Had to!

All of the plates were split for us – so we each got our own little plate. This dish was served on a very cool stone/granite plate – more like just a flat piece of rock, really – with the calamari in an edible “shell”.

Stacey affectionately called it a “squid-ucopia”! And she even ate a tiny piece! She didn’t really enjoy it, of course, but at least she was a trooper enough to try. She also “sneaked” all of her calamari into my squiducopia so it looked like I didn’t like it… but I did!

The fried garlic and chile flakes were all kind of at the bottom of the shell thing, but I got a few peppery bites here and there. It was also served with a kinda spicy sauce that I couldn’t get enough of. It had a good kick of flavor and tasted wonderful paired with the calamari. I ate almost every bit of this.

beet-goat-cheese-salad

[roasted beet and goat cheese salad – honey-miso vinaigrette, baby greens, toasted hazelnuts]

Our next course was a roasted beet and goat cheese salad. Stacey, who is allergic to milk, was very happy to see goat cheese since it’s something she can actually eat. We were both not thrilled with the prospect of beets though, and our plates kind of looked like this:

beet-henge

[“beet henge”]

Well, mine looked like this. Stacey pushed all of her beets together on her plate and then said my plate looked like “Beet-Henge”.

I love Stacey.

And the goat cheese was really delicious. And creamy. And kind of dreamy.

pot-roast-mashed-potatoes-local-greens

[pot roast – mashed Yukon potatoes, local vegetables, truffle oil]

The first entree we got was this deliciously tender pot roast. The outer part of the pot roast had a bit of a crust and the inside was flavorful and tender. I especially like eating bites of the pot roast with the very creamy mashed potatoes. The mashed potatoes were perfectly smooth and well seasoned – very flavorful. The local veggies were all bright and crisp and there was such a nice variety on the plate – not to mention colorful! Continue reading “dining at terra american bistro for san diego restaurant week”

jones brothers mississippi bbq / san diego, ca
San Diego County, Mary, Lincoln Park

jones brothers mississippi bbq / san diego, ca

Jones Brothers Mississippi BBQ is a little joint off Euclid Ave. near Lincoln Park. Jake suggested we try this place out last month after he spent some time talking to one of the owners. We’ve passed by this little nondescript BBQ spot a few times when we were on our way to Chula Vista and avoiding the traffic-clogged 805 freeway during rush hour. The smells of BBQ wafting in the air always made our mouths water and we finally had the chance to stop in to check out their BBQ.

bbq-overview

[bbq overview – 3 meat combination with 3 sides – $22.99]

View their menu!

The ladies at the counter were really helpful and friendly – greeting us warmly as we came inside and grabbed a menu to try and figure out what we wanted. They even suggested that we get the 3 meat combination – that way we’d get to try a bunch of stuff for one price. That’s what we ended up doing and it was more than enough food for Jake, T and I to share for lunch with plenty of leftovers for later.

They also let us sample the BBQ sauce. They have a regular mild BBQ sauce, a spicy BBQ and what they call “Twist BBQ” sauce – a combination of the mild and spicy. I got a little taste of the twist and enjoyed it enough to agree that we have all of our meats smothered in the “twist” sauce. It had a delightfully sweet taste and just a enough of an extra spice to give it a tiny kick – which is about as much spice as I could take or want. I am, after all, still a wimp when it comes to spicy stuff.

pulled-pork-in-bbq-sauce

[pulled pork]

The pulled pork ended up being my favorite meat of the three that we tried.

The pork was very tender and juicy. It melted away in my mouth from how tender it was and the sweetish sauce was a great accompaniment to the pork. I like pulled pork with sauce on it, so this was perfectly fine to me. I’m not sure what makes this stuff “Mississippi” style BBQ, but whatever it is, I like it. There’s no tangy flavor (rejoice!) just a nice, sweet and clean flavor from the sauce and the juicy meat.

beef-brisket

[beef brisket]

I’m really not a brisket person – I don’t know what it is that turns me off from it – but this beef brisket wasn’t too bad, especially with that tasty BBQ sauce. Jake and T seemed to enjoy it but there was one item they enjoyed just a bit more…

hot-links-in-bbq-sauce

[hot links]

… which was the hot links! There is a damn good amount of hot links here, also covered and tossed in their “twist” BBQ sauce. I am normally a great big fan of hot links and these hot links were also very good – juicy with a nice crisp “snap” to the links – but good god, they were really spicy! The “hot” part of the name was not lost on these links and they were much spicier than what little old me is used to and I sadly couldn’t eat too many of them. Jake and T were pretty bonkers for them though, and considering they like spicy stuff, this one was the winner for them that day.

Damn me and my low tolerance for spicy. Continue reading “jones brothers mississippi bbq / san diego, ca”

star dust donuts and searching for sea shells in imperial beach
Imperial Beach, San Diego County, Mary

star dust donuts and searching for sea shells in imperial beach

Jake and I have driven by Star Dust Donuts probably 3 or 4 times now and every time it was closed.

They have crazy inconsistent hours:

But one magical day in early December, Star Dust was open!

Jake, the kids and I were heading down to Imperial Beach to collect sea shells for a present Jake was making for his mom for Christmas. Since we were going right by, Jake suggested we check and see if Star Dust was open and when I saw that it was, I did a little happy dance in the car. Finally, we could try it!

There wasn’t a whole lot of donuts left… so I just got one of each.

They had: Buttermilk Twist (.94 cents), Old Fashioned (.94 cents), Carmel Pecan Rolls ($1.59), Chocolate Iced with Nuts (.94 cents), Chocolate Raised (.94 cents) and Cinnamon Rolls (.94 cents).

They cost a little more than what you’d get at a regular donut shop, aren’t really fancy looking and pretty basic.

But man oh man, were they good! The buttermilk bar and the old fashioned were probably my favorite of the bunch – just simple, crunchy, melt-in-your-mouth donut goodness. The donuts tasted fresh and perfectly crisp. Very yummy.

I don’t have any other photos of the donuts since my camera died later! Probably from all of the photo taking I did at the beach.

We went as far south as you can go – all the way to the end near the Tijuana Estuary.

The sun was still up while we went to collect shells. The beach was pretty empty and it was pretty chilly that night – but the sky was beautiful. Continue reading “star dust donuts and searching for sea shells in imperial beach”

San Diego County, Mary, City Heights, Cheap Eats

hao vi chinese restaurant / city heights – san diego, ca

Hao Vi is this little restaurant is smack in the middle of City Heights. Jake and I used to pass it all of the time on the way to his old apartment in the ‘hood and for some reason, I always wanted to go here. It didn’t look like much, just this tiny little place on the corner, but I wanted to go exploring. The day we were going to actually go we couldn’t, since Jake didn’t have any cash and I had a brain fart and couldn’t remember my pin number. I racked and racked my brain, but I just could not think of it! It was like one day I remembered it, and the next day – poof! That memory was gone.

Ah well. I got a new bank card and reset my pin to something I would actually remember and we were finally able to go here.

As you can see from that sign on the counter, this place is definitely “CASH ONLY”.

And yes, that giant light in the back is probably one of two lights in the whole place. The other from the front of the place, where the outside sign is located. They aren’t into interior lighting in this place. It also looks kind of dirty and there’s a weird tray of condiments at every table. Oh, and the parking is this weird tiny lot in the back off of a side road, with no lights there either.

This place screams “hole in the wall” on so many levels.

They’ve got a shorter menu then I’ve seen at other Chinese restaurants. No descriptions on it at all with a vague idea of what you’re going to get. We tried to ask the waitress what a few things were but it was hard for her to explain in broken English and it was hard for us to understand. We just went with it and ordered the best we could.

Menu Page 1 | Menu Page 2 | Menu Page 3

[beef chow mein (dry) – $7.99]

When we got our dishes, I actually confused them. And then I confused them again while writing this post. The names of the dishes didn’t quite match up to what I thought – why does it say dry in parenthesis? No idea. What we did get was a veggie laden dish with some delicious stir fried beef and yellow noodles.

You can’t really see how much (or what kind) noodles is in the dish from that first photo so here’s another shot. Under the layer of veggies lies this bed of noodles with a lovely little sauce. In the mix are bean sprouts, cabbage, onions, carrots and topped off with a sweetish sauce that’s made with pork and beef stock. There’s definitely a ton of veggies in this dish (much to Jake’s dismay) but the beef is tender and well seasoned. A surprisingly excellent first dish to start off with.

Another note here: we ordered three dishes, and each dish came out one at a time – long enough for us to polish off a majority of the dish before the next item came out. The dishes are served family style and it’s plenty of food for sharing!

[bbq pork vegetable crisp noodle – $6.50]

The second thing I picked was under “Chow Fun & Mein” – which was Chow Fun and which was Chow Mein I’ll never know.

Now this one sort of came out like what I thought – with crisp noodles on top. They look a lot like the noodles from the previous dish – except the noodles are crunchy and there’s a tasty sauce underneath. Continue reading “hao vi chinese restaurant / city heights – san diego, ca”

San Diego County, Mary, Hillcrest

busalacchi’s a modo mio / hillcrest – san diego, ca

Busalacchi’s is a pretty well known name around here in San Diego and recently I had the opportunity to visit Busalacchi’s A Modo Mio in Hillcrest for “a modo mio” week – or “my way” – where the chef calls the shots for dinner service. Guests get to choose what kind of entree they want (chicken, red meat, fish or vegetarian) and chef Joe Busalacchi takes care of the rest. It’s a fun and adventurous way to dine and you get to taste a little bit of everything that a restaurant has to offer.

This was the appetizer samplers laid out before Stacey and I for our first course. No messing around here. There’s a little bit of everything, including some complimentary bread with a bruschetta topping (which was incredibly flavorful for something that just looked like tomatoes in a cup).

[garbanzo croquettes]

These little fried croquettes were made out of garbanzo beans and pressed into this square shape. I thought they looked kind of weird and spongy, but they were actually a little crisp on the outside and kind of creamy in the middle (and really not spongy whatsoever). I’ve never seen garbanzos prepared like this before!

[pickled veggies plate with artichoke, olives, mushrooms, sardines, cheese and prosciutto]

We also got this little plate of mostly pickled things. I personally don’t like pickled anything so I was feeling very adventurous with this plate. I did try the mushroom but I didn’t care for it – the marinade made it taste off to me, but like I said… no pickled stuff for me. Prosciutto was fine, a tad salty though.

[pizza bread]

For some reason I have no notes about this except “pizza bread” and “flavorful”.

Clearly I need to take better notes.

[eggplant parmesan]

This dish actually surprised me because I don’t usually like eggplant. But this dish I ended up really liking it and – funny enough – didn’t taste at all to me like eggplant. I just tasted a very flavorful, rich and herby sauce with plenty of basil. The eggplant was tender and just soaked up the flavor of the sauce so I was really astounded I liked it!

[calamari]

Since Stacey doesn’t eat seafood, I got to have this plate all to myself. Wonderfully seasoned calamari, I would marry you if I could. The batter on this version is light and crispy, well seasoned and perfectly fried. The batter did not take away from the deliciousness of the calamari and is one of the better versions I’ve had of this dish.

[frisee pomegranate salad with arugula and pumpkin seeds]

This salad had frisee and arugula in it – and yet I still liked it! The combination of flavors and textures just made this whole salad really shine – from the crunchy bits of pumpkin seeds to the brightness of the pomegranates to the sweetness of the dressing balanced with the peppery arugula. Really packed with flavor and it was pretty and artful. Continue reading “busalacchi’s a modo mio / hillcrest – san diego, ca”

Cheap Eats, San Diego County, Mary, City Heights

minh ky restaurant / city heights – san diego, ca

We went here because A) the place I originally wanted to go to was cash only and for the life of me, I could not remember my pin number that weekend and B) it had a fairly high rating of over 300+ reviews on Yelp. I’ve learn to take Yelp reviews with a grain of salt though, since people tend to rate with no rhyme or reason (“the parking sucks, 1 star” or “it looks dirty, I walked out and didn’t actually try any of the food, 1 star” or on the opposite end with highly overrated food and other shenanigans). We ended up here on kind of a whim, a second choice location, but as it turned out, it was a pretty good whim after all.

Parking here is actually pretty weird. There’s a tiny, almost unnavigable parking lot in front of the tiny strip mall and a sketchy parking lot in the back, behind the restaurant. We parked in the back since it was the only space we could find, though the area made me cringe with the obscene amount of trash littered about.

We went inside and saw a small, cozy, 12-table restaurant. Every table was full but we must have had a stroke of good luck since we didn’t have to wait long to be seated.

They have an enormous six page menu with over 200+ items on board. A little baffling, to say the least.

Menu Page 1 | Menu Page 2-3 | Menu Page 4-5 | Menu Page 6

There’s also a specials board on the right side, listing about 5 different specials. We decided to try the Shrimp Tempura and BBQ Pork.

[tempura shrimp + bbq pork – $5.50]

Since neither Jake or T like shrimp, I got to keep that all for myself. The shrimp are butterflied and flattened and have a thin coating on the batter with what seemed to be panko crumbs. There was a side of Thai sweet chili dipping sauce for both appetizers. I enjoyed the shrimp – the batter didn’t hide the flavor of the shrimp and the shrimp was nice and tender on the inside.

The BBQ pork was a tad dry but a few pieces were perfectly sweet and tender.

[dumplings and wonton lo mien – $5.75]

This dish actually surprised me since it came out in two bowls – one with the noodles and one with the broth and dumplings/wontons. Lo mien makes me think of noodle dishes, sans broth, and nothing like this.

Here’s the broth by itself – you can see the dumplings and pieces of char sui pork just under the surface with the scallions scattered over the top.

And a closeup of the noodles with a hint of a sauce just underneath the pile of noodles.

Jake started to eat them separately, but me – I put those two suckers together and had myself a little lo mien soup.

I loved the flavor of the broth – it wasn’t overpowering, very nicely seasoned with a good amount of flavor and (as you can see) oil. The noodles were tender and delicious as well and the meaty dumplings were really nice with the broth. I liked the pork pieces in this dish more than the ones we had as an appetizer – they were more tender and flavorful, perhaps a result of sitting in the broth? Continue reading “minh ky restaurant / city heights – san diego, ca”

San Diego County, Mary, Poway

company pub & kitchen / poway – san diego, ca

Company Pub & Kitchen is a gastropub in the heart of Poway, adding to their lineup of restaurants and “boozy” places in town. Laura and I came here one evening before we continued on with our marathon of “Downton Abbey”. I started watching Downton Abbey earlier this year and immediately knew Laura would also be into it – we’re both fans of English dramas and have major soft spots for Mr. Darcy (the BBC TV version, of course – hello, Colin Firth!).

We needed some full bellies before we could go and hunker down for a few hours and I had a group deal for this place.

Let’s recap: Things I’m a fan of: Colin Firth, Jane Austen novels, British dramas and group deals.

[the drink menu]

I really dug the paper their menus are printed on. It’s that teacher’s grade paper. Do teacher’s still use this? Surely they’ve upgraded to a computerized system by now…

[orange wheat and a snake bite (stella & strongbow cider)]

Laura got a Hanger 24 Orange Wheat beer while I opted to try a “Snake Bite” – which is a combination of Stella and Strongbow Cider. I almost got a “Shandy” which is a beer of your choice mixed with Sprite – but Laura gave me a “Maybe you shouldn’t try that…” look and I decided that the stella/cider combination did sound better… I actually ending up really like it. Maybe I should put cider in everything!

[quack mac & cheese – duck/bacon sausage with mac n cheese – $9]

We started by sharing two items – a salad and this Quack Mac and Cheese which had duck and bacon sausage with a Gouda, Cheddar and Parmesan cheese sauce with the noodles.

The sausage sounded so interesting – but, turns out neither of us like the sausage very much. The sausage was a bit on the spicier side and had a very intense smoky flavor. The texture was also really odd, probably from it mostly being made out of duck.

The mac and cheese was very creamy and tasted good – but it was rather on the oily side. It looked to me like the cheese sauce had separated and broke, like when you add the cheese while the sauce it still hot. I liked the flavor overall, but the texture of the sauce made it a little off.

[“abc” salad – avocado, beets & goat cheese with heirloom spinach, toasted pine nuts, white balsamic vinaigrette – $8.50]

Our waitress had the salad plates split for us so we both got a nice, even sized portion for sharing. Pretty simple salad and the beets were chopped small which I appreciated since they didn’t stand out as much (since I’m not a huge fan of beets). The avocado and goat cheese made for a nice creamy texture along with the crunch of the toasted pine nuts. The vinaigrette was light and not too heavy handed. Continue reading “company pub & kitchen / poway – san diego, ca”

San Diego County, Mary, Mission Gorge

tropical fruit paradise / mission gorge – san diego, ca

I buy lots of group deals from Groupon, LivingSocial, Amazon Local and places like that. Lately I’ve felt like a lot of the places I’ve been to have been just kind of “meh” and not really impressive with their food or service, so when I finally went in to use one of my coupons to a little place called Tropical Fruit Paradise, I really wasn’t expecting very much. I read a couple of Yelp reviews saying they had good torta sandwiches and that was enough to get me to shell out money to buy two coupons – and as it turns out, this was a really excellent idea.

Let’s say that my first visit was the “scouting trip”. I went here alone for lunch one Saturday afternoon while Jake had to work for a bit. My Amazon Local deal covered $10 – just enough to get me one torta sandwich and one strawberry agua fresca. I had to pay tax and for my bag of chips, all in all a steal.

[steak torta sandwich – includes mayo, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, jalapenos, and sliced avocado with a side of salsa – $6.99]

I ordered just a plain old steak torta, just wanting to try something “basic” and simple here for my scouting mission. I must say I was pleasantly surprised. The steak was well seasoned and marinated – cooked perfectly as well. It was juicy and cooked to medium and stacked high with lots of fresh veggies – red onion, tomatoes, green leaf lettuce and slices of perfectly ripe avocado.

The bread on the torta is also really nice – the bread is fluffy with a nice chew and is grilled on the inside. I could tell it was grilled on a stove to toast since the top of the was still fairly soft but had a really nice crunch from the grilling.

Since it’s a pretty large sandwich, I only ate half and brought the rest home to Jake. He ended up gobbling the sandwich in no time and thought – even cold – that it was one of the best torta sandwiches he’s ever had. I think I might have been onto something here.

[agua frescas – strawberry flavored – $2.49, large]

Ever since I got one of these at Frutilandia oh so many moons ago, I’ve loved them. I order them pretty much wherever we go – but I always get the same flavor! I can’t seem to branch out and try a new flavor, sticking with my standby strawberry favorite. The version here at Tropical Fruit Paradise seems a little creamier than other versions I’ve had a little less sweet – but still quite delicious in my book. I ordered one of these on both of my visits to Tropical Fruit Paradise. I can’t manage to tear myself away from them.

Must… have…strawberry water… arrrrgh!

[tostielote – tostitos, nacho cheese and corn – $3.99]

From here on out we’re using iPhone photos since I actually left my camera at home on our second visit. Lordy. Jake ordered this – it sounded totally weird to me, but since he was paying for it, I wasn’t going to complain.

I ate my words shortly after though since I did actually kind of like it. These are served right inside of a bag of salsa flavored Tostitos chips and topped off with nacho cheese, jalapenos and corn. Nacho cheese and corn?! Was this invented on purpose? I can’t see how that’s possible. I honestly believe someone had an open can of corn that got accidentally dumped in some nacho cheese and no one noticed until they started eating it and then decided it was good. I would never put “nacho cheese” and “corn” together otherwise. But for some reason it’s tasty? Even as I ate it I was in disbelief. Still kinda am.

[cubana torta – milaneza, chicken, ham, chorizo, egg, american egg, jack cheese + veggies – $7.69]

Jake and T shared this Cubana Torta – this thing is packed with goodies! Milaneza (which, in this case, it a thinly sliced breaded steak cutlet), chicken, ham, chorizo and an egg… with two kinds of cheese! This is definitely a rich sandwich with all of those layers packed into one sandwich – but you’re still able to wrap your whole mouth around the sucker since everything is thin enough to still make it a decent side.

I did have one little bit and the chorizo seemed to be the most dominant flavor since it had a little bit of a spicy kick to it. I thought the egg made it “too much” – but Jake totally loved this sandwich. We had this last weekend and just last night he told me he had been thinking about this sandwich for three days! I hope I don’t lose out to a sandwich! Continue reading “tropical fruit paradise / mission gorge – san diego, ca”