Encinitas

Wade Hageman of the very successful Blue RibbonPizzeria in Encinitas (west of the I-5) will add another venue when he opens The Craftsman New American Tavern. After Mother’s Day takes over the spot that is Savory Casual Fare also in Encinitas (east of the I-5). Expect a late June/early July opening with a menu of “Hand Crafted Comfort” food emphasizing house made sausage, charcuterie, artisan cheese and Hageman’s farm to table approach with ingredients from local farmers, breweries and wineries. Savory Casual Fare, 267 El Camino Real Suite A & B, 760-634-5556, Blue Ribbon Pizzeria, Lumberyard Shopping Center, 897 S. Coast Highway 101, Suite F102, 760-634-7671.

When Savory closes after Mother’s Day, owner, Pascal Vignau moves to Chandler’s Restaurant in the soon-to-open Hilton Carlsbad Oceanfront Resort & Spa.

Go French for a week and dine at some of San Diego’s best: The Marine Room, Vagabond, Bleu Boheme, Winesellar & Brasserie to name a few. The Second Annual Tour de Cuisine (French Restaurant Week) runs from March 24 to April 1. Click here for more information and to see the three-course menus.

The Red Door Restaurant & Wine Bar named Miguel Valdez, who has been with the restaurant for a year and a half, their executive chef. On April 4 and June 20, Valdez will accompany guests on a tour of the Mission Hills Farmers Market, buy ingredients for the dinner, then return to the restaurant to enjoy an inspired meal. Four courses $45, with wine $70, and evening includes one of Chef’s recipes. For information: 619-295-6000.

In Liberty Station close to the Barnett Avenue entrance look for SOL Markets(Seasonal, Organic, Local) to open late January. According to one of the principals in the venture, Vincent Brown, “We will only carry products from local farmers/ranchers and other craft purveyors. The farmers market rotates its suppliers and appears part time. We will be open 7 days a week and are moving to open an exhibition kitchen and tasting room for beers and wine. We have a dedicated space there for community and education, we carry credit cards and fully vet our suppliers. We are not here to compete with the farmers markets, but to help grow the number of people who are interested in buying locally and eating seasonally.”

In Hillcrest, Lotus Cafe and Juice Bar adds a second location (they’re in Encinitas) and moves into the spot recently occupied by Pizza Nova. Construction is underway, so expect to see it open soon.

And beer buffs can get in on the festivities to celebrate and enjoy San Diego Beer Week that runs until November 13.

A quick note about Buzz’s absence on these pages: For the past year she’s been testing recipes for a friend’s cookbook due out next October, coupled with traveling far and wide. Expect to read about some of the meals she had in New York, Puerto Rico, Paris and soon Cuba. In the meantime, here are a few bites from Buzz about San Diego’s restaurant scene. Expect another post sometime after November 17!

Easter is around the corner, and here’s a quick roundup of things to do and places to go if cooking a ham isn’t your thing….

Get the kids involved on Thursday, April 21, when Cups La Jolla hosts an Easter Cookie Decorating class from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Chef Francois of renowned bakery Girard Gourmet, teaches the fun class. Ccst is $50 for a parent and child team, $15 per additional child, and $30 for a solo adult. For more information or call 858-459-2877.

More cupcake ideas come from the HOP box at Sprinkles. The box contains dark chocolate, red velvet, brown sugar praline and carrot cupcakes adorned with pink and green bunnies and is from April 15 to 24. The Jewish holiday of Passover isn’t forgotten here either. Get a dozen Passover Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes adorned with blue Star of David and sealed with a Star of David sticker and available from April 18th to 26^th. 8855 La Jolla Villa Drive, La Jolla. 858. 457 3800.

Take your daughter (or son) to tea at The US Grant Hotel on Saturday, April 23 from 1pm to 3pm where you’ll sip premium loose leaf teas served alongside a tantalizing selection of house-made sweets and savory treats.    Cost is $47 adults and $22 children.  For reservations, 619-744-2039 .

At La Valencia, you can do brunch buffet style, served throughout the day in the hotel’s various dining areas, seating from 11 am and is $75 per adult and $32 per child plus tax and tip. Bring the kids for an Easter egg hunt from 11am to 3pm. For reservations, please call 858- 551-3744.

Also in La Jolla, Roppongi Restaurant & Sushi Bar offers an à la carte menu from 11am to 2pm with interesting dishes that include Jidori chicken adobo; breakfast tacos with eggs, cheese and Asian guacamole; macadamia nut pancakes and more. For reservations: 858-551-5252.

If you’d like to sweeten an Easter basket, consider chocolates from Chuao (available countywide), Chi Chocolat (Liberty Station), The Elegant Truffle (Point Loma village), Eclipse Chocolat (University Heights) and Chocolat Creamerie (Hillcrest and Gaslamp). Buzz can attest that each of these purveyors makes artisanal and extremely luscious chocolates to satisfy every chocoholic.

**All three locations of The 3rd Corner (with the very cool redesigned website…) now offer happy hour from 3 to 6pm in the bar only, Tuesday through Saturday. Note the three venues are closed on Monday.

**That venerable group of local chefs known as CooksConfab will host Camp Confab, a sleep-over at Susie’s Farm in Imperial Beach on September 11 and 12. Dinner and breakfast the next morning will be prepared by many of the confab chefs. And you will be able to participate in harvesting, cleaning and preparing the produce from the farm. Sounds like a hoot with a host of activities that include guest appearances and tastings from such luminaries in their field as Gina Frieze from Venissimo Cheese, MIHO Gastgrotruck, and beers from Lost Abbey and master brewer Tomme Arthur and evening cocktails (after you help harvest) with mixologist Ian Ward of Snake Oil Cocktail Co. Lest you think it’s all veggies, the protein part of the meal is barbacoa of local goat and stick fire roasted local fish. There’s lots more for the $225 per person. Reservations are limited and so, at 9am September 1, get on the CooksConfab website to register. 100% of the proceeds go to Slow Food Urban San Diego.

**Jeff Rossman, owner/chef of Terra Restaurant, a hidden gem in Hillcrest (on Vermont near the east side of Trader Joe’s), has finished his cookbook, From Terra’s Table. Just in time for a holiday gift, the book publishes in November and sells for $32.95 online and at bookstores. The focus is on Jeff’s passion for local ingredients and the many farms and vendors that supply his restaurant. You can receive a 20% discount as a foodbuzzsd reader when you buy the book online here and use the code foodbuzzsd20 .

**Gordy’s Bakery sounds yummy and a place Buzz needs to try as she travels the 5 back and forth to LA. Just east off the freeway at Encinitas Boulevard in the Smart & Final center. Owner Gordy is born and raised in Encinitas and had a wholesale bakery business years ago. Sold the business and took a break and worked at the Running Shoes store and trained the track team at San Dieguito Academy. He has now gone back to his love of baking and has opened a retail bakery in the previous Baskin-Robbins space.

In Mission Hills, Philippe Beltran (of Bleu Boheme in Kensington) gave up on a place next door to Lefty’s Pizza. The building will now be a beauty salon: Cut. Instead, Beltran will focus on redoing a former flower shop on Adams Avenue where he will then turn out pizzas.

At the corner of Rosecrans and Talbot in Point Loma, the nearly finished box of a building (certain to be nominated for an Onion award in design) will house La Playa Bistro due to open this June or July. Expect traffic congestion–it’s a very busy intersection as the entrance to La Playa and the sub base.

Also in Point Loma, according to workers on the construction site next to the Dolphin Motel, the buzz is that the restaurant will be a coffee shop, not a steakhouse. Stay tuned.

The Arrivederci restaurant group has been busy. Along with their Ristorante Arrivederci and Arrivederci Pizza on Fourth Avenue, the group also owns the soon-to-open Au Revoir Bistro in the former La Vache location at Fourth Avenue and Robinson. They’ve just about made Monopoly on those few blocks of Fourth. The long awaited Il Postino by Arrivederci opened in North Park. Haven’t been, but will as it is next door to Buzz favorite, Caffe Calabria.

East Village Asian Diner just opened in Encinitas. With a chef trained at the French Culinary Institute in New York, the casual menu looks good and well priced. Open for lunch and dinner. 628 S. Coast Highway 101, Encinitas, 760-753-8700.

Luna Grill Neighborhood Kabobery opens its second location in Mission Valley—in the same complex as IKEA and Costco. The 65-seat restaurant features modern fast casual Near East/Mediterranean food, including the freshest kabobs, salads, wraps and sandwiches. 2245 Fenton Parkway, Suite 105, 619-516-5862. Their first location is in the Albertson’s shopping center at the 56 Freeway and Torrey Highlands. Haven’t been, but Buzz loves their well-designed website.

Worth getting on the email list for the Hotel del Coronado for specials and coupons such as one that takes $25 off a the dinner bill (over $100) at 1500 Ocean, that Sheerwater now has a $30 tasting menu with lots of choices or that Eno has bubbly Thursdays and $5 Fridays.

Caught up via email to former Blanca executive chef, Wade Hageman who will soon (June/July) open his own place, Blue Ribbon Artisan Pizza in Encinitas. Bet there will be lines for the 35 seats and the local, organic, farm to table ingredients that Hageman will make into mozzarella, sausage and pizza to be cooked in a wood-fire oven. His spot in the Lumberyard Shopping Center is just a few doors away from The 3^rd Corner that dispenses retail wines as well as bistro food.

Coming in April, Point Lomans will have more than just pasta and pizza places (not that they’re bad, just that we’ve got many) to have a bite. Jimmy’s Famous American Tavern should be a nice addition to the local scene and is just a few doors away from Pizza Nova on North Harbor Drive. Sign up says they’re hiring now.

In Ocean Beach, The 3^rd Corner has $25 prix fixe dinners on Sunday with updated menus on the website. For those who travel to Palm Desert and drive that winding Highway 74 to get there, Ed Moore’s third 3^rd Corner opens in June in the old Palomino restaurant space at 73-101 Highway 111, just a few blocks from Highways 74 and 111.

Downtown, the short-lived and eclectic Guild restaurant on Newton in Barrio Logan has become a lunch spot named Blueprint Cafe. In 1989 owner/chef Gayle Covner started her catering firm, In Good Taste and in 2010 moved it to the new location. The café, according to a pal with good taste, serves “inventive and tasty” food– Buzz hasn’t tried it yet. 1805 Newton St., San Diego, 619-233-7010. Open Monday through Friday 11:30am to 6pm.

It is that time of the year…holiday madness begins with Thanksgiving. Here are a few ideas for the day that include places that will happily feed you and the family. Also included are places to get turkeys, should you decide to cook at home.

If you’re interested in a Heritage turkey (it looks and tastes a bit different than our usual big breasted beauties), check out and try one from Heritage Foods. They have other meats and food items that would satisfy any home cook. Buzz regularly orders turkey from them and Good Shepherd Turkey Ranch.

Not interested in messing up the kitchen? Then, take the family out to eat at one of the myriad of choices San Diego offers…here are just a few:

Arterra will offer a plated three-course dinner for $39 while Red Marlin (with a gorgeous bay view) let you choose from a buffet for $42. Truluck’s, Paon and many others will serve dinners also.

For something healthy and the diet restricted, check out Healthy Creations in Encinitas. They offer meals to go as well as a gluten-free baking class on November 19. Haven’t had a chance to take a look, but sounds very good.

Rancho Valencia recently became an Auberge Resort, one of a handful of prime and unique properties. With new management also a new chef, C. Barclay Dodge who comes with twenty years of culinary experience from training at the California Culinary Academy to apprenticeships at E Bulli in Spain and Jean Georges and Daniel in New York. He recently moved from Santa Fe where he was chef de cuisine at Terra, the restaurant at another Auberge property, Encantado Resort. Beginning June 1, to celebrate the property’s twentieth anniversary, Dodge will have a $19.89 three-course lunch Chef’s Inspiration menu. Each day there will be a choice of a soup or an appetizer and only one entrée that will be the chef’s choice. Some examples of Dodge’s “coastal ranch” cuisine: sardines grilled with argan oil and escabeche of summer carrots; chilled English pea soup with fromage blanc and chive blossoms; and Valencia orange-scented lamb shank with house cut noodles and Moroccan pickled carrots. Buzz hasn’t tried it yet. For reservations and information: 858-759-6216.

It’s finally official from the buzz that’s been brewing (and from the looks of the cleared tables, no cloths and no setups), Laurel Restaurant & Bar is reinventing its concept and we hope this time it will include a new name. Possibly small plates, possibly Italian, and likely we will just have to wait and see what happens in the next few weeks when the redo should be done.

The Marine Room features a number of interesting events including a Monday night lobster dinner for $40 and the thrilling high tide dinners June 19 to 24. The restaurant offers a Fathers Day dinner as well, and with executive chef Bernard Guillas at the helm, the food is always a treat.

New on Fifth Avenue at Laurel Street, Pizzicato a franchise operation that began in Portland, Oregon. There’s also an Encinitas location. They use fresh local ingredients when possible, and Italian Parmesan too. Haven’t tried either….While we’re on the subject of pizza, Pizzeria Luigi in Golden Hill currently tops my list with its thinner, New York style crust and quality ingredients. North Park’s Lefty’s Chicago Pizzeria features thicker crust and equally good toppings along with sandwiches, sausages and pasta and opens its second location mid-June in Mission Hills–on Goldfinch– in the former home of Phil’s BBQ.

Just in time for race season and Wimbleton and the US Open, The Grand Del Mar offers five new cocktails in their Lobby Lounge and The Clubhouse Grill from June 1 to September 7. Cleverly named for tennis and racing terms (Moonball Pimms Caipirinhi and Bearing Out Breeze, among others) you’ve just got to go try them yourself–especially if you love rum, vodka, Pimm’s Cup and tropical juices–creatively mixed, though not all together.

Here’s a great summer camp for kids who love food: Tender Greens has two five-day cooking classes geared for kids. June 22 to 26 for ages 7 to 11 and July 27 to 31 for ages 12 to 16. The classes will be held at the restaurant from 9 to 10:30 am and cost $75. Kids will learn to make salads and dressings, pizza, sandwiches and ice cream. Classes will be taught by executive chef Pete Balistreri and pastry chef Susanna Brandenburg and after all that learning…lunch is included. Space is limited, for information: 619-226-6254 and ask for Pete or Susanna.

The Better Half , rumors to the contrary, is very much in business. Chef/owner John Kennedy has revamped the interior to a “Baroque, over the top” look and tweaked the menu to a French New Orleans style bistro food. Their wine list list now also includes full bottles and some older vintage wines that Kennedy has on his “Over Achievers” list. The restaurant is closed Monday. For more information: 619-543-9340.

We’re hearing Urban Solace will have an Encinitas location in a new shopping center that will house a Whole Foods. More info soon.

Good news for the Barrio Logan building that formerly housed The Guild. The planning and architectural firm of M.W. Steele Group bought the building and will occupy much of it, including the upstairs mezzanine. Blueprint Cafe and a catering company (owned by a former New York chef) will use the remaining space. The 40 seat cafe will serve lunch with homemade/handmade American seasonal dishes and afternoon light fare. Expect to see it open mid July. As details are not final, we can’t divulge more names just yet. Stay tuned.

Diane Powers will open Casa Bandini in the Forum, likely sometime in July.

And we hope it isn’t true that a small Hillcrest eatery, open barely a year and a half, could be closing soon.

It's Got Bite

The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
About San Diego's Food Scene

Encinitas Eats, French Restaurant Week and Red Door

Beer, Lotus Cafe and SOLMarkets

Easter Dining in San Diego

A Mix: Cooks Confab, 3rd Corner, Terra and Gordy’s Bakery

Bits and Bites: Kabobs, Bistros and More

Bites: Jimmy’s, Blueprint, Hageman and Moore

Bits and Bites: Gobble Gobble

Bits and Bites: A Medley

Bits and Bites: A Melange

Buzz from the Bar: Updates

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