The standard for service in San Diego is lower than it should be and diners need to stand up for themselves.

Since I started reviewing restaurants for the Reader, the only thing I’ve received hate mail over has been my tendency to call out bad servers and poor service. I’ve gone so far as to say that the standards for service …

Orange County waffle sandwich restaurant is doing it right, so why not come to San Diego?

So, I was in Costa Mesa last weekend and I just happened to notice the Iron Press (3321 Hyland Ave, 714-426-8088). Installed in a bourgeois, OC mall and surrounded by corporate offices on all sides, it’s not like the restaurant …

Here you never eat alone. You're surrounded by trees, chickens, turkeys, goats, horse, future salads, and raving locovores.

Walking – again. This time up Home Avenue. Seeking out the holy grail of locovore cooking. That’s what I’ve been told, anyway. Also that this place’s happy hour – four to six – has real deals with flatbreads and a …

Anybody who likes flavored coffee would do well to make a trip to Old Town.

In some ways, Old Town is a weird, quasi-Mexican Disneyland soaked in overpriced and underpowered margaritas. We go around it at all costs, leaving the curios historicity to the tourists. But Old Town doesn’t totally suck! Harney Sushi is OK …

Tom Yum Kung means yummy shrimp in a soup that should bristle with both kinds of heat

I’m always in search of the Perfect Tom Yum Kung. Last I had of this spicy sour lemony soup was at Bahn Thai up on Park, near Adams. Pretty zippy and hot, that one. Of course my favorite is the …

Mission Hills cafe gets a makeover, adds some booze into the mix, and changes for the better.

Talk about reinventing yourself: Toma Sol Cafe up and decided to forego the coffee shop lifestyle and transform into a wine bar! Newly minted “Toma Sol Tavern” (301 W. Washington Street, 619-291-1159) is a substantial change from the old business. …

The final tally of Ethiopian restaurants following one, hungry writer's attempt to eat at them all.

If I learned one thing from Tour de Cheesesteak, it’s that people demand a reckoning. It’s a tough thing to give out. Every restaurant has its strengths and weaknesses, and deciding which of those makes one place “better” than another …

Happy hour at the BullsEye Bar can get messy

“Try one,” says my bar buddy. He shoves the chalice with half a dozen shrimp curled around its rim. A ketchup bowl sits on the bed of ice inside, along with the slice of lemon. http://sandiegoreader.com/users/photos/2013/jun/07/47008/ I do. The little …

Stop six of the Ethiopian project is in Talmadge at a second restaurant named Awash, nicer than the first.

Silly me, thinking there was only one Ethiopian restaurant named “Awash!” Turns out there is another, much further out El Cajon Boulevard, at number 4997, to be exact, right next to the Last Call bar, where they serve discount shots …

Roxy's Rockin' Grill does juices, feeds Phish fans

Oh no. Passing along National Avenue. Come to the big orange barn where they have the San Diego Public Market. This is before ten in the morning. But it's like "Honey I Shrunk the Market." Only one of the two …

Back to City Heights for another tasty Eritrean/Ethiopian dinner in an ugly bunker of a building.

After Tour de Cheesesteak, a mere five days of consecutive Ethiopian food is nothing. Nothing, I say! I could do this forever. With a spring in my step, I set out for City Heights and Asmara Restaurant (4155 University Avenue, …

Southern comfort installed in former Bare Back space downtown

Chris Reid knew he wanted his own bar and restaurant. He considered a number of potential locations, but when the spot downtown near the corner of Sixth Avenue and E Street opened up, that was that. It would be his…and …

East Village choice: An $82 steak, or happy hour?

It stands opposite the Grocery Outlet, that new cheap-cheap grocery chain on Market Street that sells discontinued stock at cut prices so you really can buy cheap eats. But don’t expect that here at Cowboy Star and Butcher Shop (640 …

A trip to University Heights' upscale Ethiopian/Eritrean restaurant of note offers sharp contrasts with other restaurants featured in this tour.

Muzita Abyssinian Bistro (4651 Park Boulevard, 619-546-7900) in University Heights isn’t an Ethiopian restaurant per se. It’s more Eritrean. Eritrea borders Ethiopia and the two countries share much in the way of culture and cuisine. For hundreds of years, the …

A strong showing heats up the competition in the contest to be the best Ethiopian restaurant in San Diego.

Stop three on my comprehensive survey of San Diego’s Ethiopian dining scene was Harar Ethiopian Restaurant (2432 El Cajon Boulevard, 619-295-3735). It wasn’t too hard to find, since it’s just down the street from Awash Market. On the outside, Harar …

No such thing as too late for breakfast here

Ah! Can’t believe my luck. I’ve been wandering in downtown La Mesa looking for lunch in all the wrong places, heh heh. Actually, it’s eight at night and I'm looking for dinner, and truth is this place is pretty alive …

Dishes from Rancho Bernardo Inn’s much-anticipated resto refresh

Last week, I had the opportunity to tour the construction site for AVANT, a new seasonally driven farm-to-table restaurant being installed at the Rancho Bernardo Inn (17550 Bernardo Oaks Drive, Rancho Bernardo). It’s a site I’m quite familiar with. Many …

Secret restaurant in the back of a North Park market has good food, dingy vibe.

For the second phase of my comprehensive Ethiopian excursion, I called upon a friend who claims expertise in these matters. She swore up and down that Awash Market (2884 El Cajon Boulevard, 619-282-8280) was the place to go. “Atmosphere 1, …

À la Disney: Is Good Time Design taking over the neighborhood?

So. El Vitral really has closed. For months the bar-eatery with 220 tequilas to choose from and the fabulous view of the ballgames was either having a kitchen fixed or getting organized to start up again. That was then. Now, …

The mussels stand up to the rest of the menu at this downtown restaurant.

Much has been written about Saltbox (1047 Fifth Avenue, Downtown San Diego, 619-515-3003) since it opened up late-2011 on the second story of the Klimpton-run Hotel Palomar, including a recent review by San Diego Reader’s Ian Pike. However, not much …