Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

More Than the Dish or the Deal

Restaurants you can take to heart.

Napizza’s truffle and porcini mushroom pizza. Something about giving the dough 72 hours to rise does seem to give it more flavor.
Napizza’s truffle and porcini mushroom pizza. Something about giving the dough 72 hours to rise does seem to give it more flavor.

Here’s a confession: I love good food, but if it’s a bargain, I love it better. I’d rather have so-so food that’s wallet-lite than fantastic fare that causes gnashing of teeth for weeks after. Heck, half the time you never even notice what’s going down ye olde gullet anyway.

What kind of food? My partner, the lovely Carla, says bears, possums, and I are soul brothers. We’ll eat anything. I’ve never become an expert in one thing — say, Lao food or sushi or Oaxacan grasshopper dishes or gourmet pizzas. But I seem to like most stuff, aside from boiled cabbage or brussels sprouts.

But there are some places that you kinda take to heart. They’re more than the dish or the deal. Something clicks about the people and the place, and you want to come back and be a part of it. These are just some.

Place

Napizza al Taglio

1702 India Street, San Diego

Napizza
My favorite new pizza joint. Something about giving the dough 72 hours to rise does seem to give it more flavor. But the main thing about Napizza is attitude. They really have tried to go green, buy local, and recycle like crazy. And they’ve just created a good vibe. A glass of wine, a square of BAPO (bacon and potato) pizza — say, ten bucks altogether — a seat outside right in the heart of Little Italy at sunset is hard to beat. ’Specially as other places nearby offer the same view for twice the price.

Place

Baja Oyster & Sushi Bar

1912 Coronado Avenue #105, San Diego

Baja Oyster & Sushi Bar
Favorite seafood hangout. This place is on the edge of the Tijuana Sloughs, but swing through the door and — bam! — you’re in the middle of a scene. Each time I’ve been here it’s crowded and feels like party time. You can sit up close to the band of crazy cooks clanging pans, among corrugated iron and palm-frond palapas, and order big (like the shrimp sampler for nearly 50 bucks) or small. My favorite: smoked marlin taco for $3. And it’s pretty filling. And, down here, people talk to you! Best time: sunset, Thursday onward.

Sponsored
Sponsored
Place

Mezzah

169 East Main Street, El Cajon

Mezzah
Right in the center of town, in the old wooden “Historic El Cajon Hall 1894,” as the plaque says. “Mezzah” means “tapa.” “We are Iraqi Christians, but our tapas are mainly Lebanese,” the owner Ammar told me. “The Lebanese love to snack on different tapas, to have a drink, and socialize.” Classy feeling here. Pretty big tapas, too. Around $7 for dishes such as grilled quail, sherhaat (steak medallions), and, my fave, fetoosh, a Lebanese salad that’s huge. Nice outside patio, right beside the park and the boulevard.

Place

Cafe Di Roma

633 9th Street, Imperial Beach

Café di Roma
My favorite Italian. This is a new, hard-to-find place started by an Italian family with deep South Bay roots. This place is full of life — Italian style: talk, sisters, husbands, cooks, wives rolling gnocchi pastries out on the table, ’50s Italian music, like “Volare,” as they create it all from scratch right here. Yes, it’s totally standard stuff, but in this atmosphere, what else? And they’re trying hard to cook healthy. They make their own sausages from turkey, meatballs that (they swear!) are “91 percent lean.” My fave: the sizzling eggplant dish ($10).

Place

Urban India

750 Fifth Ave, San Diego

Urban India
It was the $2 Stone IPA happy-hour draft pints that got me coming here. That’s unbeatable. The place is a bit of a barn — orangey, woody, bricky, though they have filled it with Indian art, Buddha heads, and big-screen TVs showing sports. You know it’s Indian because half the screens are showing cricket. The young Sikhs running it are part of the “new India” — urban, cool, on the make. Good standard Indian fare. Best happy-hour deal: the chicken tikka, sizzlin’ and crackling on a black iron platter for around six bucks.

Place

Sótano Suizo

9415 Avenida Paseo de Los Héroes, Zona Rio, Tijuana, BC

Sótano Suizo (“Swiss Cellar”)
My favorite hot dog. It’s an eight-inch craggy-crusted baguette loaded with a giant, peppery Hungarian wiener under a nest of crispy candied onions, tomato chunks, a crooked line of yellow mustard with red balls dotted along it so it looks like a coral snake, plus unmelted Swiss cheese licking over the edges. The Swiss guy who created this dawg is René Bösiger. Now he’s created his own beer, too. Take friends, take time. It’s worth the trip.

God Save the Cuisine, British Gastro-Truck
619-889-6119 | godsavethecuisine.com

My fave food truck. The first thing you’ve gotta love about these Brits is that they supply picnic blankets so you can chow down beside the truck. Then, the food’s interesting: say, smoked salmon on flatbread with sour cream, lemon, and potato salad; or beer-battered fish and chips; or spiced ground lamb on salad leaves. And dessert? How about the Queen Mother’s favorite: Eton Mess, a strawberry compote with crumbled meringue and fresh mint. Someone should give these Brit brothers, Dave and Kevin Keylock, a knighthood.

Place

Potato Shack Café

120 W. I Street, Encinitas

The Potato Shack
It’s not that the food leaps out at you, it’s that they give you so much of it. And when you’ve come out of the water, surfing, whatever, that’s what you want: a giant portion of something real unhealthy, like, say, baked spuds. Here in this little low place under giant ficus trees you see local firemen, church groups, gals with their lil ol’ moms, surfers. Tables are slices of tree trunks. My favorite breakfast is chicken-fried steak, steamed eggs, squaw-bread toast, and fries. Actually, what they’re famous for is their “manhole cover–size pancakes.” Too much, even for me.

Place

Tras/Horizonte

9680 Rio Colorado, Marron, Tijuana, BC

Tacos Kokopelli
My favorite street-taco stand. It’s just a tent-covered stand. But Guillermo “Oso” Campo, the chef here, till recently had a post at a three-Michelin-star restaurant, Oud Sluis in Holland. Came home, thought, Hey, why not just try something new on the streets of my hometown? Result: Here he is cooking by an open-fire mesquite grill. Makes tacos like… ceviche of sole blackened on the grill, then slapped on a messy red layer of toasted chilies, peanuts, squash, and roasted habaneros in olive oil. Out of this world? Grab his food before some five-star restaurant grabs him.

Place

Tiger! Tiger!

3025 El Cajon Boulevard, San Diego

Tiger! Tiger! Tavern
My favorite tavern. Lee Chase and Jeff Motch of Blind Lady Tavern started this up last year as part of their campaign “to have a meeting place like this every two or three blocks.” (Motch’s words.) Sure seems to be working in this woody, frontier-looking barn. Friday nights are ker-razy. Menu’s kind of honest, Gold Rush–era, sandwichy, German sausagey, Vietnamese fusion. And it’s coupled with a zillion interesting beers and baristas interested in pairing you with them. Foodwise, my fave is the oyster po’ boy sandwich. Tasty, creamy, and tangy with pickled chili and pickles. Those oysters squish through in every bite.

Place

Meijo Japanese Restaurant

600 Palm Avenue, Suite 300, Imperial Beach

Meijo Sushi
My favorite Japanese sushi joint: The (mostly Vietnamese) people who run it are a fun crowd. They keep things buzzing. They tell jokes. And (bottom line) they’re cheap. I’ve had sushi mix — five different kinds of fish flesh on rice, plus nine sushi rolls, for about nine bucks. Or six-buck specials, such as teriyaki chicken with fried gyoza, or shrimp and beef curry. That and a bottle of sake will get you out, belly full, for around $10. The formula works: This place always seems to have a cheery crowd of locals, and the shelves bulge with those masu boxes that regulars drink sake out of.

Place

Sunrise Deli

9945 Campo Road (at North Barcelona), Spring Valley

Sunrise Deli
Fave breakfast joint. Ya gotta get out here in the early morning, say, 7:30. That’s when everything’s fresh and it feels country, and breakfast tastes good. ’Specially here in this little pink-and-green box with a deck. Ask for Jorge and order his amazing Sunrise Breakfast Special: a two-egg scramble, potatoes, three slices of ham, three sausages, three slices of bacon, plus pancakes, french toast, or biscuits and gravy, for $7.95. Or, egg muffin and OJ, just $3.50. They actually dropped prices because folks around here were hurting. If this is country values, I’m going country. ■

The latest copy of the Reader

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Gonzo Report: Bob Long played piano for Tina Turner and Ray Charles

And he got the crowd shaking at InZane Brewery
Next Article

94th Aero Squadron – French farmhouse still works

Try the antinoise –tomatoes with olive oil dressing plus capers, garlic, toasted coriander seeds, basil, spring onions, salted anchovies
Napizza’s truffle and porcini mushroom pizza. Something about giving the dough 72 hours to rise does seem to give it more flavor.
Napizza’s truffle and porcini mushroom pizza. Something about giving the dough 72 hours to rise does seem to give it more flavor.

Here’s a confession: I love good food, but if it’s a bargain, I love it better. I’d rather have so-so food that’s wallet-lite than fantastic fare that causes gnashing of teeth for weeks after. Heck, half the time you never even notice what’s going down ye olde gullet anyway.

What kind of food? My partner, the lovely Carla, says bears, possums, and I are soul brothers. We’ll eat anything. I’ve never become an expert in one thing — say, Lao food or sushi or Oaxacan grasshopper dishes or gourmet pizzas. But I seem to like most stuff, aside from boiled cabbage or brussels sprouts.

But there are some places that you kinda take to heart. They’re more than the dish or the deal. Something clicks about the people and the place, and you want to come back and be a part of it. These are just some.

Place

Napizza al Taglio

1702 India Street, San Diego

Napizza
My favorite new pizza joint. Something about giving the dough 72 hours to rise does seem to give it more flavor. But the main thing about Napizza is attitude. They really have tried to go green, buy local, and recycle like crazy. And they’ve just created a good vibe. A glass of wine, a square of BAPO (bacon and potato) pizza — say, ten bucks altogether — a seat outside right in the heart of Little Italy at sunset is hard to beat. ’Specially as other places nearby offer the same view for twice the price.

Place

Baja Oyster & Sushi Bar

1912 Coronado Avenue #105, San Diego

Baja Oyster & Sushi Bar
Favorite seafood hangout. This place is on the edge of the Tijuana Sloughs, but swing through the door and — bam! — you’re in the middle of a scene. Each time I’ve been here it’s crowded and feels like party time. You can sit up close to the band of crazy cooks clanging pans, among corrugated iron and palm-frond palapas, and order big (like the shrimp sampler for nearly 50 bucks) or small. My favorite: smoked marlin taco for $3. And it’s pretty filling. And, down here, people talk to you! Best time: sunset, Thursday onward.

Sponsored
Sponsored
Place

Mezzah

169 East Main Street, El Cajon

Mezzah
Right in the center of town, in the old wooden “Historic El Cajon Hall 1894,” as the plaque says. “Mezzah” means “tapa.” “We are Iraqi Christians, but our tapas are mainly Lebanese,” the owner Ammar told me. “The Lebanese love to snack on different tapas, to have a drink, and socialize.” Classy feeling here. Pretty big tapas, too. Around $7 for dishes such as grilled quail, sherhaat (steak medallions), and, my fave, fetoosh, a Lebanese salad that’s huge. Nice outside patio, right beside the park and the boulevard.

Place

Cafe Di Roma

633 9th Street, Imperial Beach

Café di Roma
My favorite Italian. This is a new, hard-to-find place started by an Italian family with deep South Bay roots. This place is full of life — Italian style: talk, sisters, husbands, cooks, wives rolling gnocchi pastries out on the table, ’50s Italian music, like “Volare,” as they create it all from scratch right here. Yes, it’s totally standard stuff, but in this atmosphere, what else? And they’re trying hard to cook healthy. They make their own sausages from turkey, meatballs that (they swear!) are “91 percent lean.” My fave: the sizzling eggplant dish ($10).

Place

Urban India

750 Fifth Ave, San Diego

Urban India
It was the $2 Stone IPA happy-hour draft pints that got me coming here. That’s unbeatable. The place is a bit of a barn — orangey, woody, bricky, though they have filled it with Indian art, Buddha heads, and big-screen TVs showing sports. You know it’s Indian because half the screens are showing cricket. The young Sikhs running it are part of the “new India” — urban, cool, on the make. Good standard Indian fare. Best happy-hour deal: the chicken tikka, sizzlin’ and crackling on a black iron platter for around six bucks.

Place

Sótano Suizo

9415 Avenida Paseo de Los Héroes, Zona Rio, Tijuana, BC

Sótano Suizo (“Swiss Cellar”)
My favorite hot dog. It’s an eight-inch craggy-crusted baguette loaded with a giant, peppery Hungarian wiener under a nest of crispy candied onions, tomato chunks, a crooked line of yellow mustard with red balls dotted along it so it looks like a coral snake, plus unmelted Swiss cheese licking over the edges. The Swiss guy who created this dawg is René Bösiger. Now he’s created his own beer, too. Take friends, take time. It’s worth the trip.

God Save the Cuisine, British Gastro-Truck
619-889-6119 | godsavethecuisine.com

My fave food truck. The first thing you’ve gotta love about these Brits is that they supply picnic blankets so you can chow down beside the truck. Then, the food’s interesting: say, smoked salmon on flatbread with sour cream, lemon, and potato salad; or beer-battered fish and chips; or spiced ground lamb on salad leaves. And dessert? How about the Queen Mother’s favorite: Eton Mess, a strawberry compote with crumbled meringue and fresh mint. Someone should give these Brit brothers, Dave and Kevin Keylock, a knighthood.

Place

Potato Shack Café

120 W. I Street, Encinitas

The Potato Shack
It’s not that the food leaps out at you, it’s that they give you so much of it. And when you’ve come out of the water, surfing, whatever, that’s what you want: a giant portion of something real unhealthy, like, say, baked spuds. Here in this little low place under giant ficus trees you see local firemen, church groups, gals with their lil ol’ moms, surfers. Tables are slices of tree trunks. My favorite breakfast is chicken-fried steak, steamed eggs, squaw-bread toast, and fries. Actually, what they’re famous for is their “manhole cover–size pancakes.” Too much, even for me.

Place

Tras/Horizonte

9680 Rio Colorado, Marron, Tijuana, BC

Tacos Kokopelli
My favorite street-taco stand. It’s just a tent-covered stand. But Guillermo “Oso” Campo, the chef here, till recently had a post at a three-Michelin-star restaurant, Oud Sluis in Holland. Came home, thought, Hey, why not just try something new on the streets of my hometown? Result: Here he is cooking by an open-fire mesquite grill. Makes tacos like… ceviche of sole blackened on the grill, then slapped on a messy red layer of toasted chilies, peanuts, squash, and roasted habaneros in olive oil. Out of this world? Grab his food before some five-star restaurant grabs him.

Place

Tiger! Tiger!

3025 El Cajon Boulevard, San Diego

Tiger! Tiger! Tavern
My favorite tavern. Lee Chase and Jeff Motch of Blind Lady Tavern started this up last year as part of their campaign “to have a meeting place like this every two or three blocks.” (Motch’s words.) Sure seems to be working in this woody, frontier-looking barn. Friday nights are ker-razy. Menu’s kind of honest, Gold Rush–era, sandwichy, German sausagey, Vietnamese fusion. And it’s coupled with a zillion interesting beers and baristas interested in pairing you with them. Foodwise, my fave is the oyster po’ boy sandwich. Tasty, creamy, and tangy with pickled chili and pickles. Those oysters squish through in every bite.

Place

Meijo Japanese Restaurant

600 Palm Avenue, Suite 300, Imperial Beach

Meijo Sushi
My favorite Japanese sushi joint: The (mostly Vietnamese) people who run it are a fun crowd. They keep things buzzing. They tell jokes. And (bottom line) they’re cheap. I’ve had sushi mix — five different kinds of fish flesh on rice, plus nine sushi rolls, for about nine bucks. Or six-buck specials, such as teriyaki chicken with fried gyoza, or shrimp and beef curry. That and a bottle of sake will get you out, belly full, for around $10. The formula works: This place always seems to have a cheery crowd of locals, and the shelves bulge with those masu boxes that regulars drink sake out of.

Place

Sunrise Deli

9945 Campo Road (at North Barcelona), Spring Valley

Sunrise Deli
Fave breakfast joint. Ya gotta get out here in the early morning, say, 7:30. That’s when everything’s fresh and it feels country, and breakfast tastes good. ’Specially here in this little pink-and-green box with a deck. Ask for Jorge and order his amazing Sunrise Breakfast Special: a two-egg scramble, potatoes, three slices of ham, three sausages, three slices of bacon, plus pancakes, french toast, or biscuits and gravy, for $7.95. Or, egg muffin and OJ, just $3.50. They actually dropped prices because folks around here were hurting. If this is country values, I’m going country. ■

Comments
Sponsored

The latest copy of the Reader

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

San Diego Fix it Clinic, Gaslamp Holiday Pet Parade

Events December 14-December 18, 2024
Next Article

How Much Time Do I Get With My BetterHelp Therapist?

Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

This Week’s Reader This Week’s Reader