TRUST at Playground - Santa Ana, CA

Dinner - Saturday, October 12, 2013

Santa Ana always struck me as "that place between San Diego and Los Angeles". Indeed, I would've never thought about making a trip there if we hadn't been running a race in nearby Long Beach. Some restaurant hunting yielded a series of interesting blog posts about a restaurant called Playground in downtown Santa Ana. Further investigation showed that they were running a small dinner series called TRUST, a tasting menu at their chef's counter (interestingly, in a space separate from the main restaurant).

TRUST is billed as a refined experience, where the kitchen is able to perfect dishes from the more ad-lib menu in the main restaurant, while also focusing on better ingredients and a more cohesive narrative. As it turns out, it was still a huge mishmash, but our dinner was engaging and quite a lot of fun.

The Chef's Tasting at Cowboy Star - San Diego, CA

Dinner - Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Theme name - check. Butcher shop - check. Dedicated steak menu - check. One could easily be forgiven for thinking that Cowboy Star is just another steakhouse - many of the indicators are there, down to the staff's Old West belt buckles. And yet, as we discovered, there is far more than meets the eye.

Executive chef Victor Jimenez and recently-hired second-in-command Chris Osborne (this guy is serious - ex-Townhouse and ex-George's California Modern) have been running a weekday reservations-only tasting menu at the kitchen counter - an opportunity for the kitchen to play, experiment and just cook without restraints.

Aubergine - Carmel, CA

Dinner - Saturday, August 31, 2013

So much can change in six months. Since our meal in February, Justin Cogley (deservedly and expectedly) received one of Food & Wine's Best New Chef awards, putting Aubergine on the map for a whole new segment of diners. Naturally, national recognition brings increased pressure, but the entire restaurant seems to be holding its own, and more.

We had planned a drive along Highway 1 for the Labor Day weekend, and a good meal is always the perfect way to end a long day on the road - what follows is an extended version of Aubergine's tasting menu.