Thanks for stopping by to read today's issue of mmm-yoso!!!, a blog about food. Kirk and His Missus are continuing their vacation and Cathy is writing this post.
In early October 2017, when The Mister and I were leaving Bushfire Kitchen after a lovely lunch, we saw signage across the parking lot about some sort of seafood restaurant 'opening soon!'. There it ended. Until a few weeks ago when I was driving and heard a special ring tone from my mobile phone and needed to pull off the freeway to respond immediately. So here we were in the same parking lot... Seasurf opened in late October 2017 and was the fourth partner of a group of Los Angeles/Culver City/Santa Monica based restaurants named Sea Salt Grill.
It's a walk up, order, pay type place with your food brought to your table. There is indoor and covered outdoor seating. The menu is varied with Salads, Sandwiches and Poke. There are Grilled, Steamed and Fried choices as well as Bowls, Tacos, Burritos with interesting 'sides' and 'extras'. We sat down with the menu to plan this meal.
Seaweed salad ($3.99) was a reasonable choice to serve as a palate refresher during the meal we planned. Fresh, tender (I somehow have had a few unfortunate encounters with seaweed texture which I can only describe as 'shredded plastic') with a subtle sesame flavor. A large, flavorful serving.
There are two home made soups available ($3.99/cup) and we ordered one of each. The Baja Seafood Chowder 'cup' (I wonder how large the bowl is) filled with fish, shrimp and sea clams along with tomato, carrots, celery, onion, hominy and potato was really good. The Fisherman's Wharf Clam Chowder had sea clams and baby clams along with onion, celery and potato. Also excellent. Even side by side it was difficult to pick a favorite.
Of course we chose the Crispy Calamari ($6.99) to share. The light cornmeal breading and perfectly fried, tender squid was also great. The tartar and cocktail sauces were fresh made and really tasty. Kind of sad it was the only fried item we ordered, but in reality it was just enough.
At the bottom of the "Off The Grill" part of the menu was Seafood Cioppino ($13.99). This was a perfect item to share. Scallops, clams mussels, shrimp, calamari and fish in a garlic tomato sauce: traditional Italian stew on top of a small serving of rice. The two pieces of grilled toast were just enough to sop up the rest of the juices. Such wonderful flavors!
Condiments were not needed for any of this meal.
So glad we stopped and were able to try a bit of everything. There will be return visits.
Seasurf Fish Co 2650 Del Mar Heights Road Del Mar, CA 92014 Website (858) 280-7100 Open: Mon-Fri 11a.m.-9 p.m., Sat-Sun 12-9
ooh “plastic” seaweed salad does not sound good...glad this version was okay.
Posted by: kat | Wednesday, 29 May 2019 at 04:24 PM
Quite a few places seem to be 'stretching' their seaweed with agar, Kat. That's the texture which is so different, unlike the 'leaf-only' seaweed. I think the Poke supplier is also the source of the really good seaweed here; it was memorable.
Posted by: Cathy | Thursday, 30 May 2019 at 07:20 AM
They have an awesome happy hour too Cathy! $1 per oyster and they're delicious. I've tried almost all the items you have and agree that they're all fresh and yums. Glad you enjoyed the visit and had a good meal.
Posted by: Faye | Thursday, 30 May 2019 at 10:25 AM
I should go and try the fish and chips.
Posted by: Soo | Friday, 31 May 2019 at 09:24 AM
I noticed the sandwich board with HH specials when we left, Faye, and will be returning! I saw you had had the cioppino after I wrote the post; I'm glad we had the same experience and tend to choose the same foods. This was a great find which I really had forgotten to follow up.
They do know how to fry things properly, Soo. The fish and chips normally would be a first time item for us, but we were in a 'healthy' mood that day.
Posted by: Cathy | Friday, 31 May 2019 at 12:26 PM