Seeing Is Believing at the Blind Pig

 The Blind Pig Kitchen and Bar

31431 Santa Margarita Parkway

Rancho Santa Margarita, CA 92688

Our six-month exile in Rancho Santa Margarita was coming to an end soon. We lived out here because our former lease was up, and the place we would be living was being renovated, and we wouldn't be ready to move in for half a year. One of the most affordable places we could find butted up against O'Neill Regional Park, but it seemed so far away from everything. 

If we wanted to avoid the toll roads, it would take us an extra twenty minutes to get anywhere. I planned my days by making only one trip to and from home. We eventually just caved in and used the toll road to reach places. Since we were in such a remote place, we decided to explore the dining options in our temporary city. RSM/Foothill Ranch is not known as a culinary mecca by any means, but some hidden gems can be found if you look hard enough, like The Blind Pig. 

The Blind Pig is near the lake in the Mercado Del Lago shopping plaza, also home to Carmelita's, KD's Donuts, Il Sole Italian, and the Trough, a sister restaurant of The Blind Pig. They have delicious breakfast burritos and sandwiches that are worth visiting for. The Blind Pig has been here since 2013. It's credited with elevating the dining scene in RSM at a time when there were too many chain restaurants and mediocre fast-casual spots dotting the dining landscape within its city limits. 

It was a slow burn with many of the locals. They didn't quite get the New American menu or the craft cocktails they were slinging behind the bar. They now have a four-star rating on Yelp with nearly a thousand reviews. They have also opened another outpost of The Blind Pig in Yorba Linda, another tough city to crack, but this October, they will celebrate their 5th year in business there, so it appears that people have taken to them there as well.  

We arrived at half past six on a Saturday evening without a reservation. The restaurant was half full, and we were seated immediately near the back of the darkened dining room. The dinner menu lists over ten starters and about the same number of entrees. Prices for main dishes start at $16 and go up to $65 for the twenty-ounce ribeye. I could put away over a pound of meat, but the $65 price helped me pump the brakes on that idea. Let's see what we actually did partake in this evening. 

Neither of us was in the mood for a salad, so we split the Crab Cakes ($16). The online menu for this item claims that it comes with a radish serrano tartar sauce and baby arugula, which, obviously, this starter did not have. The online menu describes this as including a cilantro lime slaw and a creole avocado aioli. This is closer to what it was, but the sauce resembled a deep mustard look and taste. The slaw on top was a nice compliment to the very well-done crab cake underneath. There was not a lot of filler used, the crab was fresh and flavorful, and the breading used to bind everything together was light. It's one of the better crab cakes we have had 20 miles inland. 

Again, this Short Rib Ragu ($24) is not listed on either their online menu or any of the menus pictured on Yelp, so maybe it was a special this evening. This plate featured pappardelle as the pasta, with a nice and meaty short rib ragu underneath plenty of parmesan and several basil leaves. Katie loved this dish and finished it rather quickly. She claimed it was just as good as those she had in Italian restaurants and was even better than some of those Italian joints. She would not hesitate to get this again if it appeared on their regular menu or as a special. 

When I walked into the Blind Pig, I was inclined to get one of their two burgers, but I called an audible and selected the Pastrami Dip Sandwich ($22). Some pickles, Swiss cheese, garlic aioli, and some onions joined the pastrami between the bread. The dipping sauce they chose for this was Carolina gold sauce, a mustard/vinegar sauce the people in that part of the country use instead of traditional barbecue sauce. I was unsure how I would like this, but it worked for me, and I'm not the biggest fan of mustard. It was muted just enough and predictably went well with the pastrami. The bread-to-meat ratio was off, as this sandwich needed more pastrami. The bread was soft yet held together nicely. The hand-cut fries that came with this were fantastic. They had a great crunch, and I alternated dipping these between their delicious garlic aioli and ketchup. If you don't get a meal with fries, consider ordering these fries off the starter portion of the menu. 

We wrapped up our evening with the Skillet Cookie ($13). Its base was a chocolate chip and sea salt cookie topped with a scoop of lavender and honey ice cream. I believe the ice cream was vanilla, but honey was poured over it, and lavender was sprinkled on top. This was good, but did not knock my socks off. The cookie base was good, with just the right amount of salt added. This lost me with the overpowering lavender and honey, which got in the way of the cookie and ice cream. It's not my favorite cookie skillet of all time. 

The Blind Pig is definitely one of the restaurants we miss now that we live in our new place. It's also one of the few restaurants we'd be willing to drive back to RSM for. I'd like to try one of their burgers or short rib tacos on future visits. They also change their menu quite often, so there might be something else that I want to try. What we had on this visit was delicious, and the service we experienced was cordial and efficient. Also, watch for the $10 coupon they send out through the mail to save a little extra money here. In the six months we lived in RSM, we got one every two weeks or so. Any savings help these days. 

Out of five speakeasys (because the term blind pig was another name for a speakeasy during the prohibition years), five being best to zero being worst, The Blind Pug gets 3 speakeasys. 

For more information about The Blind Pig, head to their website by clicking here: https://www.theblindpigoc.com/