You'll like Brunos Just the Way They Are

Brunos Italian Kitchen

210 West Birch St.

Brea, CA 92821

If you are anything like me, you probably get a lot of offers through email. I have two email accounts, one for personal stuff, and one that I use for all of my promotional stuff. You know, like when you are asked to sign up for the club card at the supermarket, enter an online contest filling out an NCAA basketball bracket for a million dollars that you know you have no chance of winning or even signing up with a restaurant so you can get a free hamburger or dessert on your birthday. We all do it, and I usually like keeping these less meaningful emails separate from more pressing matters.

I bring this up because of the one promo that I must have let slip through the cracks of my personal email, the one from Brunos Italian Kitchen and their sister restaurant, Cha Cha's Latin Kitchen, which is a few doors down from Brunos in Downtown Brea. I get at least four emails a week from these two restaurants, which are linked together by not only geography but by owners Don Myers and Peter Serantoni, a team with decades worth of restaurant experience, with stints at El Torito, Chevy's, Paul Martin's, Scott's Seafood, The Catch, and Roy's Hawaiian, among others. They seem to be the perfect team, with Peter on the culinary side of things, while Don works the business and front of the house operations.

Brunos came to be after Cha Cha's opened in 2009, and Brunos followed suit a short three years later. The inspiration behind Brunos is Peter's time he spent in Venice, Italy as a youth. Bruno was his father and inspiration to pursue food as a career, while his grandmother shared her cooking philosophy and her rustic recipes. This winning combination has gotten tons of positive press from the local food community, and the restaurant is full on most nights. All those email blasts seem to have worked, as we found ourselves here on a busy Saturday evening in downtown Brea.

The rest of Downtown Brea seemed almost deserted on this early Saturday, save for Bruxie, Cha Cha's and Taps. Lending to the apocalyptic vibe was the numerous empty storefronts that once welcomed lots of customers, like the departed Lillie's Q, Tower Records, and the Melting Pot. The badly needed second parking structure behind Buffalo Wild Wings provided parking relief to this area and it was only a short stroll to the jam-packed and rambunctious crowd at Brunos.

I was kind of taken aback by the noise at Brunos, which I eventually got used to. We were seated well inside the darkened restaurant, which had a good number of tables. The premiere seating appears to be the patio in front of the restaurant, nearest the street and seems like it would be excellent for people watching.  The inside portion of the restaurant utilizes numerous wine bottles lining the walls, a partially separated bar along the right-hand side of the restaurant, and hanging light fixtures that function more as decoration than providing light. Even with the large crowd on this evening, the restaurant conveyed a coziness that came around shortly after we acclimated to the environment.

The menu at Brunos is comforting as well. It's broken up into Italian favorites of appetizers, plates of pasta, entrees, and a couple of sides. Pasta is priced from $16 to $23, while the entrees will set you back right around the $25 mark. As my four times a week emails alert me, there's always some kind of specials going on here most nights of the week, (Meatball Monday, Two for Tuesdays, Wine Wednesday, Trio Thursday, Seafood Sundays). We were here on a Saturday, so no specials promos for us, but we were excited to give the food here a try, so let's see how everything turned out for us on this evening.

Bread was of a very sturdy variety here at Brunos. It was served lukewarm with a thick crust and soft and pillowy inside. Good flavor and good chew to it, just what you want in a solid piece of bread. It was made even better with the provided oil and vinegar that has become the standard dipping sauce in any good Italian restaurant these days.

These Arancini ($9) easily have the award for the most colorful appetizer of the year wrapped up, and we're only halfway through the year so far. These lightly fried risotto balls included a little mushroom, mozzarella and fresh herbs inside, and a trio of sauces splattered on the plate. These were definitely lighter than I imagined they would be, but they also lacked the flavor punch I was expecting. Even though it wouldn't have looked as beautiful on the plate, it probably would have helped to have the sauces in a ramekin for easier dipping. This was fine, just a little too subtle from what I was expecting. 

Caesar Salad ($9) is my jam, and this one at Bruno's was pretty impressive. Whole leaf romaine was placed on the plate and drizzled with an oil and vinegar Caesar dressing, a few croutons, and a white anchovy placed on top for a dramatic effect. I'm usually more partial to a creamy Caesar dressing, but this one was excellent and really clung to each inch of the very fresh romaine. A few extra croutons would have been appreciated, along with chopped up romaine, but still, this Caesar was a winner.

Entrees were out fairly quickly, and first up was Katie's choice on this early evening, the Pappardelle Bruno ($20). This dish brought to mind an Italian version of beef stroganoff, but without the overbearing sauce that comes on that dish. The pappardelle noodles were some of the freshest we have had, while the short rib was shredded nicely, very tender and juicy. Not overly heavy, this was a very satisfying plate which has Katie excited for more trips to Brunos to explore more of their menu very soon.

Not the most gorgeous of lasagnas, but my mom really enjoyed this Lasagna al Forno ($18). This was a little different than my mom was used to, it had a delicious bechamel sauce included with a very well done bolognese sauce. The pasta was fresh and lots of cheese was used in this A very comforting lasagna that my mom could not finish, so my dad ate it for lunch the next day.

My dad had zeroed in on this Shrimp and Blue Crab Fettuccine ($23) when he perused the menu at home before arriving at Brunos. This was a very interesting dish to me and was not exactly what I had envisioned when it came to the table. Yes, there was shrimp and shredded blue crab along with fresh fettuccine included. The sauce was a Meyer lemon cream, which predictably went well with the seafood in here, and was pretty subtle but still present. They also added some texture with the addition of cut-up asparagus and the flavor was enhanced even more with the addition of garlic, fennel, and some basil oil. The dish was finished off with an Asian flair when it was topped with citrus tobiko, a flying fish roe that was a risky move with someone like my dad, but it worked out fine here as he cleared his plate in record time.

I have gotten into a routine when eating in Italian restaurants recently. I usually order a pasta dish with a white or cream sauce and then order an extra meatball in marinara, then mix the meatball and the sauce together to create a kind of pink sauce. I did the same here at Brunos with their Rigatoni Alfredo 2.0 ($17.50) as my pasta dish. I'm not sure what the 1.0 version of this was like, but this 2.0 version was hard to beat. Like everyone else at the table, I have to agree that the pasta was indeed fresh here, with a nice tenderness to it. The alfredo sauce was not too heavy but did not sacrifice flavor, and I enjoyed the duo of the mushrooms and the pancetta, but of course, some extra pancetta would have been appreciated. Once I mixed in the meatball and the marinara this dish was just as good as before. The meatball was nice and tender, while the marinara added a nice homey feel to the alfredo sauce. It was just as good the next day for lunch and was the envy of lots of my coworkers.

Desserts were on the house because my mom had let it slip that we were celebrating my birthday a week late, and their impending anniversary the next day. Our server brought us a Raspberry Brown Butter Torte ($7.50) and a Budino al Caramello ($7.50). The favorite of our table was the budino, which featured a layer of caramel pudding, chocolate ganache, and a dollop of whipped cream on top. A little hard to get all three layers in one bite, but when it was accomplished it was magical. The torte was fine, but I'm not much of a raspberry/fruit kind of guy. I did enjoy the base of this though, with its limoncello cream, brown butter shortbread, and salted caramel drizzle that was streaked across the plate. The budino was just better, and I did eat the neglected torte when the budino was all gone.

Brunos was a nice change of pace from Americanized Italian restaurants, with their very heavy red sauces and lots of cheese. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy that kind of Italian food as well, but leaving Brunos I did not feel overly bloated and could stay up and watch a few things on Netflix when we got home, instead of crashing by 8pm. The food here was fresh and light, but still flavorful, which is a difficult balance to achieve. Chef Peter has done his grandmother's recipes proud of the food that we experienced on this evening. Service was professional and cordial. Glad we finally made it to Brunos after all these years, next we might even take them up on one of their great deals during the week. I know I'll definitely get an email or two about them.

Out of five grenades, (because one of the most famous Bruno's in the world is Bruno Mars and one of his first of many number one hits was the song Grenade, which reached number one in 2010) five being best to zero being worst, Brunos Italian Kitchen gets 3.5 grenades.

For more information about Brunos Italian Kitchen, head to their website here: http://www.brunosbrea.com/

Not Just Blowing Smoke at Fire Breather BBQ - CLOSED

Fire Breather BBQ

22722 Lambert St. #1702

Lake Forest, CA 92630

I have often used this blog to lament that there is no good barbecue where I live in South OC. The best is probably Wood Ranch, but the rest is really subpar. I've had a few decent meals at Lucille's, but most of the time, it's been, at best, mediocre. Dickey's was impressive when they first opened up here, but they have gone downhill fast. Bad to the Bone in San Juan gets a lot of love from people, but I've found their stuff to be bone dry like sandpaper going down. Texas BBQ on El Toro Road? Unedible.

When my good friend David asked where I wanted to head for dinner for my birthday, I recalled seeing Fire Breather BBQ when I picked up sandwiches at Philly's Best next door. The unmistakable aroma of barbecued meats hit my face when I entered to pick up a menu on that trip. It must have stuck with me because I told David we would meet at Fire Breather. Barbecue restaurants had burned me many times, so I did not come here with such high hopes. Big mistake.

We arrived at Fire Breather at 5:30 on a recent Friday evening. This is a casual barbecue restaurant. Ordering is done at the counter, and the food is brought out soon afterward. There are less than ten tables inside and a few small tables in front of this strip center restaurant. The decor inside is non-existent, except for the large wagon wheel with hanging lights in the center of the room and a wall with artificial turf fastened.

The menu at FireBreather is pretty sparse as well. They offer five kinds of meat for their one-, two-, or three combo meat plates. There are also two sandwiches, (brisket and pulled pork), five sides, and the rest of the menu is rounded out by kettle chips and bottled beverages.  That's basically it, straightforward and to the point, which you can get away with if your barbecue is good. Let's see if that's the case here.

Starting things off for us is the Pulled Pork BBQ Sammy ($12) that tempted Katie. This sandwich had plenty of pulled pork piled on a Hawaiian burger roll. The meat comes without sauce, and it's up to you as to how much you want to add. Not that this pork needed any. It was moist, with a nice subtle smoke to it. The smoke was manageable, and there was not a bad bite during the short life of this sandwich. The sandwiches come with Apple Slaw and your choice of one side. Katie got the Potato Salad, which she was over the moon about. She felt this was one of the better potato salads she has had in a long while. It was chunky style, with plenty of celery and red onion included. Just like grandma used to make. 

There would be no doubt what I'd be having this evening at Fire Breather's, the Beast Mode Combo ($24). I like trying as much as possible on one plate, and this was a perfect choice here. It also helped that David would be paying, thanks, buddy. For my three portions of meat, I went with brisket, baby back ribs, and pulled pork. All were fantastic. Brisket is the king of barbecue meats and indicates whether a place will be good. Fire Breather passed this test with flying colors. The brisket was tender, with a small ribbon of fat running through it, which gave it a nice flavor boost. The outside bark was flavorful, along with the rub that they used. That is precisely what I look for in brisket. The ribs featured a nice-looking smoke ring on them, and they were meaty, while the pork pulled easily from the bone with just a little tug. Just like Katie's sandwich, the pulled pork continued to shine. I liked that some textures were included with this pile of pork. You get some of the crispy ends along with the moist inside cuts. I went with the BBQ beans for my side item, which were fine but did not elevate to anything above average. Some cut-up brisket in these would have made them better.

David probably didn't want me to feel like I was the only one eating a ton of food here, so he also went the Beast Mode ($24) route at Fire Breather. He picked brisket, tri-tip, and pulled pork. Tri-tip can be a tricky barbecue meat to get, as it is easy to come out dry and flavorless. That is not the case here. It was meaty and flavored nicely with a nice rub and a tinge of smoke. Easily one of the best tri-tips I have had in a long while, even though David allowed me to have one slice. He selected the mixed veggies for his side item, which I did not get a chance to try.

Fire Breather BBQ should be where you head when you are in South OC and want a good barbecue. I was impressed with all the meats we tried on this trip here, as they are not just South OC good. They are some of the best we have had in Orange County. The sides were disappointing, as they were all basic. Maybe they don't have room to make mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, or greens in this storefront. This is definitely a family-run business, as Kat, the amiable woman at the counter, is one of the owner's wives, and she had her adorable infant behind the counter with her. They are proud of the barbecue they serve here and have every right to be. Be aware that they are closed on Sunday and Monday, so you only have five days to get your barbecue fix. Based on just this one visit, I can now declare the South OC curse of bad barbecue is broken.

Out of five kisses (because the co-lead singer and bassist of Kiss, Gene Simmons, was famous for breathing fire on stage at their concerts), five being best to zero being worst, Fire Breather BBQ gets a strong 3.5 kisses.

For more information about Fire Breather BBQ, head to their website here: http://www.firebreatherbbq.com/

Birthday Dinner at Garduno's Ristorante

Garduno's Ristorante

398 East 17th Street

Costa Mesa, CA 92627

As I get older, birthdays seem to mean a little less to me. You would think it would be just the opposite because with each birthday it brings you closer to the end. I know, that's too dark of a thing to write on a restaurant review site, but it's true. As the early part of June rolls around, and Katie inevitably asks what I want to do for my birthday, I usually want to forgo hanging out with family and friends that want to make a big deal about my latest trip around the sun. I just want to have a low key day, try a restaurant that I have yet to try, with just my beautiful wife by my side.

That's what we ended up doing on this beautiful Sunday early evening in OC. We napped a little in the afternoon, drove to the beach and walked the boardwalk between the Newport and Balboa piers, and then we had planned on eating at one of the restaurants back in Newport. Unfortunately, where we wanted to eat was packed with people watching the NBA Finals, and we could not get a seat for at least a half of NBA basketball, which meant easily another two hours. So we decided to get out of the packed Newport area and headed slightly inland to Costa Mesa.

That's when it hit me that I had a dentist appointment coming up, and my fantastic dentist would ask me for the sixth straight appointment if I had tried one of his favorite Italian restaurants in Costa Mesa yet. Not wanting to disappoint the guy with the sharp implements mere inches away from my open mouth, I decided it would be best to have my birthday dinner at Garduno's Ristorante.

We were just coming from walking at the beach and were unsure if we were dressed appropriately enough to eat here, so we cautiously walked through the door and were put at ease with the red and white checkered tablecloths, wallpapered walls, and the overall general hominess of the place. It also helped assure us since there was only one other table occupied during our entire visit at Garduno's.

Garduno's has been around since 1988 and is situated in the same food rich shopping center as Sidecar Doughnuts, Pie-Not, Mi Casa Mexican Restaurant, and Shirley's Bagels. The menu at Garduno's is pretty much what you would expect from an Italian restaurant in these parts. They have a handful of appetizers to choose from, veal, chicken, baked dishes, and different types of pasta to select from. They make all of their pasta every day and have 14 varieties of sauce to pick from. Pretty impressive from such a small place. I was intrigued and excited to see what my dentist has been talking about the last three years.

Bread came out rather quickly after we had ordered. This was a pretty good representation of Italian sliced bread. It was a bit crusty on the outside and soft on the inside, and it came out warmed with butter packets that were easy to spread since they were heated up a bit by the warm bread.

I don't think I have seen Mozzarella Fritta ($7.95) served like this before. This fried mozzarella was sliced like a thick piece of french toast, breaded, and bathed in a creamy tomato sauce. I guess this is the more grown-up version of mozzarella sticks that lurk on the menus of almost every restaurant around. This was a very good starter. The cheese had a nice stringy quality to it and was not as heavy as I would have expected. The breading had a slight crunch to it, while the sauce was a good version of a blush sauce.

I'm always happy when a salad is included with a meal, and that was the case here at Garduno's, even with the pasta dishes. This House Salad included a nice mix of greens, red cabbage, tomatoes, shredded carrots, olives, cucumber wedges, peppercinis, mozzarella cheese, and a very tangy Italian dressing. The produce was fresh and I definitely appreciated the variety of the veggies in this, but the Italian dressing was too tangy for both Katie and I. A lot of people love this dressing in the online reviews I have read so it might have just been this batch that had too much tang.

When we first started dating I made a carbonara for Katie, and she claims that it helped cement her love for me, which I'm not so sure that's the case, but that's what she claims anyway. She tried the Carbonara ($19.90 which includes a $2.95 upcharge for picking tortellini as her pasta) on this evening at Garduno's. This was a very creamy version of a carbonara sauce. It did include peas, pancetta bacon, and mushrooms, and ended up being quite good. I'm not a big fan of tortellini, but Katie liked it with this dish, even though it did not bring to mind other traditional carbonara dishes she has had in the past. This came out scalding hot, and as it cooled the sauce kind of grew on me. I even scraped her bowl clean and mixed it with half of my meal that I took home for work the next day.

For my birthday dinner, I went with the Meat Lasagna ($15.95). This was a very saucy, yet meaty version of a lasagna. They use a mix of ground brisket and chuck, then add parmesan, mozzarella, and ricotta cheeses to this almost noodle-less lasagna. There might have been a couple of pasta sheets in here, but they were kind of overwhelmed by the very thick tomato sauce and meat. Not that I didn't mind the extra abundance of meat in this, it just would have been nice to have it be a little more balanced. I've gotten into the habit of ordering Meatballs ($3.90 for 2) at every Italian restaurant I've eaten at lately. These were not a bad version whatsoever. They had a nice texture to them, not too firm, but still loose enough to break easily using a fork. They had a good flavor and went well when I added one of them to my already meaty lasagna.

What would a birthday dinner be without dessert? I'm not usually too excited by Italian desserts. Not really a fan of tiramisu or cannolis, but these Gelato Truffles ($5.95) hit the spot. These were described perfectly on the menu as large bonbons. We had the Mint and the Salted Caramel variety. These worked out perfectly for Katie and I as I liked the mint one, while she was content with the salted caramel bonbon. These were about the same size as a racquetball, with some pretty decent gelato included inside the chocolate shelled scoop that resembled the Magic Shell we used as kids.

Garduno's ended up being a very adequate spot for my birthday dinner. I wouldn't say that it blew us away, but it's a good neighborhood Italian restaurant and one that we would visit fairly frequently if we lived nearby. In an area where there is some pretty stiff competition for Italian food, (Mama D's, Filomena's, North Italia, and others), Garduno's kind of gets lost in the shuffle, but they are worthy of a visit. Service during our stay was a bit awkward, but in the end, our server kept things moving along at a decent clip. Glad I can finally report back to my dentist that I made it here after nearly three years of him asking me. Now maybe he'll take it easy on me with all of those root canals.

Out of five crazy chickens, (because the largest employer in the city of Costa Mesa is El Pollo Loco), five being best to zero being worst, Garduno's Ristorante gets 3 crazy chickens.

For more information about Garduno's Ristorante, head to their website here: https://www.gardunosristorante.com/

Farm to Table Comes to Corona - CLOSED

Blackburn's Farm to Table

4300 Green River Road Unit 106

Corona, CA 92880

It's another trip out to Corona to visit our good friends Sabrina and Anthony. We met them about 8 years ago now, and can't get rid of them. We have been on vacations together, played in the same bowling league for way too long, and they even read at our wedding three years ago. Although we don't see each other all too often these days, when we do reconnect, we pick up like no time has passed. We alternate between heading out to see them and them coming this way.  As is my usual job, I pick where we are going to eat, and this time we headed to Backburn's Farm to Table.

Blackburn's is situated in a shopping center that I have driven by numerous times when I'm out this way but had never stopped at. There's a couple of retail shops, a Mediterranian, Mexican, and a pizza place in this 91 Freeway adjacent shopping plaza. Blackburn's has been open for coming up on three years next month and is brought to us by Bill Blackburn, who wants to share his passion for farm fresh, organic food with the people of the Inland Empire.

Blackburn left a lucrative job in telecommunications, went to culinary school, and opened up a catering company in OC. After a stint in Redlands, he opened up Blackburn's Farm to Table in these Corona foothills. He's gotten plenty of positive press from the Press Enterprise, Inland Empire Magazine, Dining Out Magazine, and Westway's Magazine. It's not just food publications that have given Blackburn's their seal of approval, they have a solid four-star rating with over 500 reviews on Yelp. I was intrigued to see how our visit would go on this evening.

We arrived at Blackburn's at 6pm on a recent Saturday evening with a reservation from OpenTable. We did not seem to need one, as we were one of two tables occupied at this rather early dinner hour. People must have known that Sabrina was going to be eating here, so they got out of Dodge. It did get a tad busier as the evening went along though, but never more than half the dining room was full at one time. The dining space is nice and sleek, with assorted artwork on the walls, pale wood table tops, and a darkened ceiling.

The one-page menu at Blackburn's is broken up into appetizers, soup and salads, entrees, and desserts. Entree prices range between $13 to $29 with ten options to choose from. Appetizers, salads, and soups hover around the ten dollar mark, and there are five choices offered. We made our meal selections leisurely since we hadn't seen each other for a long while. Here's how everything turned out for us at Blackburn's on this evening.

I have a weird relationship with mac and cheese. I never had it while I was growing up, not even the Kraft blue box variety. I put that fact on my online dating profile, and it's one of the reasons that Katie reached out to me, so I guess I have mac and cheese to thank for being married. Thus, I now have a soft spot for this very comforting dish and have learned an appreciation for it. We tried the Skillet Macaroni and Cheese ($9.95) on this evening at Blackburn's. This was a very good representation of a grown-up mac and cheese. A very good four cheese blend, which was equally delicious and clung to the noodles wonderfully. The top had a nice amount of bread crumbs which provided a nice textural element. The menu online states that this used to come with shrimp and crab, and that would make this version even better than it already was.

Katie and I are clearly salad people, as we both opted to add a salad to our dining experience at Blackburn's. She had the Organic Field Greens ($6.95), while I went with the Iceberg Wedge ($7.95). Her salad included cucumbers, sliced tomato, sunflower seeds, and a white balsamic vinaigrette that impressed her a lot. Blackburn's lived up to their name with this salad which featured some farm fresh produce and that very good dressing tying everything together. I love wedge salads but I am not a fan of having to chop it up myself, but I did not mind with the one here. The fresh iceberg was paired with plenty of blue cheese chunks, chopped tomato, and some of the best bacon I have had in a while. It was very crisp and flavorful and went well with the other ingredients of the salad. I was happy with the change from my usual Caesar salad that I get almost everywhere I eat out. I definitely see more wedge salads in my future, especially if they are just as good as this one.

It's always a crapshoot as to what light eating Sabrina will get when we go out to eat, and she finally settled on this Garlic Pesto Chicken Flatbread ($9.95) after some great debate. Besides the chicken, garlic, and pesto, this also came with some balsamic onions, roasted red peppers, and mozzarella cheese. Sabrina was of course very stingy with giving me a taste of this, but she proclaimed that it had a good flavor, she thought the portion size was more than fair, and she would definitely get this again. High praise from hard to please Sabrina.

Katie wanted something light for dinner, so she zeroed in on this Vegan Bolognese Spaghetti ($19.95). Spaghetti squash was the base for this very healthy dish, while the bolognese sauce was made up of quinoa and lentils. Predictably, when I tried this I was not a fan, but Katie really enjoyed this different take on spaghetti. She claimed that she did not miss the noodles and meat in this, found the sauce wonderfully flavored, and it has even inspired her to try making this at home. I'll probably eat somewhere else when she finally gets around to doing this.

Anthony could not resist the allure of the Fresh Fish of the Day ($26.95) which happened to be sea bass on this evening. The sea bass was flaky, fork tender, and had a nice sear to it, but it was kind of plain tasting on its own. It definitely needed a sauce to help boost its flavor profile. The green beans and the mashed potatoes were nicely done sides that helped save this dish a bit. Not the best fish dish Anthony has had but it ended up being adequate.

I asked our server what the most popular entree was here, and she immediately stated it was this Center Cut Pork Chop ($21.95). This was a big double cut pork chop, which was topped with sliced peaches and a fruity sauce, which I could not detect what it was made from, maybe cranberry? It was good, but a little too much on the sweet side for my liking. Some bites of the pork chop were on the dry side, which is hard to get around with a piece of pork this big. I remedied this by alternating bites of the mashed potatoes and mixed veggies. A beautiful dish, but one that fell a little flat for me.

Dessert was going to be our last hurrah at Blackburn's and this Whiskey Bread Pudding ($6.95) might have been the best thing we had here. The bread pudding base was neither too soggy nor too dry, which is one of my major critiques with bread pudding. This one passed with flying colors. It was moist and had a nice structure to it, along with a nice caramel sauce and plenty of vanilla ice cream perched proudly on top. A very nice ending to our long overdue rendezvous with Sabrina and Anthony.

Blackburn's did have a few hiccups with their entrees on this evening, but it's easy to see that this is the kind of restaurant that Corona needs more of. Restaurants that are chef-driven, independent restaurants serving food made with good quality and healthy ingredients. Highlights for me on this evening were the mac and cheese, salads, and the dessert, but the entrees were underwhelming and missed the mark for me. I've heard really good things about their breakfasts though, so that might be another opportunity for us to come here again. Service was pretty good, and our server kept things moving along nicely and did not seem to mind us sitting here for a while after our meals to continue catching up. Can't wait to see where the four of us end up next.

Out of five hawks, (because the hockey team based in Blackburn, England is known as the Blackburn Hawks, and I'm missing hockey this summer), five being best to zero being worst, Blackburn's Farm to Table gets 3 hawks.

For more information about Blackburn's Farm to Table, head to their website here: https://chefbillblackburn.com/

Pizza Without Any Parallel? - CLOSED

Parallel Pizzeria

34255 Pacific Coast Highway Suite 101

Dana Point, CA 92629

I used to have a rule that I would wait until a restaurant was around for a year before I would review it. My reason for this was that I did not want a website full of reviews of boarded-up restaurants. That stat still floats around: about 90 percent of restaurants fail to make it to their first anniversary before closing up shop. Now coming up on my ninth year of writing this restaurant review site, inevitably, there are a good number of restaurants that I have been to that have gone the way of drive-in theaters, rotary phones, and record stores (I know I'm definitely dating myself with these references). I realized this was a silly rule because most of you want to see if you should eat at that new place in town. If that new place in town you are wondering about is Parallel Pizzeria, the answer is yes, you should head there right away.

I had a sneaky suspicion that Parallel Pizzeria would be great when I heard who was behind it. Chef Ryan Adams of the vaunted 370 Common in Laguna Beach and the soon-to-be very busy Buttermilk Fried Chicken in Downtown Orange, along with his business partner, James Nunn, opened Parallel late last month. Situated in The Row Shopping Strip, this is a homecoming for Chef Adams. He used to skate and surf in this area when he was younger and always lamented that there were no good pizza places in Dana Point. He decided to rectify that by bringing Parallel to town.

To say that New Haven-style pizza is under-represented here in OC would be an understatement. I did some quick research and discovered that this is the only place serving New Haven-style pizza in the county. I could have overlooked a spot, and someone will correct me if that is the case. New Haven pizza is distinctive in that its shape is oblong instead of round, the dough is fermented for 72 hours, the pizza is cooked in a charcoal oven at 700 degrees, and they even did some water analysis with some help from the guys at UCI to get the water as close to Connecticut's as possible. A lot of work went into this restaurant.

Thankfully, this is not a build-your-own pizza concept, which is refreshing for a change. Haven't we reached our saturation point with the build-your-own pizza places? The menu here is divided into a small selection of starters, salads, and sandwiches. There are eight signature pies and a red and white base model that you can customize with an added upcharge per topping. These are not single-serving sizes of pizzas either. They offer medium and large on most pizzas, and the medium could definitely serve two. They also serve a gluten-free cauliflower crust for people who are into that sort of thing, like my fantastic sister-in-law, Emily. Enough build-up; how did we like this new pizza place in town?

I've been on a real meatball kick lately and had to give these Housemade Meatballs ($7.95) a spin. These smaller-than-I-imagined meatballs came five to an order, were bathed in a tangy red sauce, and dusted lightly with parmesan cheese. The meatballs were tender and had a pleasant texture. I loved the marinara sauce, which was not too acidic and had a slight sweetness. After devouring these in record time, I looked forward to trying their meatball sandwich on my next visit.

The medium version of this Chopped Salad was the perfect size for sharing. Chopped iceberg lettuce is jazzed up with radicchio, sliced salami, tomato, artichoke, mozzarella, onion, olives, and garbanzo beans and is then rounded out with a red wine vinaigrette. The freshness of this salad cannot be debated, and I liked that they added lots of items to it. I was not thrilled with the dressing on this, though. I thought it had a tanginess that was too strong for my palette, but Katie seemed to love it. I'm more of a creamy salad dressing kind of guy.

Now, the real reason you come here is the pizzas. Katie got the White and Green Pizza ($18.95) for her maiden visit to Parallel. This pizza is topped with prosciutto, ricotta, a well-done cilantro pesto, chili flakes, garlic, parmesan, and plenty of arugula. Katie felt this was a very flavorful pizza, and the absence of sauce allowed the excellent toppings to be the show's star. The chili flake added a tinge of spice, while the delicious prosciutto and creamy ricotta added a nice textural element. I had imagined this would be a dry pizza, but that was not the case. A very clean-tasting pizza and a great first impression of New Haven-style pizza for us.

I came here knowing I would have this Clam Pizza ($22.95). I know it might seem a little crazy to most of you, but clams on a pizza is pretty much a tradition in New Haven, Connecticut, so since this would be my first time experiencing this type of pizza, I thought I might as well go all in. The little neck clams are joined on the pizza by cuts of bacon, pecorino cheese, red onions, olive oil, and chili flakes. If you are averse to clams on pizza, they are not fishy or slimy like you might expect. The sliced bacon and the spicy chili flakes overshadowed the clams, which were a little hard to pick out while eating them. New Haven pizza is very light on the cheese and sauce, but the crust was delicious, and I definitely do not consider myself a crust guy. A very light pizza, which did not make me feel as heavy as I only ate half of it and saved the rest for dinner the following evening. The perfect bacon used here excited me to try their carnivore pizza next time.

I'm thrilled that the people of Dana Point have a great pizza option in their town. Since this was our first foray into New Haven-style pizza, I don't have anything else to compare it to, but I liked what I had this evening. The pizzas were lighter than Chicago's heavy, deep-dish style, less greasy than New York-style thin crust, and had more flavor than Neapolitan-style pizzas. You can say that the New Haven type of pizza is comfortably right in the middle ground of pizza. A sweet spot, if you will. Since Parallel has only been open for a month, I look forward to seeing how it's received by the community and how it evolves. We had the pleasure of running into Chef Ryan Adams during our visit, and his passion for the culinary landscape of Orange County is contagious and very optimistic, which is something that I like to hear. Plus, he's one of the most down-to-earth chefs/owners we have met in the nine years of writing this restaurant review blog. I'm glad I decided to break my rule of waiting a year to review a restaurant, even though I have no doubt this one will be around way longer than that.

Out of five lollipops (because New Haven not only was the birthplace of the first hamburger, submarine, and corkscrew but the lollipop was invented in this town in 1892 as well), five being best to zero being worst, Parallel Pizzeria gets 3.5 lollipops.

Parallel Pizzeria has a minimal website, which will hopefully be updated soon. You can see it here: http://parallelpizzeria.com/