Juniper and Ivy, San Diego

 We ate at this great restaurant in San Diego on a recent trip.  This is my birthday dinner for this year, and it was all kinds of wonderful.  The first thing, which is less important to me, is that it is a beautifully designed and laid out restaurant. We had a cozy corner table that was just perfect, and there were all sorts of other options for special seating.  The wait staff was also very pleasant.  Also not high on my priorities, but a nice addition to a memorable evening.

 Then there is the food.  Which was just flat out wow.  They had a couple dozen dishes on the menu and the majority of them were tiny or small plates, ranging in price from a few dollars up to fifteen and twenty dollars.  That may sound like a lot, but think of it this way--the quality of the preparation and the inspiration of the dishes is like a high end fixed price meal, but you get to choose each of the courses, and in the end we spent about $100 for two.  Not an everyday meal by any means, but we felt like we got a deal.  We cook, and we would never accomplished this at home.

The best dish was a huge portion of a beef crudo on toast cut into four portions, each topped with a perfectly poached quail egg.  I am not a beef eater, and I do not care for it raw, but I have to admit, this was delicious.  The pictured dishes are cod and shrimp poached in a richly flavored broth, with cherry tomatoes.  It was perfectly cooked and had such balanced flavors.  Next down is abalone with an avocado gazpacho and an olive, pine nut, and herb side salad.  Abalone is always kind of a crap shoot and this was delicious.  The surprise dish was a sous vide chicken with a mole made with carrots and topped with Mexican pickled carrots and fresh thinly mandalined carrot, so basically carrots three ways and super moist chicken.  Really delicious, and the one dish that we might actually be able to replicate at home.