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WELCOME TO THE BEST RESTAURANT OF THE MONTH SERIES! THIS MONTH 'S WINNER: TRUST RESTAURANT
If you're a regular visitor to this blog, you know I love to cook and am very passionate about making wonderful food. However, I also love to eat great food prepared by other people - I mean, who doesn't love that? Seeking out and trying new restaurants has been a hobby of ours for a number of years now. In a nutshell, I'm here to bring you delicious and amazing food experiences, whether it be through my own recipes, tried and true recipes of other great cooks, or great dishes served at restaurants around the globe (with a focus on my hometown of San Diego).
I have spent a lot of time creating, testing, and posting recipes and thought it was about time I started documenting my eating experiences outside our home. I started by creating a list of the top 15 breakfast spots to try in San Diego. From there, I've decided to create the series Best Restaurant of the Month. I want to share all this wonderful food we eat in the hopes that someone can use it as part of their own eating experience. This series leads up to the Best Thing I Ate series I post at the end of each year.
Where We Ate in March
Before announcing our March winner, lets give props to all the places we ate at. Some of these restaurants were incredibly delicious, only beating out by our winner by a hair. There was no actual hair, in case you were wondering. Typically, we eat at a few more restaurants than this during a month, but March was a CRAZY month!
Simpang Asia in LA - Serving Indonesian cuisine, I was very excited to check this place out after having recently returned from Singapore. The Char Kway Teow and the Roti Paratha were the best dishes here. The Laksa, unfortunately, fell a little flat on flavor.
Republique in LA - We stopped here for breakfast on our way to the Valley (yes, traffic was hideous). The vanilla and blood orange donut was one of the best donuts I've ever eaten. Both the Kimchi fried rice with poached eggs and the croque madame were quite delicious. The eggs were perfect. Flavors all complemented each other perfectly. Definitely worth a trip back, perhaps for dinner next time.
Oi Asian Fusion in LA - This place had great reviews, so we were slightly disappointed with the flavor of our dishes. CAVEAT: we only got takeout. Next time we're in LA, we will give this place another shot and dine in - takeout is never as good.
Bull and Grain (breakfast) - We came here for the breakfast in March, however, we were also there in January for San Diego Restaurant Week, and were very impressed during both visits. They serve the most delicious breakfast macaroni and cheese with house made bacon and a pretty mean chicken fried steak.
Izakaya Masa - We came here for the ramen (stay tuned for the best ramen in San Diego), but also had the most delectable monk fish liver and grilled Yellowtail kama (collar). Ramen was quite good as well.
This Month's Winner - TRUST
For month of March, our winner is TRUST Restaurant. Trust serves locally sourced ingredients that change with the season. Because of that, keep in mind that some of the dishes you see here may not be available all year round. Focusing mainly on small dishes, the menu is meant to be served family style, offering just a few entrees for those who don't like sharing (what?!?!?).
The menu at TRUST is amazing - there are so many wonderful options. Between the two of us, we ordered 7 small plates off the menu. All were amazing, but my favorite was the shrimp and sausage. The dishes we ordered are included below, with a brief description. I would 100% recommend ordering any of these dishes if you decide to give this place a visit.
Hush Puppies
I never thought I could love hush puppies so much. I mean, I knew I liked them, but these are out of this world. Served with house made ham, house cultured honey butter and sea salt, these were the perfect start to what would be a perfect evening of dining. The butter and ham were a great complement to the hush puppies. The hush puppies were light and fluffy, and had incredible flavor. There is a chance I will spend the next year attempting to copy this recipe...
Chicken Liver Toast
Chicken liver toast is one of those dishes we always order if its offered. And it's always good. This was no different. I was rather indifferent to the radishes garnishing the dish, but the mostardo was excellent, a perfect complement to the chicken liver.
Wood Grilled Octopus
This dish was far from what I expected (can't really tell you what I was expecting, but it was not this). The ground, fresh pepperoni is what gave this dish that extra oomph. I loved it. One of my favorites of the evening. The octopus was tender and filled with flavor, cooked to absolute perfection. The salsa verde and chilled legumes added a great texture and extra boost of flavor to the dish. Amazing!
Beef Tartare
Another dish we tend to order whenever we go out, TRUST executed this one extremely well. The quail eggs, mustard seeds and pickled onions were all perfect accompaniments. The beef was incredibly fresh, and the crisp lavash was a wonderful touch, adding great texture.
Shrimp and Sausage
The best dish of the night (at least in my opinion). Juicy shrimp served with andouille sausage and toasted bread in a tomato based sauce with garbanzo beans and wine herb butter. I mean, this was absolutely amazing. The andouille sausage was delicious, but the flavor was not at all overpowering (as it can sometimes be). The tomato sauce was not overly tomatoey (new word?) and the shrimp was perfectly cooked. And did I mention the bread? I could have just sopped up the sauce with that bread all night. But alas, there were other dishes to indulge in.
Uni Pasta
While I loved this dish, I found that the uni flavor was not as intense as I would have hoped. It tasted more like a good linguini with clam sauce. Don't get me wrong, it was a delicious dish, it was just missing that extra oomph from the uni. The shiitake mushrooms were absolutely wonderful - I may even try to incorporate this idea in my own linguini with clam sauce dish.
Braised Oxtail Raviolini
This was the boyfriend's favorite dish. Good thing too, because I was stuffed by then and only had room for a couple bites. Served with pine nuts, carrots, a touch of horseradish, oxtail au jus and ricotta cheese, this dish was so hearty and delicious. The ricotta added a great layer of richness, the oxtail was perfectly tender, and the raviolini was cooked to perfection. What a great way to end the evening!
There were so many other dishes on the menu I would love to try next time like the East Coast Scallops, Hamachi Crudo, Ricotta Agnoloti and the Lobster Risotto. Who knows, maybe TRUST will land a spot on the best meal of the month list again in the future!
Offering killer dishes like the Ultimate Sticky Bun, Fried Pork Cutlet, Steak 'N Eggs (the boyfriend is such a sucker for this), Pancakes and Fried Chicken and Chilaquiles, TRUST serves an outstanding breakfast menu as well. Check them out on the Top 15 Places to Eat Breakfast in San Diego list.
So that concludes our praises of the delicious food offered at TRUST.
Have you ever been to TRUST? If so, what are your thoughts? What dishes did you order and what was your favorite? What was the best restaurant you ate at in March?
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