Navio — Attraction in Loíza

We recently invited my sister to celebrate her birthday at the Ritz Carlton Half Moon Bay. Part of the celebration was a birthday dinner at Navio, the Ritz’s five star restaurant. In short, we had an unparalleled, spectacular dining experience. Out of five stars, I give Navio ten stars. If interested, more details below. My sister has been a vegan for quite a while. I was a little concerned about Navio having adequate vegan selections for my sister, as I wanted her to have a great dining experience for her birthday. As it turned out, I should not have worried. When we arrived to Navio, both the hostess, (Ella) and our server (Horace) acknowledged that we were celebrating a birthday and that we had a vegan in our party. Horace explained the dinner menu to us and, to our surprise, handed my sister a vegan menu! That was very cool. As my sister studied the menu, we got an even bigger surprise. Navio’s head chef, Francisco Simon, came out to go over the vegan menu with my sister and said that he could modify any the selections to her liking. Wow. For entrees, I had the Black Cod and my wife had the Beef Tenderloin. Both were perfectly prepared, artfully presented and delicious. I want to thank Marcos, the resident Som for the excellent wine choices he gave me. My sister’s vegan entree was a selection of five vegetables plated together. After a few bites, it became apparent to my sister that each vegetable had been prepared individually and uniquely. In addition, there was a dollop of sauce next to each of the vegetables, which gave the diner the choice of how much additional flavoring, if any, to add. We were all very impressed with the preparation. My sister explained that the “vegan option” at nearly all restaurants is a selection of good quality vegetables all cooked together with some type of seasoning, oil, or sauce. She was astounded that each vegetable on her plate was prepared separately. She described her dining experience as a “Glorious Reveal” as she worked her way through the various preparations on her plate. We later heard that Chef Francisco had prepared her meal himself. My sister’s final comment was that her dinner at Navio was the best vegan meal she had ever had. Then she corrected herself and stated that it was the best restaurant meal she had ever had, vegan or not. Each dessert, much like my sisters vegetable entrée, was an assortment of different elements with complex flavors, textures and appearances prepared by Pastry Chef Matt. He is a true pastry artist. To top off the experience Chef Roberto Riveras, Executive Chef for the entire property, stopped by our table and asked how we enjoyed our dinner. My sister described the difference between her vegan dishes at Navio compared to other restaurants. Basically, there is no comparison. We then asked Chef Riveras to tell us about his history as a chef. His response was a very animated and upbeat story. He described his international culinary journey and his current quest to use all his experiences to create innovative dishes with all the local California ingredients he has at his disposal. He truly has a passion for food. At Navio, we enjoyed elegant fine dining with excellent service from the professional yet friendly staff, innovative entrees and desserts that were flawlessly prepared and artfully presented under the personal supervision of the head chef. Who could ask for more? The Navio Restaurant at the Ritz Carlton Half Moon Bay gets my highest recommendation. Navio should have another Michelin star in my opinion. Here’s a special shout out to the people at Navio and the rest of the hotel who made our dining experience and hotel stay extra, extra special, especially for my sister’s birthday. Ritz Carlton Executive Chef Roberto Riveras, Navio Head Chef Francisco Simon, Pastry Chef Matt, Horace, Marcos. Mr. Rafael Gorina Executive Assistant Manager-Rooms Division and Spa, Hotel, Violeta, Maria V., Ella, Maria (front desk) and the entire...

I give this place 4 star rating. Alright. It's about 199.99 plus tax and tips for one person brunch. Since the price was high, I had to compare this place with other very fine dining places where I have been to (SFO, Vegas, Miami, HKG etc). With that price, we have to expect a very high quality of food and services. I have to say this place has an amazing view facing Pacific Ocean. The decoration and the hotel itself did give me a bit of classy feeling. The time I was there the place was not packed, which I liked. Quiet and relaxing. So I wanted to enjoy myself by not taking any pictures of the food. I didn't want to be "that person" who needed to take pictures of food all the damn time. I also wanted to respect the place and the atmosphere. It's all you can eat brunch. I can order as many times as I like within 2 hours period. I was allowed to only order two dishes at a time. My server had a very good timing to come by to help us order once we were finished dishes. Chefs always looked for perfection and consistency on every dish. I had total of 4 people and we tried all the food on the menu. I started off with caviar tasting and smoked salmon. The caviar was alright to me, but the smoked salmon with crispy potato opened my appetite. Then I ordered wagyu beef slider and lobster. Wagyu beef was not fully 100% wagyu. It's mixed. The slider also had a piece of pork belly in it. The fat from pork belly did ruin the taste of wagyu. So I had to take the pork belly, so I could try to taste the wagyu. Although it's not 100% wagyu, but it tasted pretty good with mushroom and sauce. I had this slider 3x. The lobster was fresh enough for me to have it 2x. I also had beef tenderloin. This was a filling piece and it was nicely cooked which was medium rare. The scallop was fresh and its surface was crispy enough for me to know that it's cooked and had good texture. Cavatelli, to me, was like very fancy mac n cheese with black truffle. This was very filling as well. I also tried their waffles and they did a good job on it by making it fresh, crispy, with nice real berries and sauce. Since I liked it, I was like okay... let me get the benedict and the chocolate chips pancakes. Both turned out to be... just okay. The dessert tower happened at the end. I took a picture of them because they were nicely decorated. I really liked the lavender one which was on the top and the peach one which was in the middle. The honeycomb and the chocolate one were just okay. Alright. the quality of food here was slightly above mediocre, compared to other places with similar prices. BUT the services were exceptionally good. And the view? no places can beat this. Oh yup. Almost forgot to tell you that you are required to use valent parking and it's 50 bucks for weekends. I think this was ridiculous since I came here for brunch. It should be complimented. This place can be a good place for dates or a small groups of people. I think coming this place was like one time experience for me. Should you come? I...

Updated review. Post COVID, prices have increased (roughly 2x more expensive. Required valet is $50 (wow)) and no longer is it a get-it-yourself style buffet, but it's a limited menu, but you can get "unlimited" refreshes, but only 2 choices at a time. So you can get food only as fast as the server comes to take your next order and they serve it to your table. The choice limitation (some 15 items I would guess, which is one fraction of what it used to be), the inherent throttle of how fast you can get food based on a server taking your next two dish-order, the limit of ordering 2 dishes at a time (they are small sample size dishes), and the 1.5 hour seating time limit (after 1.5 hours, they force you to do desserts the last 30 mins and you get one of each of the 4 desserts per person. Very good desserts ! But limited).

So about twice the price, a fraction of the choices and limited to how much you can get because you go at their pace, we won't be coming back until / it they resume the previous style awesome buffet.

The price is one thing and wouldn't even bother plus that much, if we had not had the throttling of amount and reduction in selection. A lot of our favorites were no longer on the menu. eg the tons of cheeses, breads, dim sum, sashimi/sushi, and a lot more variety of the seafood, meats, desserts, that used to be there.

We will now be looking for a new Mother's Day Brunch tradition (after many many many years)

-------------- previous review -----

5 star for food and service. 1 star for billing process !!

We used to come here for all special occasions. Mother's day, birthdays, anniversaries,etc. They have a great brunch. It is just absolutely wonderful.

But THIS time, we had to most confusion and misleading check out experience. We paid $25/ person deposit to make the reservation. That is fine. But when we got the bill, it showed the full amount. We mentioned we had paid the deposit already and they said that yes, Unfortunately, because of the system they are using (which they say they are very happy with), they have to show the full amount (ignoring the deposit that was taken over a week ago), and promised if we sign for the full amount, we will see it reconciled after we sign the full amount. So you have to sign off on the full amount with tip, and hope they follow through and give you credit for your deposit.

Sure enough, it was deducted. But this has to be the MOST confusing and misleading billing process. It doesn't detract from the food and service, but their billing process SUCKS ! Seems they implemented this two months ago. That person needs to really fix this !! We talked to the wait staff (not their fault) and their manager (who showed happiness about their new system...