Chez Loma — Restaurant in Coronado

Where to begin... we’ve wanted to try this place for some time and finally had the opportunity recently. It appears they are trying to get it together for reopening, so I hope that is the root of this bad experience. This was a very expensive meal that had a lot gone wrong, in multiple directions, so after some contemplation of whether to review or not, here it is... so, it was a bad sign to start that the menus were paper menus, probably intended to be thrown away after each use, but were instead very crumpled, with random numbers and writings on them, indicating they were not being used as their presumed intention would dictate... we did not heed this warning. An aside that may be important for some, they had no highchair available for either of the infants we had dining in our party. Our party ordered two of the duck tacos ($17), a French onion soup, an order of salmon ($36), and a chicken breast dish ($35). Starting with the duck tacos, the menu description stated there would be a mango-pico de gallo and some other more minor garnishes. The pico had no mangoes in sight, and there were literally only the three tacos on the plate...very small, obviously Safeway-bought flour tortillas (another bad sign was that corn tortillas were not even available, despite this option being indicated on the menu), very dry shredded meat that may or may not have been pork or duck, and a bit of this non-mango pico de gallo. I’m not a stickler for presentation in the slightest, but these tacos were just barely edible at best, so the presentation of all the food bears mentioning to give a better sense of the lack of quality of this meal. My tacos originally came without the “hot sauce,” which I didn’t notice at first. The waiter brought this later on a separate plate that also contained a lemon for some reason... he placed the saucer of hot sauce on my plate, and then hesitated when he realized he didn’t have any utensil to take the lemon from his plate and place it on mine, subsequently awkwardly grabbing the lemon with his bare hand and placing it on my plate. It is a good thing I had no use for the lemon.

The French onion soup was apparently not very good, according to the person who ordered it. I felt the broth was pretty good, but I am no French onion soup expert. The salmon was also ordered by that same person, and the only things on the plate were the hunk of dry (and apparently cold) salmon, a heap of (also apparently cold) mashed potatoes, and (warm) asparagus. This person also indicated their two glasses of pinot noir were excellent. Onward to the chicken dish, which I will attest, was the tastiest entree. However, the menu indicated the dish was chicken breast, and what was served - for $35 - was a single chicken LEG, on a small bed of mashed potatoes. When I questioned the waiter on the difference noted here from what the menu indicated, he practically yelled at me that this was the only chicken they had. I didn’t really pay it much heed at the time, nor did I fully grasp at this point all that had been going wrong. We finished our food, and when I received the bill, the waiter indicated the chicken was taken off the bill, which I also didn’t understand at the time that he was talking about the chicken he yelled at me about... I paid the bill, which I feel was quite expensive for what we received in return, and noticed afterwards that the chicken had not, in fact been removed from the bill.

Also, another aside, the waiter promised the “best” old fashioned “you ever had” - in practice,...

We are very sad to leave a poor review, as we have been coming since 2001 when Ken Irvine owned it. He was a brilliant chef. We really miss his signature gingerbread.

There was a change of management in between where it was bad. We retried it a couple years later and we had a fantastic meal. We thought were safe tonight.

When we arrived we were immediately cold. Everyone in there it was wearing the jacket they walked in. This telegraphs that they were too cheap to turn on the heater on January 2.

Our companion had the onion soup which was mediocre with a small amount of cheese on it. I had a beet salad which was fine but nothing special like previously. And my husband had the escargot which is a standard for him. The escargot was not fresh, it likely came out of a can but it turned out to be OK.

Our first clue was when we asked the server and he said the coq au vin and the Beef Bourguignon were done in the same sauce. We both cook so we know what goes in all of these dishes but it are wine based so it's possible it could turn out all right. Both were tasteless. This is not the point of an elegant French dining experience.

This really grievous part of this was that my husband's stock beef is strained out, what he thinks he should throw out, after it's been simmered and most of the flavor was extracted it still had more taste than this dish.

Companions filet was fine and cooked right. It was however a very dainty portion as was was ours.

Desert choice was flourless chocolate cake. It tasted fine but it was way too large of a piece, which was certainly not the case with our entrées. Presentation was a block instead of a slice with a little whipped cream and a few pieces of sliced strawberry. It was served way too cold, this means you can barely get through it with a spoon. Temperature is an important component of the dining experience.

Whipped cream or berries or creme anglaise needed to be in the correct proportion to offset the richness of the desert. In this case it was way off kilter. And let me tell you, we love rich, smooth textures and chocolatey, so it's so hard for us to even say somethings too rich and chocolatey. It just needed balance.

If you're in an elegant French restaurant, you are expecting an exquisite experience on your palate. You are just hoping your eyes might roll backwards and your toes curl. Also, it was $350 with wine. Considering the proportion served and the quality it was grossly over priced

The menu looks and tasted like it was prepared by a person who read the book French cooking for dummies.

I hope this review spurs the owners to explore the restaurant's roots and to restore it to its...

Extremely disappointing experience at Chez Loma. Raw Chicken served

Wanted to share our recent experience at Chez Loma. We have been coming to Coronado for many years and somehow never tried out Chez Loma. During our recent trip my wife, daughter and I decided to give it a shot. **Ambiance & service was excellent (our server was knowledgeable and attentive) The grilled Caesar salad was fantastic.

Unfortunately that’s where the good experience stopped. Our entrees arrived and after the first few bites of the chicken Milanese my wife says “this tastes weird” “does this look cooked all the way to you”

Upon my inspection, her chicken was raw/undercooked. We immediately stopped eating and notified the server. He was shocked and took the plate away immediately. He did comp her plate (only) and offered us crème brûlée (which we declined) honestly my wife’s appetite was gone as she was very concerned on potential sickness for her and our almost two year old daughter who was also eating the dish.

The bigger concern is that there was little acknowledgment to this issue. No manager came by to apologize and express concern for the fairly serious health risk by serving undercooked chicken.

Given the high end restaurant/reputation we were shocked nothing more was done / little level of acknowledgement. It was as if it was just swept under the rug and to get us out of the restaurant.

Long story short our Chez Loma experience was about as bad as it could have been, which was a huge disappointment to us as we had high hopes. We had hoped the ownership/manager would care enough to speak with us and even sent an email to the restaurant after arriving back home.

Chez Loma never responded to the email.

Extremely disappointing experience from a "high...