Vista Del Mar — Restaurant in Eureka

Driving up and gazing upon the Vista Del Mar, if you’re a “judge a book by its cover” person, you’ll probably turn around and go somewhere else. And you’d be doing yourself quite a disservice.

Vista Del Mar is THE place the locals go. There were two people covering the bar and tables: one was the bartender/server and the other was a busboy. The pink haired, tattooed, bartender is both friendly and sarcastic and knows almost everyone who walks through the door. If she doesn’t know you, you’re instantly welcomed into the family. We chatted with a couple of tables.

She took our drink orders and slipped away to help literally everyone else. We split the nachos and shrimp po’boy and got tots with it.

The nachos come with homemade chips which were crunchy and delicious, yet light and airy. The nacho cheese has a nice little kick to it along with their sweet pico de gallo and jalapeños.

The po’ boy was big enough to share. The shrimp was huge and delicious, the bun was light and fluffy with a slight crisp and held up the shrimp, lettuce and roumelade sauce. Everything was truly fantastic!

And we had stumbled upon this place on our trip down the 101 and looking up great places to eat in Eureka, CA. So, if you ever find yourself out this way, make it a point to stop in and grab a bite at the Vista Del Mar. You’ll be...

We were staying in downtown Eureka and wanted seafood so decided to try Vista Del Mar for dinner. It's in a more industrial section so walking there could take you thru some seedier sections. Walking in you see the bar and lots of tables. You can sit wherever you want. It was clean and gave off more of a bar than a restaurant vibe. The bartender was our waitress. She gave us menus, brought us drinks, brought us our food after we went up to order. She was friendly and checked in on us, and I would rate the service for what it was as being very good. The calamari appetizer was really tasty. Lots of tentacles and rings. Light crispy coating. Came with a lemon garlic aioli for dipping. We liked that a lot. I ordered the fried oyster basket which came with fries. They oysters seemed huge to me. Many were filled with a greenish ooze that I googled and apparently, it's the unprocessed foodstuff the oyster eats and is both really good for you and adds to their value. That being said, I was not a huge fan. I usually enjoy raw oysters, and I enjoy smoked oysters from the can, but I was put off by the texture and flavor of these. I also found the fries pretty bland. I suspect if I lived here, I would go back and just try other dishes since the calamari was excellent, but I'd have to pass on...

Down at the foot of Commercial Street on the West waterfront is a small bar and grill across from the Pacific Seafoods processing plant. Parking spaces are on all sides and the waterfront trail is right there although there is no view of del mar. The small noisey space had been updated and the seating is all high top stools at tables and the full bar. There are plenty of draft taps and bottles. High mounted TVs display sports. Food is served on a paper covered metal tray on bare wood tops with paper napkin wrapped metal utensils. The menu features fried food and sandwiches with Cuban flair. We had lunch and it was busy, but the lone server did an amazing job handling the whole room including the bar. We had fish and chips (20), a sandwich 16, a bottle of corona 4, and draft beer 7 (Pint of north coast old Rasputin). The food was mostly excellent. The fish batter was crispy as well as the fries and tots. The "reubano" sandwich was fine, however it was thin on protein. The pan Cubano was the main feature, but could have used more fat in the grilling. I asked twice for Dijon which I loved, and it's lateness can be forgiven because of the high customer to server ratio. We plan to return to sample the fish tacos and a regular...