Craft & Commerce — Restaurant in San Diego

I LOVE this place! Geo was our wonderful server, I didn't catch the bartenders', expo's, or the host's names, but the team is incredibly strong. Moreover, the chefs are not playing games with these amazing dishes!

Was the experience absolutely perfect? No, but these are HUMANS working in a pandemic, and they did the best they could with what was available. My least favorite dish was the beet burrata salad. It was too soggy and oily for my taste, so if you have had a perfect, fresh burrata made for you before, I may stay away simply because your standards will be too high lol. My friend, who never had burrata prior, however, loved it! WARNING: This place is busy,, so except to wait EVEN IF if you have a reservation. Just please be understanding that you may wait an extra 30 minutes, like we did, simply because people aren't getting up (they don't hate you, I promise they want to serve you lol).

Now for the many pros: •Aesthetic: It's like a tiki feline theme

•Menu: they have seasonal menu changes! Which makes me incredibly happy!

Food: Outside of the burrata, everything was so good! I'd highly suggest the Honey Mustard skewers over the Nashville style. The biscuits are from heaven by the way (I'm convinced, they HAVE to be if they're that good). The duck tacos were the bomb dot com. Salted Butterscotch pudding was fabulous, the potato cookies were... a unique experience (like a French fry with sugar) .-. Shihito peppers were crisp to perfection and the crispy garlic was just the cherry on top! My friend loved the mussels too!

Drinks: The bartenders are talented! Our initial female bartender was also incredibly sweet, attentive, quick, and helped me pick my first drink. The bar lead made an incredible spin off of an amaretto sour that I feel like should be on their next menu! The sezerac is well balanced, I would recommend it as your first round if you plan on getting a sweet drink too since your palate would be shocked by the contrasting spirit forward profile of the classic cocktail.

•Company: This company is a part of a bigger conglomerate of restaurants, which was actually a reason we specifically visited! You can tell they are in good hands, I hope my best friend and I cam help a conglomerate like them one day that is even a fraction of theirs. I love how happy the employees look to be working under the conglomerate and how insightful the employees are. Geo even went as far as to share how she was moved up from being a hostess, and to whoever promoted her, just know I will be excited to see her move into being a bigger role. She speaks highly of you and she carries light into people. All her tables in her section were laughing and happy looking fellows, us being...

Decent food, but very restrictive menu, and no customization.

I got the Big Green Salad - kale, shaved carrots, parmesan, olive oil bread crumb and fermented pepper vinaigrette. I asked for some protein to be added on, and they literally had no option outside the Confit Duck Leg. This was a big disappointment. I asked if it would be possible to get some plain chicken, but there was nothing of that sort. The duck was SUPER oily, but flavorful. I had to press out all the oil using paper towels, and make it work. The salad was nice with the duck - the parmesan was like snow over all the thing, so the flavor really came through. The dressing was horrible though - very good decision getting it on the side and not adding it on.

My fiancé got the Lamb Chop Lollipops (with dill yogurt, nut dukkah, arugula, pickled red onions) and he loved them! I tried the dill yogurt plain and the flavor was so unique! Everything went so well together. He was a big fan.

He also got the Beet & Burrata Salad (+ frisee lettuce, citrus, toasted hazelnuts) and it was decent. The Beet and lettuce and citrus and hazelnuts all worked, but the burrata was Horrible! SO SALTY! It really ruined the dish. We had to try to remove all the casing and find the creamy inside, but even that was just bearable.

My sister-in-law got the Confit Duck Leg "Tacos" (it was crispy duck legs, pickled onion, queso fresco, salsa verde, cilantro, avocado, corn tortillas and bone marrow on the side). It was all a platter of all the components so you had to assemble the tacos yourself. She isn't usually a fan of boned meat, but she clearly enjoyed this meal. Said the same about the tortillas - she's not usually a fan of corn tortillas because they tend to be tough, but these were fresh and soft as ever. We had a tough time with getting anything out of the bone marrow though. It was the kind where the content was inside the cylindrical thing, and SO hard to get out. Ended up not even eating it.

We got the C&C Corn Dogs (with whole grain mustard, cheese sauce). The cheese sauce here was amazing! We could have just had them plain. The corndogs themselves were so big and fresh. The meat on the inside was lovely, and much better than those regular fair ones.

He also got the All Things Must Pass cocktail (blanco tequila, strawberry, fermented plum, passionfruit, lemon). A bit too strong for me, but he seemed to like it.

For dessert we got the brownie - I really liked the gelato on top, but the brownie itself was just sub-par. Not rich and fudgy as...

We were excited to try this location after being loyal customers of other restaurants within the Consortium Holdings group. Unfortunately, our experience did not live up to expectations.

Upon arrival, the host was accommodating, seating us promptly, and providing menus and water after confirming our reservation. However, things quickly went downhill from there. We noticed the table next to us was only served water, so we decided to order both drinks and food at the same time. Our server, Todd, took our order and that was the last we saw of him.

The table next to us received their drinks and food from runners, while we waited without any updates. Our food was eventually brought out by the runners, but they were too quick to give us a moment to ask about our drinks. We noticed the table next to us get a second round of drinks before we received our first or a check in from our server. Todd checked in on the table to the other side of us, having a lengthy conversation, and we had to flag him down promptly after the conversation ended as he was walking away. When we asked about our drinks, Todd said “Oh, that’s my f* up,” before running off and returning with our drinks five minutes later—by which time we were more than halfway through our meal.

From that point on, Todd seemed to focus on other tables, engaging in long conversations while ignoring us. We had to flag down the host for our check, it was only then Todd returned with our check without offering any resolution for the earlier mishap.

As for the food, the burger was good, but the mac and cheese was just okay. My drink was too sweet for my taste, but perhaps it would have been more enjoyable if I had it before our savory meal.

It’s also disappointing to see the google responses from the restaurant. After reading other negative reviews, it seems there is little effort to address these service issues. The generic replies, which don’t offer any resolution or follow-up, give the impression that the restaurant is willing to overlook poor service.

We have no plans to return here and will be hesitant to try any CH restaurants we haven’t already been to. We used to talk highly of the CH restaurant group but now I’m...