Postino Del Mar — Restaurant in San Diego

I'm trying to be nice as I know this is a new place, but they have got some major growing pains to take care of. First, I did make a reservation over the phone and when asked if I wanted outdoor seating, I said yes. When we got there, no outdoor seating available and they tried to put us in this VERY CRAMPED seating area by the outside patio area (not sure how anyone would ever be happy sitting there). We told them that we would wait for outdoor seating, and after scrambling, someone did find us a table outside. Next, the music is so freaking loud I don't know how anyone can talk over it. It is extremely loud inside the restaurant and outside, surprisingly, it's still really loud. I understand they want to give off some kind of a "cool vibe", but really - does it need to be THAT loud??!! They also don't have their liquor license yet, so it's only beer and wine and sadly, the wine list is pretty short. I was hoping it would be a lot more extensive than it is, but it's approximately 20 possible choices (maybe a few more, maybe a few less?). They also don't offer wine flights, which I find surprising since they don't have any hard alcohol choices right now. With regard to service, they were VERY disjointed. We had to have about 3 different people that came to our table to take our order, and we told them we had already placed it. Yes, I guess it's better to have "more" service, but it was kinda wonky to have to keep saying "we already placed our order". Also, it was a busy Friday night and our waitress came over to our table NO LESS than 8 times saying "can I get you anything else"? The first couple times it was nice - after that - I know it's code for "can you please leave" (we had only been there for 45 minutes, so we weren't hogging a table). I get it, they are new and still training people. It was just a huge disappointment. I definitely won't be recommending it and if I decide to go back, it won't be for months. Sad, because it could have been really great (they should have waited to open till they had their liquor license and trained their staff...

Wow. Impressive place! I don't know if I would have ever driven down to One Paseo just to try Postino but after this week, this is definitely going onto my recommendation list when friends ask me where to go in North County (is Del Mar still considered North County? lol I'm from Oceanside - the true North).

Staff treated us incredibly well. We had a center booth inside where we could see a snapshot of every part of the restaurant. I know a lot of people prefer the patio and next time we'll be definitely out there...but anywhere at Postino catches the vibe. We came at 4pm on a Friday and it wasn't too busy. By the time we left, it was PACKED and the biggest scene at One Paseo by far.

Of course, we went well beyond the complimentary board and wine and ordered a pitcher of the Japanese Lager, the Nine Iron Panini, the Crispy Cauliflower, the Blackberry Smach and another several glasses of the $6 happy hour wine (before 5pm).

For the board, we all had different favorites. I thought the Salmon & Pesto and French Onion Soup were the best. My daughter loved the Burrata & Bacon and my wife loved the French Onion too!

The Cauliflower was bomb...wow. That romesco sauce is fire and I need to make this at home! The Panini was good but the bread was a bit too hard to finish the whole thing. Still tasted great. Overall, we ingested a LOT of carbs so get your work-outs in before splurging lol.

We also tried the Donut Dots for dessert. Spectacular, dense and super tasty with the three sauces they came with.

One note: are there bathrooms inside the restaurant? No idea. We knew One Paseo has plenty of restrooms scattered around so that was fine (but would still like to know!).

Can't wait...

Where do I begin?

Last night, my husband, son, and I went to the new restaurant in our neighborhood. We waited about 10 minutes for the host to seat us because he wasn't at his station. When he finally showed up, he asked if we wanted to sit inside or outside, and I chose inside.

Our waiter was lovely, but we had to wait a while for our food. Just moments before it arrived, my family and were having a nice conversation and we were laughing and happy just to be interrupted by the host and manager they both came to our table with an unpleasant attitude, saying we had to move outside immediately because dogs aren’t allowed inside.. ok I understand the policy, but why wait until we were seated, had ordered, and our food was about to arrive to inform us? It was unprofessional. I explained that I didn't try to sneak the dog in and assumed dogs were allowed since the host didn’t say anything. Honest mistake.

The attitude from both the host and especially the manager was completely inappropriate, made me feel as I broke a low and have to integrated by those two. Absurd! On top of paying good money for what turned out to be overpriced, flavorless food—a piece of toast with hardly any toppings.

We live in One Paseo and were excited about this new restaurant, but I will definitely not be back and won't recommend it to my neighbors. It left me feeling really bad. Restaurant should not make you...