On The Alley — Restaurant in Ventura

I had been craving fish tacos when I was vacationing on the Central Coast. I was happy to see it on the menu here at On the Alley, where the menu for their other restaurant, Brophy Bros above, didn’t have it.

I ordered one baja fish taco and one fried avocado taco. Both were delicious! There was a thin layer of breading on the avocado, which gave it a nice crunch that contrasted well with its creamy texture. The fish taco, which also came with avocado slices, was perfectly fried as well. A little hot sauce on both and it was a very satisfying lunch.

What really impressed me were the tortillas! They looked and tasted homemade. They were thicker than the store bought ones and had a good bite to it.

Seating can be difficult during the lunch rush because you have to find what’s available. But luckily our party of 9 was able to move tables together.

Service was really good! You order at the counter and find a table afterwards. But during the end of our meal, someone (perhaps the GM or the owner), came to our table to ask how we were doing. I don’t usually encounter that at fast dining places, so that was really nice!

I will definitely come back here...

So many things I like here and then there are a few disappointments. Positives: there are many items on the menu that are awesome, like salmon salad, fish sandwich, their soups and more. The view is absolutely the best! The vast majority of the employees are delightful and hard working. Negatives: I often have to clean my own table after finding an empty one, but most annoying to me is the plastic utensils. I'm paying top dollar for food and I'm eating from a bendy plastic fork. I would really appreciate eating my $20 salad from a metal utensil. Not to mention that all those plastic utensils get thrown away and go into our landfill adding more plastic to our environment. It's a casual, low key environment with few frills which is totally fine, but could definitely use...

I was having a rough day, and was stranded in Ventura waiting for a tow and decided to grab a quick bite. The kitchen was unfortunately understaffed resulting in long wait times for food and there were several unhappy customers, but the manager worked hard to make everything right with everyone. I had to leave because my tow truck was arriving, and I asked to cancel the order. It had just been completed so the manager gave me the shrimp tacos to go and comped the order. I didn’t want to eat them in the tow truck so I waited until I got home and by then they were cold but they were still DELICIOUS. Excellent food and a staff that works hard even when they’re short staffed. Just wanted to share my...