If you stroll through downtown La Jolla long enough, you are liable to see an older gentleman motor by in an insanely expensive automobile. (The McLaren shop is, after all, just down the road.) It’s …
October 17, 2024
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Stories by Ambrose Martin
A bespoke suit will make you chick magnet
Mercy Hospital dumped two bags of saline in me
Like many young men in their bachelor days, there was an evening — long ago, but not quite long enough, if you take my meaning — when I found myself stumbling, staggering, lurching, reeling, and …
October 17, 2024
Gonzo Report: Relishing The Mountain Goats’ relatable content at The Belly Up
The Mountain Goats are an intensely personal band. Last year, I had the chance to spend a couple of days in Palm Desert with my wife. We set out in the evening at the end …
November 2, 2023
The Lion’s Share’s Dark Therapy: Ms. Bobyr’s variation on a Boulevardier
Alina Bobyr“Guam is a whiskey desert,” says Joe, the guy next to me at this, his favorite bar in San Diego ever since he was first stationed here in 2014. The feel of the place …
October 12, 2023
Gonzo Report: They Might Be Giants’ Flood not quite rained out at Humphreys
“What’s this,” marveled the lady approaching the rest rooms at Humphreys before the show on the evening of April 14, “no line for the women’s rest room? And a line for the men’s?” “It is …
April 27, 2023
I-Que BBQ: flavors that sing “Yabba dabba do, bite and chew”
When I was a younger man, I wrote up the Chevy Chase apartments, situated on the border between La Mesa and Spring Valley, as ideal bachelor digs. Unfancy, freeway close, but more importantly, bumping up …
April 20, 2023
Casa Gabriela looks to lift the Boulevard
When I arrived in La Mesa nearly 25 years ago, the odd, triangular lot at the end of the main drag was occupied by a sleepy restaurant with a sleepy name: Village Garden Restaurant & …
April 2, 2023
Christmas is never not coming
Somewhere well into the wee hours of a Christmas in the not-nearly-distant-enough past, as the adults in my family labored to finish with the wrapping of presents, the curling of ribbon, the printing of tags, …
November 14, 2018
Shrimpquest 2018
For pure evocative force, it’s hard to beat the Germanic. “Shrimp” — taken from schrimpfen, “to contract” — works well in this way: the thing is basically a shrunken lobster. But for culinary loveliness, it’s …
May 16, 2018
Fancy beef joints serve fancy burgers
Last year’s visit to the bar at Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse for a burger confirmed my suspicion that fancy beef joints serve fancy beef, even when it’s ground. So this year I stuck with steakhouses. (I …
September 13, 2017
A slice of Chicago
You don’t “grab a slice,” you order it and then settle in. Check your phone. Read a novella. There is no getting around the time it takes until — as the Regents Pizzeria reheating instructions …
August 9, 2017
San Diego Reader 2017 guide to tacos
Taco means tiny taste of temptation. Satisfaction by a thousand different cuts of meat and veggies. Is it just me, this wacko taco love affair? I don’t think so. Every San Diegan has a secret …
May 17, 2017
Customers order two, four, six at a time
Un Mundo An impressive lineup of hot sauces stands guard along the front window counter of Un Mundo, defending the cheerful interior from the curvy corporate brickwork and congested parking lot outside. The motto here …
May 17, 2017
The sort of meat you’d expect to find at an upper-tier butcher shop
When I’m having folks over for burgers, I like to buy the premade ground-chuck patties at Iowa Meat Farms ($4.99/lb). The pack and portion are perfectly consistent, the price is close to supermarket ground beef, …
September 14, 2016
It’s not news, but it’s love
As a critic, you eat for your readers. It’s not enough to enjoy, say, a burger and tell folks, “It was yummy!” You have to judge the grind, the pack, the cooking, the seasoning, the …
August 3, 2016
Old familiar ways
Forty years in, you start to feel it. Unless you’re a certain sort of hardy soul — I’m looking at you, Ed Bedford — the thought of finding a new place to eat is no …
September 18, 2013
San Diego Reader Feast! Issue – Kearny Mesa Asian lunches, best fried chicken...
San Diego restaurants taste-tested for you. Eats for Freelancers | Spirit of Family Dinnertime | More Than Dish or Deal | Accessible Gourmet | Lunchtime in Kearny Mesa | Fried Chicken | Restaurants to Try At Least Once
October 17, 2012
San Diego's Best Fried Chicken
The background photo on my brother’s iPod shows a plate of fried chicken and waffles from Roscoe’s up in Los Angeles. Before dining there, he had never enjoyed the two foods together, and he was …
October 17, 2012
Burger Time
Half-pound cheeseburger, $6.25 The champion bar burger, certainly for the money. It starts with the beef: fine grind, loose pack, superjuicy, good grill seasoning that keeps you taking bite after bite. A medium rare that …
October 19, 2011
San Diego Reader restaurant issue
It’s Hard to Eat With a Paper Bag Over My Head by Naomi Wise I arrived in San Diego nine years ago, a well-spoiled food snob coming down (pun intended) from San Francisco like the …
June 17, 2009
You Can So Eat Well in San Diego
This is Ambrose Martin. Rich food makes me gassy. Juvenile? Sure. But it’s not like I ever intended it to see print. For the two years that I pounded out pinch-hit restaurant reviews for the …
June 17, 2009