Market (Part 2) - Del Mar, USA

When we visited Market earlier this year, we had a great experience that you can read about here. However, the restaurant’s founder and original chef Carl Schroeder recently sold his business after a strong 19 years. Although original chef de cuisine John Thompson and his team are staying on board, we had to pay a visit to see what has changed and what is staying the same.

Although our previous visit was great, we were purely curious about the potential change, since there was some buzz about Chef Schroeder selling the business he had built from the ground up for nearly two decades. Although a lot had remained the same, there were some noteworthy changes which we discovered.

Dinner here at Market is a pre-fixe three-course menu which primarily features seasonal options, as well as familiar year-round dishes but with seasonally-influenced preparations. There is quite a variety of options to choose from for each course, so any palate is sure to be satisfied.

Like last time, the meal began with some fresh bread sent out from the kitchen, as well as a little amuse bouche. The bread selection remained consistent, featuring a couple slices of sourdough, and a couple small cornbread muffins. Different was the amuse bouche, which this time featured chopped tuna sashimi between thin, crisp chips, topped with a small dollop of cream and golden caviar. These bites were fresh, clean, and delicious, and were a very pleasant intro to the meal.

The rest of the meal, for the most part, was solid and well-prepared just as it had been the last time. Our starters were the Creamy Porcini Mushroom Soup and the Alderwood Smoked Salmon & Kilo Caviar. For the mains entrees, we tried the Hook & Line Caught Swordfish as well as the Grilled Beef Tenderloin. Although each of these dishes were good, I would say the mushroom soup stood out. Especially as the weather was starting to cool as we were entering the fall season, the rich creamy umami flavor of that soup really hit the spot. The smoked salmon, however, was a bit lackluster. Not to say it was bad, it was just not at the level of the other dishes. Also, in general, compared to our previous visit, it felt like the presentation had been toned down a bit, not in a sense of being sloppy, just less effort.

For dessert, the same could be said as the rest of the meal. The options that we tried were a seasonal apple dessert, which had green apple sorbet and salted caramel semifreddo, and a menu staple, Chocolate, which featured bittersweet chocolate mousse cake and Baileys ice cream. Both desserts were good, but definitely fell short of their predecessors in overall execution.

Something that was a bit of a bummer during this visit was that we were not able to add another entree to our meal. In the past, we were able to add an additional entree (for a fee), which let us experience a broader sampling of the menu, not to mention, taste a dish that we ended up enjoying very much. This time, however, our server was adamant about that not being an option, saying that only a set amount of ingredients were prepared each night, for a strictly three-course meal.

In general, I would still say the meal was enjoyable. However, if this had been our first visit to Market, we might have been reluctant to give it another try. As mentioned, the food itself was good, but the presentation and just the overall experience was not what it has been in the past. We will chalk this one up to the flux of the ownership transition, but hopefully this meal was not an indicator of Market’s new direction. We know what this restaurant and kitchen are capable of, and we hope to see that talent carried forward and developed into its full potential!