Addison (*) San Diego – April 2025

A buddy and I decided to take a few days off to visit San Diego. Having dined at a few names on our respective restaurant lists in NYC and Chicago, we finally decided to make the journey to try some restaurants in California for the first time. Addison has been on my to dos for a while so it became the first big name on the roster. From here, I traveled to SF and dined at SingleThread in Healdsburg and Saison in SF (will add those in the coming days).

The Space:

Addison is located at the Fairmont Hotel in Del Mar, about a half hour drive from downtown San Diego. The restaurant stands in a building of its own at the end of the sprawling hotel that also has a golf course. The property itself is beautiful and while my friend and I have been fortunate to be able to dine at a few *** at this point, this might’ve been the first time I flashed a look to him thinking “this is going to be fancy as hell”. This feeling dispersed somewhat as the meal commenced but the evening at Addison felt like the most white-table-cloth-ey meal I’ve ever had.

I think we got lucky with our table and were seated at what I considered to be prime real estate, right by the fireplace (pic #2).  The dining room is dimly lit and beautifully adorned but imposing. Everything here feels large, perhaps not unreasonably so, but large nonetheless – the dining room itself, the bar, the tables, the distance between the tables, the distance between the diners at any given table. The size of the dining room made it feel like there was a constant eerie silence around me throughout the night. However, the food helped quell some of these impressions.

The Food:

Addison serves a tasting menu for $385 showcasing local ingredients with the cuisine influenced by Mexican and East Asian flavors. The menu features an extremely strong middle act – the main seasonal selections or entrees – bookended by just good, if not underwhelming, initial bites and desserts.

The small bites, which I’ve often found to be incredibly impressive at the higher starred restaurants, offered a nice tease but were nothing to write home about. The mains included some absolute worldies, beginning with the egg and rice dish all through the main meat dishes – each one an exhibition in impeccable mastery of ingredients, technique and flavors. For me, some of these dishes were the strongest collection of savory entrees I’ve had. The desserts, on the other hand, felt like an abrupt drop off from the mains. The desserts, much like my experience with desserts at many fine dining restaurants, felt like an afterthought. It wasn’t so much that flavors were lacking. They were all perfectly nice on their own. They just weren't…memorable. After a string of stellar main dishes, it was just disappointing to end the meal on a relatively flat note.

The other thing about Addison’s menu that left us a little frustrated was the add on options, or in this case, their substitution. They offer two supplements to choose when you sit down at your table, one an A5 Wagyu course and the other, a Caviar service by the Chef. We didn’t even bother enquiring about the price of the Caviar service, but I imagine it was just as expensive, if not more, than the Wagyu course priced at $195 (more than half the price of the tasting menu). We went into this knowing the Wagyu would cost a pretty penny. What we didn’t know, and what I think the staff at Addison could have better explained, is that the course is a substitution and not a replacement, i.e., for the person choosing it, the Wagyu replaces the final savory entrée on the menu. So those considering going with this option during the visit, know that you are not adding a course to the menu, you are replacing one for the price of $195.  

Despite the gripes above, some of the dishes at Addison are truly world class. I’ve described my favorites below:

1) Shellfish Chawanmushi, broccoli, bok choy and celtuce – This was not the best chawanmushi dish I’ve had at a restaurant but I did appreciate the balance in this dish. It was a perfect example of a dish being greater than the sum of its parts. The custard on its own was nothing overly impressive. But a spoon driven deep into the bowl with all the different components made for a beautiful bite with the sweetness of the sea urchin balancing the savory saltiness of the custard nicely.

2) Regiis Ova Caviar, Koshikari Rice, Smoked Sabayon, Sesame – the restaurant’s signature and for good reason. An example of varying temperatures and textures, this dish was an absolute delight. An all-time great dish. Cold briny caviar, warm smoked sabayon and hot perfectly cooked rice with crispy bits on top. I still dream about this one. Perfection.

3) Splendid Alfonsino, flavors of spring, crab consommé – a constant theme of Addison’s main entrees is balance. Like the two that preceded this, a dish with perfect balance where each ingredient elevates the other. The fish, with soft meat but crisped up skin is perfectly complemented by the spring veggies. And that consommé with an intensely deep and comforting crab flavor, was a warm hug that rounded out each bite.

4) Crispy horse mackerel, green garden, clam butter – another stellar entrée featuring my favorite fish. Mackerel with the perfect tempura like texture that did not feel greasy in the slightest accompanied by two very different sauces – one more herbal and vegetal, the other intensely rich of clams, but both working perfectly well with the fried fish. A little dollop of lemon on the side of the plate adds some fresh acidity to each bite.

5) Quail egg drop soup and Cantonese quail – two dishes highlighting quail as the main entrée if one chooses to do away with the Wagyu substitution. While we were glad to try the Wagyu, I would have been more than happy for this quail dish to be the final entrée. It was quite comfortably the best poultry dish I’ve had on a tasting menu. It featured a piece of quail breast, loin and the leg, each spiced to perfection and accompanied by the deeply satisfying and flavorful jus and perfectly cooked vegetables. I had to switch plates midway so that my friend could try some of this too. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little disappointed to give my plate away.

7) A5 Wagyu – yes, this was an expensive course. Yes, I felt disappointed when we found out it was a substitution and not a supplement. But God, this was good. Served with a sweet and salty dipping sauce, I can simply describe this as the most intense piece of meat candy I’ve ever had. Easily the best rendition of Wagyu I’ve ever had as well. Was it worth the $195 surcharge? Debatable. We were glad we got the chance to try but we were both in agreement that we probably wouldn’t get this if we return, especially because the quail was such a showstopper on its own.

Pairings:

I usually like to do a wine pairing with a tasting menu. Addison offers three pairing options – a $385, a ~$700 and a choose your own battle pairing, which is more of a freestyle option selected based on the interests of the diner as long as the pairing is at least $1,250. I opted for wines by the glass instead because Addison’s wine pricing is insane. It has, by far, the highest markup I’ve seen to date in the US, which I reckon is roughly twice that at other similarly starred restaurants. That said, their by the glass offerings also contain a lot of the wines that feature on the pairing so choosing individual glasses will no doubt be more economical and also contain more generous pours. I did not linger too deep into the wine list so I can’t say much about bottles but when pricing by the glass is so high, buying bottles is always the better option especially if in a group of wine drinkers.

Putting aside the pricing, I will say that the Somm at Addison was approachable, polished and did a really nice job explaining the wines to me. When I selected a couple of individual glasses, she also coursed them out really well along with the food, creating a pseudo-pairing of sorts for me, which I really appreciated.

Service:

Extremely professional and polished service here, very much like what we experienced at Le Bernardin in NYC. I’d say the hospitality here feels relatively warmer, with one of our hosts asking us about our past experiences and planned travel that felt a little more personal. The service with the food is well choregraphed, with servers moving in unison ensuring that they touch the plate down on the table at the same time. Each person who explained the dish did it as though they were up on a stage performing a monologue on cooking techniques and ingredients. It is clear that the staff here take their work extremely seriously, as they should when operating at this level. Having dined at other places where the service is a lot more laid back and geared towards making one feel at home, I wouldn’t say that the general service demeanor at Addison is my preference, but I still felt very well taken care of regardless. The one nit I do have is wanting a little more clarity when explaining the supplement/substitution courses as such.

Summary:

Overall, my experience at Addison was very enjoyable for the most part. It was a mixture of slightly underwhelming lows of initial bites and desserts, incredibly high highs of the main entrees, shock and awe at the wine prices, and relative frustration that I did not get a whole course of quail because I had to split what I thought was a supplement of Wagyu with my friend. But in the end, I walked away more with the memories of the impressive mains than the other nits.

If wine is your preferred beverage, be ready to spend top dollar, more so than at other ***s, unless you decide to do bottles, which may well be more reasonably priced. They do offer cocktails and spirits so at least there is an outside option in case wine is not your thing (looking at you, Alinea).

Would I return? Yes, but not before I try other places on the West Coast. I don’t find myself feeling the itch to return as soon as I can. (I did end up having that feeling three nights later at SingleThread). If I returned, would I get the add ons/substitutions? Nope.