I will be in San Diego thursday April 1st-Sunday the 5th. I am looking for a couple recommendations for lunch and dinner spots. I see the recommendations for Thee Bungalow, but not a whole lot else.

Would anyone else care to make some recommendations. I would like a BYO friendly place for a dinner.

Here are a few.

North County tryVincent's Sirinos

La Jolla tryCuvee

Rancho Bernardo (Best service and best brunch but $25 corkage) El Bizcocho

Downtown tryLaurel

I think you have been to The Winesellar and Brasserie before haven't you?

PM if you want more info.

Dale

We didn't go to any BYOs, but would recommend Wineseller and Brasserie and Rainwater's, in addition to Thee Bungalow.

Lunch

Go to the Sea Port Village Busters in the marina is good.

For Hotel food, go to the Sheraton by the airport - eat on the patio.

Very casual - Chula Vista, Bob in the Marina. Good in & out. Not much for wine

Old San Diego. On main drag "San Diego Ave". On the righ t there is a hamburger resturant. Its across fromall the mexican resturants. Best burger & coldest beer in town.

My first year of college before I went back to Santa Barbara I did a summer stint and waited tables at Rainwater's. The first time I ever saw the most elegantly dressed women gnaw on a 2" thick bone-in chop (dirty minds get out of the gutter!).

If you want a steak, Rainwater's is the place. And if I recall, the3y had a pretty big wine list too.

My recollection of Rainwater's wine list was that it was strong in Pinot Noir.

I was perusing the wine list at Wineseller & Brasserie The selection and pricing seem very good. This will be hard to pick something, what recommendations do you all have?

Seek, you have the great opportunity to pick a wine that you'd consider buying. If you enjoy the wine at dinner and are so inclined, you can purchase it at retail prices in the store downstairs.

My wife and I ended up dining at Laurels. This is a very good resturaunt, not excellent. Wine list is fairer than most with a very good selection from all around the world. My wife's first course seemed to have some mistakes in the Kitchen, and when our server asked how things were we politely mentioned the small issues, they ended up crediting the dish on our bill. Other than the one dish our experience there was 3.5 stars on a 5 star rating.

I assume you mean Laurel here, which is downtown near the airport. If so this is the sister restaurant to Winesellar and Brasserie and they can piggyback onto the wines that Winesellar has in stock. I think there is a small retail shop in the restaurant but nothing like at the Winesellar.

Yes skwid it was Laurel the sister resturaunt to the wineseller and Brasserie. They had a very small retail section by the front door, but nothing impressive.

We were going to go to the Winseller and Brasserie, but instead decided to stay closer to downtown and go to Laurel.

I have reservations at Laurel for next Saturday, mountainwoman's 40th...hopefully the '64 Leoville LC magnum will still be alive.

I have my fingers crossed for you, mm, but I think you should have a backup ready. Good luck.

Putting my trust in the magnum format but they do have a nice winelist to back me up. If I don't like my wine will they refund the corkage?

If you dump it and buy from them, they should.

Any updates to this? Am in Del Mar 1/18-1/21 and looking for places to eat dinner that byow. 15-20 minute drive is fine.

Given the resounding number of replies, I figured I'd post what I've seen so far.

Indigo Grill (India Street off of Beech) Like the atmosphere, drinks were astronomically expensive - $10 for a mohito that more soda than rum. Ceviche appetizer (salmon) was o.k., but not overly impressive. I ordered a flat iron steak that was again o.k., but not impressive. Friend ordered a rack of lamb with a blueberry glaze. Tried a couple bites and it was very good, which I found surprising. Overall, not a bad restaurant, but not somewhere I'm in a hurry to go back to.

Arterra (Marriott Del Mar) I've made it a habit of avoiding hotel restaurants like the plague, with the Heathman in Portland and Tulio's in Seattle as my two exceptions. Combine me being tired, me being lazy and a need for more Marriott miles for an upcoming vacation and it's table for one at Arterra. Main course had 3 skillet-seared scallops on mini potato pancakes, topped with duck confit. Sauce appeared to be a light terriyaki, with a pile of button mushrooms in the middle. It was delicious. Given my budget, I didn't order a bottle of wine, but did look over the list because I'm saddistic like that. Quite a few syrahs and a decent selction of pinots including multiple Ojai labels (clos pepe is the one I recall off hand). Had several different Kistler offerings (Kistler Vineyard pinot and chard and a couple others) running about 3-4x mark-up. I would go back again with friends.

Depending on where I land tomorrow, I'll update.

BluePoint (5th and Market in San Diego) - Excellent martinis, served in half-size glasses with the remainder kept on the table in an ice bucket. Had 2 mojitinis, which I really enjoyed. Food was good, but not spectacular. I thought it was a tad on the pricey side and we went to BluePoint thinking they'd have a ton of oysters. There was one appetizer ($13) that served 3 sets of 2 oysters (we orderered, was very fresh and yummy), but that was it. Manhattan clam chowder ($8) was great, but a little short on clams. I ordered a whole deep friend striped bass ($26), which tasted o.k., but my friend's Grilled Ahi ($27) looked a lot better.

Wine list? Yeah, that's why I got the mojitinis. Cellar selections were primarily Silver Oak ($400 for 1994, I believe) and Jordan (90, 91, etc. in the $200 range) and Opus ($375 for 1997). They did have quite a selection of Shafer reserves and Lokoya, but again, the pricing was ridiculous.

Overall take on the place? If someone else was paying, I'd go back, otherwise I'd wander around and find something else downtown.

Please comment on my choice of restaurants.
Based on what I read here, Squires and Zagat, I plan on going to:

The Bungalow
Fleming's (sponsored drug dinner)
Wine Sellar and Brasserie
Laurel

Also up for consideration are Tapenade and Pamplemousse, but unless someone sways me I will probably stick with the above agenda.

Also any wine shops worth going out of my way for?

Zeke, hit Thee Bungalow the first night. You may find you like it so much you'll cancel a different reservation to go back. We did.

Wine Seller and Brasserie is worth the drive. If you like the wine you have with dinner, you can buy it on your way out in the retail store downstairs.

Rainwater on Kendrick would be on my go-to list.