Cellar Door - Santa Cruz, CA

Cellar Door Café at Bonny Doon Vineyard
328 Ingalls St
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
831-425-4518

We were in the mood to try something new for lunch the other day. Since we were on that side of town I suggested The Cellar Door since we'd been told to go there so many times but had never made it. I'm really glad we went.

We had an assortment of small plates. I started with local greens with lemon and almonds. A salad was beautifully presented, well dressed and lovely. My husband started with a plate of pedrón peppers which he said were great, but I had to take his word for that, I can't stand the things!

We also started off with some Boquerones. They were beautifully marinated, not at all over salty. We ended up having to order two more plates of them because our five year old ate them all!!

I finished up with the Crisp Steelhead with local squid, cannellini bean brodo, corn and Sungold tomatoes. This was fantastic. The skin on the trout really was very crispy and tasty. The squid was cooked perfectly so it wasn't chewy and the brodo was drinkably good. I've got a thing about corn in dishes, it tends to taste like a cheap filler to me (I think this comes from school lunches as a kid). This corn was so sweet still so crisp that it added to the dish rather than taking away from it.

I'd like to return to taste more of the menu and try their tasting menus sometime.