Rosarito, Baja Mexico
We travel to Baja bout 3 times a year, we love the food, the culture, the beautiful coast and were pretty upset when a trip in November 2018 was cancelled due to the potential border closure, and it did happen. This was the first time we had a chance to get south of the border since then. We stayed at an AirBnB in Las Gaviotas, the same development we have stayed at consistently for the last 5 years. We’ve stayed other places, but due to the changes in the safety we choose to stay at a gated, guarded community that we were familiar with. It gives us access to the Rosarita area and areas further south after having passed the crazy Tijuana traffic. We usually opt to go home through the Otay Mesa border crossing to avoid TJ on the way out. These are our favorites when there.
Rosarito, Tacos El Yaqui - Walk up window to order wood grilled carne asada tacos on flour tortillas with cheese (quesadillas) with beans (I opt for no beans), salsa, cilantro, onions, and guacamole. 2 tacos and a pepsi $7 US and the fact that it’s on a flour tortilla with grilled with cheese is such a refreshing change from the standard corn + carne, which is of course delicious, but this is sooo much better. Do yourself a favor and try it.
Ollie’s Pizza - I know that this isn’t street food, but this is the best thin crust pizza, which is my preference even though I was raised on Sicilian style thick crust rectangular pizza. They serve it with so many condiments on the table, our favorite is the Mike’s Hot Honey that complements the gorgonzola with caramelized onion pizza so perfectly. The roasted baby veggies ( on the weekends) have a touch of pesto, and is ideal with fresh salads and a bottle of local wine. Dinner for 3 $ 80 US, that was 3 appetizers, a salad, 2 pizzas, and a bottle of wine. The 3 of us loved the honey so much we’ve all either ordered it from Amazon, or purchased it at Ralph’s.
Beautiful Baja Sunset
Whole fried fish at Popotla fishing village, Mariscos La Tia
Lobster Puerto Nuevo Style meaning halved and fried - Comparing 3 restaurants. (We’ll keep adding to it.)
1: Ortega’s II Lobster, rice, beans and hot flour tortillas and comes with soup or salad and a free margarita with each meal $29 US each. Lobster was overdone (5 of the 6 halves) and therefore stringy and hard to remove from the shell losing some in the process which was disappointing. Rice, beans and tortillas were superior.
2: Ortega’s Patio Lobster, rice, beans and hot flour tortillas $21 US each. The lobster was done perfectly, rice, beans and tortillas were good, but Ortega’s II were better. We all agreed, better lobster is better, so we would definitely come back here. They also had a choice of small $21, medium $40, and large $60 and I would estimate that the large was > 3#. July 2019
August 2019 great lunch and service.
September 2019 great dinner and service medium size lobster with a salad and margarita/beer/lemonade $35 US
3: Ortega’s Lobster, rice, beans and hot flour tortillas $27 US each. Lobster was slightly over done, rice, beans and tortillas were great. The line here is always long probably because it’s the first restaurant as you enter the village but the service is always fast. This is always consistent and you have the option of having the lobster steamed vs fried (I’ve had it steamed), others may prepare it steamed, but I haven’t seen it offered on any other menu.
Splash This restaurant was featured in a blog that Susan and I follow and we saw a dish we had to try. It was a crab stuffed, bacon wrapped shrimp, so both of us ordered it, one with rice and beans, the other with salad and fresh veggies. Mine came with soup in addition to the rice and beans and it was a bland, thin Tortilla Soup, I didn’t finish it. As for the main course, we both came to the same conclusion, as amazing as it sounded, it was way too salty and hard from deep frying it and wouldn’t order it again. Jake on the other hand got the Salmon with lemon butter and capers and it was huge and delicious. His dish was by far the best and the only one that was finished, If we ever went back, that is what we would order again. July 2019.
The Bleu Galley Cafe - Across the street from La Gaviotas has delicious breakfast and lunch choices. This was my Omelette ‘Al Gusto’ (how you like it) with ham, bacon, cheese and tomatoes served with roasted vegetables on a cilantro pesto. While you wait they serve you house made biscuits with fresh fruit jam and butter. It’s a small but very efficient open kitchen where the staff works together to prepare your meals as you watch. The Croque Monsieur is very rich, the Shepherds Pie is definitely a do over and I can’t wait to try the Quiche Lorraine. July 2019
We always over pack when it comes to food, we made this with leftovers from appetizers. Sauteed spinach, brie and prosciutto stuffed chicken breast, and tomato and cucumber salad.
Pasta Y Basta - This was a great find, not just a pizza place. We had arugula with apple salad, mini ravioli with chicken broth soup, and a antipasto board with fresh bread for starters and this was after a complimentary cauliflower soup and super light warm bread with olive oil and balsamic. Our entrees, were lemon caper salmon, fettuccini carbonara and a principessa pizza with prosciutto, burrata and arrugala. We tend to go back to the same places hat we love and decided this weekend would be a ‘new’ time to explore.