Dining Review: Vue

Resort life is all about enjoying a luxury-heightened level of comfort at all times. This extends beyond abundant thread counts, domestic tech, and other in-room amenities to a property’s spa, recreational facilities, and restaurants.

Realizing this, Omni La Costa Resort & Spa’s management initiated a sweeping, multi-year remodel that has updated and upgraded nearly every aspect of the nearly half-century-old Carlsbad resort. The revamp will come to a close this summer, but its impact on Omni’s indoor-outdoor eatery, Vue, can be felt right now.

Vue — pronounced view — provides just that, care of a sizable outdoor patio looking out onto Omni’s championship golf courses, as well as a putting green where youngsters can be seen fine-tuning their short game. There is also a soft-toned, modernly appointed dining room, but when the weather is amenable to al fresco dining (i.e., most days in sunny San Diego), the kid- and dog-friendly patio is the place to be.

In addition to the aforementioned greens glimpses, patio diners can feast their eyes on a bountiful garden of verdant herbs and other produce, all of which are utilized by the kitchen as well as Vue’s bar staff. The latter break their cocktail offerings into three categories — “mainstays,” “out of the box,” and “riffs.” Nomenclature aside, the majority are classic drinks made unique through the use of interesting ingredients and house-made mixers, including drams and syrups. Case in point: a whisky sour lent depth of flavor by elderberry liqueur, agave syrup, and citrus fruit grown on-property, and a margarita cut with mezcal and rice syrup, then served in a glass rimmed with a mixture of salt and togorashi (Japanese chili-pepper blend).

An ample wine list comprised mostly of familiar, accessible labels is also available along with an assortment of mostly local ales and lagers. That includes Destination Paradise, a blonde ale produced exclusively for Omni La Costa by award-winning Carlsbad craft brewery Burgeon Beer Co.

Vue’s food menu is similarly broken into distinct sections, allowing for increased variety capable of pleasing different individual tastes and situational dining preferences. Main courses in the “features” section include comfort food ranging from tender braised short ribs with fresh house-made tortillas and shrimp scampi with cheesy bread to select-your-protein (chicken, shrimp, beef tenderloin, or tofu) coconut curry and kung pao, a horseradish-spiked trip-tip sandwich, and an applewood-smoked bacon cheeseburger.

Sustainably sourced seafood and seasonal produce overlap with culinary innovation in the “fresh catch” portion of the bill of fare. The miso glaze adorning succulent, flake-apart sea bass is downright caramely and perfectly offset by a finessed take on a Thai green papaya salad. The sweetness of plump sea scallops matches that of puréed sweet corn running through an accompanying farro risotto.

The kitchen’s deft work with sea fare also applies to sushi starters, some of which, like the uchicha (spicy tuna with tempura shrimp and aged soy sauce) and uzumaki (a salmon-fortified California roll with jalapeño) are on the everyday menu. But one-offs like the staff-favorite surf-and-turf roll — shrimp, tri-tip, and fried threads of celeriac, emboldened by a ponzu made creamy with the addition of rendered beef fat — pop up from time to time. (Note: If it’s not on the day’s menu, there’s nothing wrong with asking about it.)

From sushi to culturally nuanced seafood dishes and heightened takes on hearty everyday entrées, there’s a little something for everyone at Vue. There’s something to be said for that, considering how frequently resorts apply five-star gourmet sets of blinders when planning their on-site culinary programs. Having a wider breadth of offerings helps to extend the comfort at the heart of the resort model into the dining room. And you really can’t beat that view.

Service: 4
Timeliness: 4
Ambience: 3.5
Culinary Innovation: 4
Food Quality: 4.5
Cocktail Program: 4.5
Wine List: 4
Beer List: 4.5
Value: 3.5