Chefs from Michelin-Star Kitchens Reshape Oceanside's Restaurant Scene

Eater

31-07-2025

When chefs from top Michelin-star kitchens break away to start their own ventures, curious eyes often follow them. They bring talent to new towns or cities and deliver the potential to transform a scene with the fine dining skills they pick up. In the past few years, several chefs from celebrated restaurants have departed the places where they cut their teeth and opened restaurants in the north San Diego County city of Oceanside, California.
When Michelin's California guide was first released in 2019, only upscale tasting menu restaurant Addison earned a star. Since then, three other restaurants, including Soichi, Jeune et Jolie, and new tasting menu specialist Lilo, have earned stars in San Diego; Addison acquired its third star, and dozens of more casual restaurants have earned Michelin Bib Gourmands. Animae chef Tara Monsod has been a finalist for the James Beard Award for Best Chef: California for two years in a row. Oceanside earned its first Michelin star in 2023 with modern Mexican restaurant Valle from chef Roberto Alcocer, placing the city on Southern California's dining map, but that was just the first step. The city is becoming an impressive culinary destination, thanks to its distinct terroir and laid-back surf culture, an ideal blend perfect for chefs who are tired of the big-city grind.
Oceanside transplants include Nic Webber and Jacob Jordan, a duo who met at San Diego's Addison, and Brandon Rodgers, previously the chef de cuisine at three-Michelin-starred Benu and alum of the French Laundry. Alcocer, who first gained attention for his Valle de Guadalupe restaurant, Malva, says that Michelin's arrival in California in 2019 was like a door opening. 'It was the perfect moment to chase a dream I had carried for years — to build a restaurant in the U.S. that could one day earn a Michelin star,' says Alcocer. After the owners of the Mission Pacific Beach Resort dined at Malva, they offered Alcocer a consulting role for the property's restaurant. Alcocer countered with a different offer; he wanted to lead the new kitchen as executive chef.
Cangrejo, a crab, mushroom, and radish topped tostada. Valle
A piece of seared fish. Audrey Ma
Chef Roberto Alcocer chats with diners at palm tree-lined Valle. Valle
Related The Best Restaurants in Valle de Guadalupe
South of Mission Avenue, Oceanside's main thoroughfare, at Michelin Bib Gourmand Dija Mara, chef Jason Ambacher serves stylish Balinese preparations like pork belly skewers and a short rib rendang. William Eick's Matsu, a modern Japanese tasting menu spot, offers a 10-course dinner with ingredients sourced from nearby farms and waters, reflecting Oceanside's hyper-seasonality. According to Canvas Rebel Magazine, Eick has cooked 'just about every' cuisine besides African and Indian. He started small with a pop-up, serving just one table per night, three nights a week, honing his craft. Matsu has since grown into a 48-seat restaurant with inventive dishes, like one that comprises every part of the sunflower paired with cuttlefish and chile oil, or oak-grilled sablefish that puffs out like an edible pine cone.
The iconic sunflower and cuttlefish dish. Matsu
An inventive sweet potato and lobster chowder that doesn't use cream or butter. Deanna Sandoval
Beyond fancy places like Valle, Mission Pacific Beach Resort also serves nostalgia and nerdy surf culture. An 1887 Oceanside home featured in an iconic Top Gun scene has been relocated to the front of the hotel, where it serves hand pies stuffed with apples, cherries, or blueberries.
Downtown Oceanside's other incredible dishes, all within a few square blocks of one another, include Craft Coast Beer & Tacos' fresh, flame-grilled carne asada, homemade tortillas, and hazy IPAs; Camp Coffee's strong brews; Allmine's pizzas and lasagna Bolognese; and Colima's oversized California burritos. Thursday evenings bring the Sunset Market, where hundreds of vendors cram into a few blocks, including 7 Siblings serving fried tamales with hot sauce, and Ula Loves Sweet Treats, which sells a showstopping fluffy banana creme.
South Oceanside, just three miles from the pier, is also quickly becoming a food destination. When Rodgers opened Tanner's Prime Burgers in 2023, he wanted to bring three-star fastidiousness that he gained at Benu and the French Laundry to unfussy American food. Tanner's simple menu serves fries crisped in beef fat; smashed prime beef patties topped with American cheese and caramelized onions on a brioche bun; and milkshakes made with organic dairy. The menu also features hot dogs, sweet tea, lemonade, a few house-made sauces, and Fatty Patties, which blend vanilla ice cream and beef tallow between chocolate chip cookies. There's an underlying complexity to Tanner's menu that doesn't need to shout its quality.
These ice cream sandwiches have a secret ingredient: beef tallow. Tanner's Prime Burgers
The simple, chic diner decor reflects the menu. Tanner's Prime Burgers
A thinly smashed beef patty covered in cheese, bacon, and caramelized onions. Tanner's Prime Burgers
Just across the street from the burger joint is Heritage Brewery & Barbecue, where their smoked brisket, tri-tip, and pulled pork star in entrees like mac and cheese, sandwiches, and tacos (it's no longer affiliated with James Beard Award finalist chef Daniel Castillo's Heritage Barbecue in San Juan Capistrano). Also in South Oceanside, Davin Waite's Wrench & Rodent Seabasstropub focuses on minimizing waste and employing sustainable fishing practices. First opened in 2013, Wrench & Rodent plays with sushi traditions as much as it messes with language. The team dry-ages fish to deepen flavor, serving untraditional items like anchovy nigiri, and impressing guests with plant-based 'Rodent' rolls, a name Waite chose for its lightheartedness and irreverence.
While South Oceanside is still close enough to downtown and sits along the Pacific, other chefs are stretching Oceanside's culinary focus inland. In a strip mall a few miles from the coast, a temporary banner hangs by four strings that reads '24 Suns.' The former dive bar was home to a pop-up from fall 2021 until the restaurant permanently opened in January 2025. The modern Chinese restaurant comes from Addison alums Webber and Jordan, a culinary journey guided by the 24 solar micro-seasons that dictate China's agricultural traditions and Oceanside's seasonal ingredients. Short seasons and kitchen inventiveness yield dishes like shrimp Robuchon, a spring-roll-wrapped head-on prawn dabbed with hot mustard, pickled goji berries, and Thai basil leaf. Other dishes include fall-apart wagyu cheek and a tender but toothsome 17-foot longevity noodle, orange sweetbreads, and many takes on duck. Sichuan-style Zhangcha duck is smoked over jasmine tea leaves and wood, aged for a few days, and then basted with cold-smoked butter. Their Fujian duck is slowly simmered with aged ginger, braised in ginger juice, fried until crisp, and finished with fermented ginger honey.
Orange sweetbreads are a homage to the classic Chinese takeout dish. Deanna Sandoval
24 Suns is known for inventive duck courses. Deanna Sandoval
Chef Nic Webber sends out dishes from the 24 Suns kitchen. Nashelle Brown
A bird's nest filled with ribeye tartare and grated bottarga. Deanna Sandoval
As summer warms Oceanside, its chefs seem even more alight with creative energy. 'We are excited about the gentler spring onions — creating a kind of kung pao tartare,' says Webber, dreaming up the stuffing for 'a slowly burnt leek.' In a few moons — supposedly by the end of the summer — expect 24 Suns to roll out a tasting menu serving things like shrimp and scallop dumplings paired with asparagus, snap and sugar peas, and grilled mackerel with a homemade XO-green-garlic sauce. The tasting menu dishes showcase refreshing, lactic, and intense preparations that have always been the spirit of Oceanside — buttoned-up yet not too serious.
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