When I travel alone, I tend to sit at the bar. I ...

When I travel alone, I tend to sit at the bar. I do this for lots of reasons, but one of the benefits is that I typically get to peer into part of the food-preparation world. Typically, if you sit at the bar, what you are looking at is... the bar. At Cardero's, when you sit at the bar by the kitchen, you see everything. What makes for a lot of entertainment makes for slightly awkward service (they are peering over you to take your order), but it is worth it.

A Mario Batali-like chef was directing everyone using humor and multiple languages with his busy kitchen team. This is a really efficient group. To have an exposed kitchen is a dangerous and brave thing; this group was clean, did not have any extra movements and got dishes out that appeared well-executed. They were amazing and exhausting to watch.

To start, I ordered the spinach salad with goat cheese, beets and a peppery flavor was good, if not good intense in some bites. Next, I thought about ordering the mussels, but ordered the linguine (with seafood). Linguine was exactly what I wanted to eat. It had a nice buttery sauce and the linguine was cooked perfectly. Their wine pours are also long, which is really nice.

I have come to Cardero's often because of its close proximity to the Westin and it has always been a good decision.