Today, we’re going for a fine dining lunch at the signature restaurant of the Lodge at Torrey Pines in La Jolla California.

The Lodge at Torrey Pines golf resort is 15 miles or 20 minutes north of the San Diego International Airport.

The Lodge at Torrey Pines is a four-star beachside resort known for its world class golf course.

While playing one of the finest golf courses, over one of the finest beaches, naturally you’ll need some fine dining. Now, there is a casual grill by the clubhouse, but why settle?

So instead, we are going to resort’s signature restaurant A.R. Valentien, named after an early 20^th century artist.

A.R. Valentien is one of only three restaurants in the san diego region to earn a Forbes accolade. While it doesn’t have a prestigious four or five star rating, it does have a Forbes “recommended” endorsement.

A.R. Valentien also has a AAA four diamond rating, which does count  for something, but I do hold Forbes accolades in higher esteem.

You can catch a glimpse of the chef’s creations on the website’s menu. I’ll link to it in the description.  I couldn’t help but to notice that there were linens on the patio tables in the picture on the website, but as you will see, there weren’t when I went there. It’s little details like this that make all the difference between fine dining and upscale casual. More about that later.

Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner are all served at this restaurant. The menus are online, but the prices are not.

I will link to pictures of the lunch menu in the description as well.

The resort has a woodsy lodge theme, and the restaurant maintains consistency.

The entry and lounge are quaint with some local art featured, their wine cellar displayed, and very traditional décor.  There is a wonderfully cozy seating area where guests can sit and enjoy a drink from the bar while they await the rest of their party but not awkwardly face a host stand.

The dining room has banquettes and tables. Properly spaced and well outfitted. The table settings and linens automatically catapult the restaurant into the realm of proper fine dining. I can only assume, and hope, that wine glasses are added to the tables or dinner service.

You could make the case that the furniture or upholstery is a bit dated, and I might agree. But often when a makeover is done on a dining room, some hopeless designer doesn’t transfer the standard of elegance to the newer version, but instead does a radical makeover of whatever is trendy and you end up with a dining room no better than a nice chain restaurant, or sometimes even a gastropub. So, I’m just fine with aged décor.

Off to one side of the restaurant is a private dining room that would be wonderful for parties or small events.

Today, however, we are sitting on the patio to enjoy the sunny SoCal fall.

The restaurant patio overlooks the pool, which overlooks the golf course, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean, and at the right angle you can see them all from your table. The patio tables are properly outfitted with one major exception, where’s my tablecloth?

I will say, the hostess had the foresight to bring us a black napkin as my dining guest wore black pants and their regular napkins are white.

And I will have to give them a point for the hardback menu, but good lord did these have some mileage. As much as I respect a good menu, it can’t look like a library book from the 80s.

There were two of us on a four top. The extra two settings should have been removed shortly after we were sat, however, they stayed as uninvited guests us our entire meal.

If I had to narrow down the restaurant’s shortcomings, I’d largely have to point out the service, once you want to be a fine-dining contender, you really have to be on top of it.

It took too long before our table was greeted by us being asked if we have been helped. Not to pick on the server, she had a great attitude, it’s largely just loose service standards.  We also waited too long for water, and we were not automatically offered bread like the surrounding tables.

I did eventually have to flag someone down to come with a breadbasket.

From which they offer sourdough or wheat along with butter.

I just have to mention, for mise-en-place for the first course, a soup spoon was placed on the inside of my silverware, when it should have been outside. I bring this up because there was a lack of silverware management throughout the entire lunch service. Yeah, I know, the spoon wasn’t a big deal, but again, if you want to play in the big leagues, these are the rules.

Now let’s get to the food.

For the first course we ordered the Pear and Autumn Squash soup with brown butter pears and Bayley Hazen Blue cheese, and then the Applewood-Smoked Trout, Frisee, butternut squash puree, pepitas and sherry-honey vinaigrette. Don’t let the clumsy service put you off, the food is well executed. While I found the soup a hint too sweet for my liking, it was a fine fall dish and the savory bleu cheese to offset the sweetness shows that there was thought put into the dish. The smoked trout was unapologetically divine. For those of you the like variations of smoked salmon, you will be quite pleased with this dish.

For the entrees, we had the  Pan Roasted Alaskan Halibut with wilted butter lettuce, crème fraiche, sunchokes, and the Chicken “under a brick” with kale, a bean ragu, preserved lemon and a chicken jus.

While the chicken was flavorful, well rounded, and served its purpose, it wasn’t anything exceptional.

Conversely the halibut was excellent. I have to credit whomever cooked it, because the fish was just the right temperature; cooked through, yet very tender. The plating of the dish was a bold move because there was wilted butter lettuce sitting in a milky crème fraiche broth, so if the flavor wasn’t there then it would be easy to pick on the odd textures, but the flavor did, in fact, deliver, and it was delightful.

One small annoyance was figuring out what was on our plates. 4 and 5-star restaurants are to name three components of each dish when they are presented. And I think it’s just good form to tell people what they are looking at when you place food in front of them. Our food was delivered without any such explanation, which prompted me to revisit my pictures of the menu to know what I was eating.

The dessert menu was short but tempting. This was a rather filling lunch, so we skipped dessert.

As a nice treat two chocolate truffles were brought anyway.

A.R. Valentien has the raw materials needed to be an even better restaurant if it so desired. However, as it stands, it’s a very suitable option to enjoy flavorful fare in refined ambience at the Lodge at Torrey Pines.