Restaurants next level at promenade

Alicia Robinson

As homes sprout up along the bluffs overlooking Pacific Coast

Highway, a shopping center also is coming of age.

Three new sit-down restaurants will help mature the Crystal Cove

Promenade, which opened in 2002 and boasts a slowly growing number of

boutique shops and some “fast casual” dining spots such as Pacific

Whey Cafe.

Sage on the Coast, Mastro’s Ocean Club and Modo Mio Cucina Rustica

are all slated to open in the next year at the center. Restaurateurs

said they picked the center because of its idyllic location on the

coast and the growing community of homes nearby, which give it a

neighborhood feel.

Coming in August is Sage on the Coast, which will be similar to

the existing Sage restaurant in the Eastbluff shopping center, Sage

co-owner Rich Mead said. The restaurant will offer contemporary food

made with fresh, seasonal ingredients, and it will feature a garden

by the patio like the Eastbluff location.

The new venue, however, will offer more small plates of foods

people can share as well as the regular entrees, which Mead said is a

trend in dining today.

“People are deconstructing meals and splitting a lot of stuff, so

people are getting a lot of different tastes,” he said.

Modo Mio is also expected to open this summer. It will be the

second restaurant for owner Gianfranco Bertolino, who also owns a

Modo Mio in Pacific Palisades.

The restaurant’s specialty will be fine Italian cuisine with a

varied menu that includes pasta and risotto dishes as well as

seafood, veal and free range chicken. Designed for comfort, the

restaurant’s feel will be a “home away from home,” Bertolino said.

Seafood and steaks will be served at Mastro’s Ocean Club, which is

slated to open in early to mid-2005, with construction expected to

start this summer. The masculine feel and large portions of a

steakhouse will be tempered with elegant furnishings to create a

sexy, vibrant restaurant, Mastro’s spokesman Oliver Badgio said.

Patrons will be able to enjoy the location by the sea in an indoor

courtyard with live trees and a glass window system that will let in

the outside air.

That sea air, and view, was one of the attractions to Crystal

Cove, the restaurateurs said.

“We actually saw Crystal Cove in 1999 and we were so thrilled with

the location,” Badgio said. “It was really what we thought was just a

very unique opportunity that we couldn’t pass up.”

The growing community of nearby homes is expected to furnish

clientele for the restaurants.

“One of the main reasons was certainly the fact that it has that

Crystal Cove residential community right behind it,” Bertolino said.

“I really like the idea that people can just walk down.”

In the center now is a mix of smaller shops and a few chain

stores, and the new restaurants should mesh well with that, said

Jennifer Heiger, spokeswoman for the Irvine Co., which owns the

shopping center.

“We expect that the restaurants will really round out what the

center has to offer and it will really be a complete package at that

point,” she said.

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers business, politics and the environment.

She may be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail at

alicia.robinson@latimes.com.