Locavore seafood in San Diego
	Reviewed By howie	Jul 31, 2008

Sea Rocket Bistro recently opened in the space formerly occupied by The Linkery (which moved a few blocks down the street). Sea Rocket Bistro seems to be trying to apply the admirable tenets of locavore eating to seafood. I believe all of their seafood comes from local waters.

I visited recently with my parents and was pleased to see that it retained a lot of the "nice-little-neighborhood-restaurant" feel from The Linkery days. The walls are lined with pictures of nearby farms in homage to Sea Rockets locavore roots.

We started off with a bunch of appetizers. The first to arrive were the Grilled Sardines. I love the idea of this, but it really needed some salt and acid. I enjoyed the lima bean salad underneat the sardines though. I'm not an especially big lima bean fan, but this won me over with its garlicky kick.

The Fish Cake Bites were next, and I found them to be unmemorable. The idea sounds good enough - raw chunks of fish coated in panko and deep fried with a creamy sauce. Perhaps the fish they used wasn't strong enough to stand up to the breading.

If you're an especially adveturous eater, the Live Sea Urchin is the dish to order. It's a a huge spiny creature almost as big as a cantaloupe - the biggest sea urchin I've ever seen. My mom told me later that its spines were still moving, but I, Mr. Non-observant, didn't notice it. It's times like this that remind me that I should resolve to slow down and always keep my eyes open for life's little wonders.

The bottom of the sea urchin is cut out and you can see the delicate golden orange blobs floating in a dark, slimy substance - was it the sea urchin equivalent of blood? The orange lobes are the edible gonads of the sea urchin - this is what's known as "uni" at the sushi bar. I liked the uni itself but found the black stuff scary. Being new to eating live sea urchin, I'm not sure what it was, but it coated my tongue with an odd metallic flavor that masked the delicate uni. I think I would have liked this dish had the uni been rinsed. But like I said, if you're into the exotic, you have to order this just to say you've plunged your spoon into a still writhing creature and then ate its gonads.

Sea urchin bisque - I didn't get a decent taste of this one, just a quick taste, and I didn't realize until afterwards that the uni was at the bottom. Doh! What I did try though could have been smoother and creamier (and warmer). This seemed more like a pureed veggie soup than a bisque. When I hear "bisque", I want ultra-rich, ultra-creamy.

For my main course, I had the Seared Sea Scallops with Mashed Potatoes. The scallops themselves were a slight disappointment. They didn't have that hint of fresh sweetness I liked, and this dish was crying for a little bit of lemon and more salt. The mashed potatoes were delicious though - by far my favorite dish of the whole meal. The potatoes had a nice creamy, smokey flavor; I'm guessing they added some gouda to them - delicious!

My parents split the special Yellowtail with zucchini and mashed potatoes. The yellowtail was not bad - maybe just a tad overcooked, and again it could have used some acid. I'm surprised they didn't serve it with a wedge of lemon. The mashed potatoes were the same yummy, smokey, creamy ones that came with my dish.

So overall, the meal was average, even considering the modest price point (most entrees were about $16). I respect Sea Rocket's interest in local, sustainable eating, but ultimately it's about how the food tastes. Though nothing was terrible, almost every dish had some little issue that made the food less enjoyable. I think if they could just fix the seasoning and brighten more of their dishes up with citrus, it would be a huge improvement. Even just sticking a salt shaker and wedges of lemon on the table would help a lot.