Baja California-Cuisine in Mercado - so the title of an article I read. Two guest chefs from Mexico…read moreare joining the Mercado team until August 2nd, 2015 to create typical Mexican food for their guests. That sounds like something we have to try!
Picked a day, placed a reservation online, all went smooth. Arrived there and enjoyed the early-evening quietness. Mercado is a large place, located where you could previously find Indochine.
After looking through the available options, we went for the 10 course tasting menu. It featured everything from fish to meat to salad. Ready to rock!
The dishes were prepared well. They looked stunning, and the staff serving us always explained what we were actually looking at. Some very interesting combinations, and some things that we didn't eat before. Each course is pretty small, so don't worry about the 10 courses. We ate through various fish themes courses, almost always combined with some spicy stuff, some very well made nacho chips and arrived at the main dishes. After 5 or so dishes, things in service started to become less smooth. First, the waiter apologized that he had swapped some course, which we didn't even notice, as honestly, we didn't have a clue anymore where we were in the 10 course. Then, as we were expecting a main dish, we were served a dessert. Another waited hissed a brisk remark to our server to move those away, as it wasn't right yet. After that, we got another main dish. We finished that, and we were asked how we liked the menu so far. All was kind of OK which we said so. Having had our eyes on the dessert, which is for us frequently, the Grande Finale, we were waiting for this. As it became apparent that this wouldn't show up without asking for it, the waiter acted really surprised about it. As a result, he didn't show up at our table then anymore, but left us to his colleagues.
We finished our meal, asked for payment and left. All major credit cards accepted by the way.
All in all, the feeling was kind of mixed. The food was generally good, even if some of the 10 courses weren't really our favorites. It could have been a bit tastier here and there. However, the service really causes that I've got to remove a star here: mix up of course, forgotten dessert, we've been served I think by at least 5 people, and I would suggest putting a mini version of the menu on the table for the guests to refer back to. I would really recommend to smooth out service a bit and the restaurant would get a solid 4 stars!