Sonoma Meritage Restaurant and Oyster Bar - French/Italian, Sonoma

165 West Napa St. Sonoma, CA 95476
(707) 938-9430
Parking: street parking
Hours: Brunch Sat and Sun 10:30am - 3pm, Happy Hour 4pm - 6pm, Dinner Daily 5pm - 9pm
http://www.sonomameritage.com/

Last Visited: September 2010

Food: 3 stars
Atmosphere: 3 stars
Service: 3 stars
Price: $$ to $$$$

Chef Carlo Cavallo serves up Southern French and Northern Italian food at this martini and oyster bar.  Formerly on Broadway, they have been at this location on West Napa Street for quite a number of years now.

My first experience with Meritage was at a catering event in 2004.  I was super impressed that they managed to make such wonderful food away from their regular kitchen.  Specifically, the prime rib was heavenly - cooked to perfection.

During the 2004 catered event

- Mini Crab cakes – Bite sized crab cakes are topped with a drop of Dijon mustard sauce. The crab cake was a little too mini, about the size of a nickel in diameter and the height of a nickel standing on end, making it just miss the mark on having enough flavor in the little package, but it still tasted good. Double to triple the size would have been perfect.

- Salad – A very fresh and crisp mixed green salad is topped with crumbled feta cheese and aged balsamic vinegar. The greens didn’t have any sign of rust and were tossed in a light vinaigrette. Aged balsamic vinegar was lightly drizzled on top of the greens. Very fresh and very good.

- Prime Rib with Risotto – Tender prime rib is placed on a bed of mushroom risotto. Vegetables are served on the side. Tonight there were carrots cut into strips and green beans. Dried black mushrooms are rehydrated and sliced, then cooked with the risotto. The texture was creamy, and though this may be typical, the grains of rice were just a little hard in the center. I personally like my risotto a little more soft in the center. The prime rib was served medium and finished with a drizzle of cream containing a hint of horseradish. This was all done on a barbecue - and it was one of the best prime rib dinners that I've ever had.

both.

When I found out that the prime rib was being cooked on a grill outside, it was apparent that chef Carlo-Alessandro Cavallo knows his stuff. It’s pretty hard to cook a nice prime rib outside in the dead of winter and make the food taste and look great, especially when you’re in a facility outside of your restaurant. He did an excellent job serving beautiful prime rib to about 100 people without a hitch.

I was also most impressed by his wait staff. They were courteous, and even more so, they knew what not to do. During banquets, you often find the wait staff puttering around and causing distractions, but despite their heavy loads, these waiters and waitresses stood to the side of the room during announcements and speeches. It’s their pleasant demeanor that certainly made the evening just that much better. The overall dining experience made me want to check out the restaurant.

Flash Forward to 2011

A few friends had come to the area to do some wine tasting and go to Sonoma Plaza.  After a day of relaxed wine tasting, all were hungry for a bite to eat, so off we went to Sonoma Meritage.  There were six of us this evening and we got there before 6pm, so the happy hour menu was available to us. 

We were given ice water upon being seated along with fresh foccacia bread served with an olive tapenade.  The tapenade has complexity with nuts aind just a really nice rich flavor.  We could have just eaten the bread all night - good stuff. 

Since we arrived early, the happy hour menu was available which means that oysters are discounted. 

- BBQ Oysters with Garlic Lemon butter or Homemade BBQ sauce - I selected the garlic lemon butter sauce and was very pleased.  These delicious bites are hot and soak up thae garlic and lemon flavoring so well.  Six to a plate.  Very enjoyable.  It was so good, that during my next visit, I ordered it again.  $10

- Bouillabaisse - Seafood Stew with tiger prawns, manila clams, mussels, and mixed fresh fish in a spicy tomato broth.  For my main dish, I selected this flavorful stew.  The quantity of ingredients is abundant and the tomato broth makes it easy to eat all of the seafood without feeling like it's overly rich.  The quantity of each type of seafood was also well-balanced.  Although the bread was a nice decoration, I preferred the foccaccia bread more.  Good.  $20

This was a good visit, and the rating for food would have been three to four stars, but I decided to come back again a couple of weeks later to try to make a meal out of their happy hour menu.  Sadly, this was a most disappointing visit.  The chef wasn't coming in until 5:30pm, and since we were there early, somebody whom was less well versed in how to time the arrival of dishes was cooking.  Coupled with the fact that there was a party of eight or ten enjoying happy hour, this turned out to be a mediocre visit, and I haven't been been back since.  The problem started when we ordered raw oysters.

- Oysters on the Half Shell Sampler Platter - The happy hour price is about half that shown on the menu, so it would have been a great deal.  However, of the four types of oysters that you get to try, they told us they only had three of the four left.  No big deal, right?.  However, somewhere between our order and the arrival of the order, another one of the varieties was no longer available, and they plated only two varieties.  I appreciated how our server asked us whether it was okay that there were three varieties before we accepted the order, but when she brought two, I wondered why she didn't check back with us again.  Sadness - I wanted to try all four kinds.  Ten oysters to an order. $18

- Prince Edward Island Mussels - Steamed in garlic butter sauce with grilled foccaccia ,  About a dozen mussels are served in a tasty broth on top of that grilled bread triangle.  While the bread is good for soaking up the broth, I would again rather use the foccaccia bread.  This seems like such a filler item.  Give me a smaller bowl and forget theis triangle - I'll be a happier camper.  Good otherwise.$12

- Mushroom Pizza - Diaster struck here.  How hard is it to get a hot item to the table when there are only three tables with patrons in the restaurant?  Apparently, harder than you think.  There was some confusion that what we had ordered was part of the other table's order, and voila, cold pizza.  I don't know how that confusion translates into food getting cold, but it did.  The mushrooms themselves had good flavor, but you can tell from the photo that despite the fact that the photo was taken immediately after the pizza arrived at the table, it had cooled down - the cheese has started to change form.  Ugh.  Maybe it was my fault for ordering pizza at an oyster bar, but still. Never again will I order a pizza here if I can help it.

- Crispy Calamari and Zucchini served with Chive Aioli - Meritage redeemed themselves with this dish because it was piping hot.  The calamari is breaded so lightly and the zucchini is fresh.  Terrific.  I would definitely order this again.  $10

- Truffle Oil Fries - And here we go again - cold food.  Who wants to eat cold fries?  The truffle oil was fragrant, but it was sad that this dish was cold. 

With this experience, I had to lower the food rating down to three stars.  If it weren't for the first two experiences, it woud have been down to a two to three star range.

Chef Cavallo, when you are out of the restaurant, please make sure that your kitchen is in order and serving with the quality that you would serve with.  It's going to be a while before I go back again because of this last visit and the cold food.

Fortunately, service is pretty good and the staff checks back with the right frequency.  They're not pretentious if you don't order wine or try to make a meal out of the happy hour - their good attitude is getting hard to find these days in Sonoma restaurants.   I would suggest eating here for regular meal service for a better dining experience.