The post The Local’s Guide to Golden Hill appeared first on San Diego Magazine.
]]>This historic urban neighborhood, known for panoramic downtown views, sits perched above the hustle and bustle. Gourmands visit Golden Hill Park for taco and burger festivals that send tantalizing smells wafting down the block. Jacarandas augment the neighborhood’s charm with pops of purple. Though downtown is only a short bus ride away, the area is cozy and residential, with tidy sidewalks, wide streets, thriving gardens, leafy trees, front porches, a slice of Balboa Park, and a smattering of small businesses.
In 1905, the streetcar brought convenience. Apartments and renters arrived in the ’20s and ’30s, mansions turned into rooming houses, bungalows moved in during WWII, and Golden Hill became one of San Diego’s most economically and ethnically diverse neighborhoods. It kind of stayed that way. Activists and alternative presses made the area a home base in the ’60s and ’70s. In the late 1970s, homeowners trickled back in from the ’burbs and convinced the city to designate Golden Hill a historic district.
Kelly Mayhew and Jim Miller
Today, GH remains a bit scruffy around the edges—just how residents like it—and has changed little in the last 20 years. There’s been some urban infill: architecture studio FoundationForForm’s multi-use building on 25th, rowhouses in a canyon on C, boxy Jonathan Segal lofts on B. Creative agency Mortis Studio moved in on 25th and C and keeps its prominent corner window fresh with art exhibits. Kingfisher on Broadway brought a Michelin mention to Golden Hill. There’s still no bank, no pharmacy, and no dry cleaners. The post office closed in 2011.
But residents know this ’hood’s charm is under the radar. Though Golden Hill has not escaped rising rents and home prices (and Starbucks), hyper-gentrification hasn’t hit here. Things are relatively quiet (except for the airplanes!), and food is yummy but not pretentious.
Things to Do in Golden Hill
Fifteen-year Golden Hill residents Kelly Mayhew and Jim Miller are City College profs, founders of City Works Press, and co-authors of Under the Perfect Sun: The San Diego Tourists Never See. The couple lives on 25th Street in a 1917 craftsman. They raised their son in Golden Hill, where he “grew up on Los Reyes breakfast burritos every Sunday,” Miller says. Here are a few more family favorites.
Breakfast and a Historic Walk
Counterpoint, Golden Hill’s first real “trendy” restaurant, arrived in 2009. “[It] has an unsung brunch,” Mayhew says. “When I’m feeling indulgent, I love Counterpoint’s version of chicken and waffles—it’s a mashup of that and eggs benedict, which is heavenly.” Other mornings, the couple heads to Golden Hill Cafe (the setting for some scenes in the 1989 Jim Belushi flick K-9) for hash browns.
“Panchita’s has the best donuts,” Mayhew adds. “I think they put nutmeg in them.”
Walk it off, as Mayhew and Miller do daily, down Broadway to 24th Street to ogle the Hill’s most opulent old house: an 8,800-square-foot, 1896 Queen Anne Victorian with a four-story, cupola-topped turret, where San Diego mayor Louis J. Wilde lived in grand style until a scandal ran him out of town in 1921.
Brews, Views, and Guy Fieri’s Pizza Pick
Mayhew recommends Tobey’s 19th Hole on the golf course for signature Golden Hill views of greenery and downtown with a plate of tots and a beer. Or check out Pizzeria Luigi’s leafy patio and New York– quality slices and pies, mentioned on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.
Award-Winning Provisions at Sepulveda Meats
Also on Mayhew and Miller’s walking route, Sepulveda Meats & Provisions opened in 2016 and was named one of America’s best butcher shops by Food & Wine in 2020. On their way up 28th Street, the couple stops to admire Mario Torero’s 1972 mural, then, Mayhew says, “we stock up on everything from homemade Italian and bratwurst sausages to bavette cut steak to pancetta. And Jasper’s is really good.” Juan Jasper’s Kitchen & Wine Bar seats eight and shares Sepulveda’s kitchen after the meat counter closes.
Facts About Golden Hill
- Golden Hill had a streetcar line from 1905 to 1939. The tracks were dug up in 2015.
- According to Realtor.com, the median listing price for homes in Golden Hill is $1.2 million.
- 66 percent of Golden Hill residents rent their homes.
- The Women’s Museum of California started in Golden Hill.
- The Golden Hill Fountain Grotto, built in 1907, is Balboa Park’s oldest design feature and predates the Panama-California Expo. It is now partially intact.
What’s Next for Golden Hill
The biggest thing on the hilly horizon for this neighborhood? More vertical housing. An eight-story tower is going up across from the historic Turf Club on 25th Street—a big deal on a block where everything else is two stories, tops. A new apartment building at Broadway and 20th has neighbors in a tizzy about preserving the area’s historic character. 30th Street recently got two additions that stick up above the surrounding bungalows, with glass and steel glinting in the sun, just like in downtown. More are planned.
As for eats, 25th Street is adding yet another culinary establishment: Birria El Rey. Taking over the former Krakatoa cottage, El Rey was a pop-up before committing to brick-and-mortar.
Where to Eat in Golden Hill
Where to Shop in Golden Hill
More Things to Do in Golden Hill
The post The Local’s Guide to Golden Hill appeared first on San Diego Magazine.
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]]>Luckily, we’ll get plenty more once he moves a block away to the former Krakatoa spot at 1128 25th Street in Golden Hill this summer.
“I think in three months, it should be ready,” he says during our conversation this month, adding they’re just waiting for final permits and the ABC license. He pauses for a moment and reflects on what that means. “I started selling birria only on Sundays with only a small pot of birria. In three years, I have my restaurant almost ready.”
Vazquez formally trained at Culinary Art School in Tijuana before working around San Diego at places like Marriott Marquis San Diego Marina. Once the pandemic hit, however, he found himself unemployed and ready to try something new. He decided to launch a birria pop-up in Golden Hill on Sundays despite hospitality coming to a screeching halt early in 2020.
“I wasn’t getting any income, so I said, ‘This is my time to try to do something,’” he says. He calls that period of uncertainty scary, but a chance to do what he always wanted to do—open his own restaurant and stop working for someone else. “If I hadn’t lost my job, I wouldn’t have done anything,” he says. But his bet paid off—fast.
“People started to like the birria, so I decided to do it on Saturday,” explains Vazquez. “Then people seemed to like it a lot. So I decided to open from Tuesday to Sunday.” He’s been selling his food as fast as he could make it ever since and had been looking for a place to expand his burgeoning birria empire. When Krakatoa ceased operations in 2022, he knew it was the right spot to develop while maintaining close ties with the Golden Hill community.
| San Diego (@birria_el_rey)The new spot will have the same favorites, plus a few more. Vasquez says he will add menudo and more proteins to the menu, like beef and chicken, as well as beer and lots more seating. “I’m gonna have some more space to create more things with birria,” he promises. Once he can open, daily hours will run from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. (The original location at 1015 25th Street is still open.)
But Vasquez is looking ahead even further. “I want to go further north to open up more birria places,” he says. But in the future, I want to open a breakfast restaurant. That’s my dream after I open a couple more restaurants with birria.”
Breakfast? I wonder. Why?
“I love breakfast,” he says with a laugh. If you eat a good breakfast in the morning, the rest of the day will be good.”
San Diego Restaurant News & Food Events
Golden Coast Mead Joins Cardiff Farmers Market
It wasn’t until 2016 that California beverage alcohol makers with Type 84 permits were allowed to “offer instructional tasting events to consumers” at farmers’ markets under Assembly Bill 774. Golden Coast Mead immediately seized the opportunity, pouring at markets in Otay Ranch, North Park, Vista, Poway, and Hillcrest. Now, they’ve added Cardiff Farmers Market to their rotation every Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the MiraCosta San Elijo Campus at 3333 Manchester Avenue.
“We’ll be able to pour customers three one-ounce educational tasters, and sell bottles to-go of our organic honey-based, regenerative, Southern California-style, refreshing, sometimes tart, enlivening, all-natural, no preservatives or artificial ingredient added meads,” says Golden Coast founder Frank Golbeck. Mead is much more complex than its “just honey wine” reputation, he adds. “The bees have to visit over two million flowers to make one pound of honey, [and] our bottles have a half pound of honey in each one. That means there are over one million flower visits in each bottle. If there are one hundred sips in a bottle, that’s 10,000 flower visits in one sip,” he explains. “Pretty inspiring, beautiful stuff if you ask me.”
Beth’s Bites
Goodbye Starbucks, hello Amoré Caffe! The corner of Robinson and Fifth Avenue in Hillcrest’s busy thoroughfare is keeping coffee on the menu but kicking corporate chains to the curb. Husband-and-wife-owned Amoré is slated to open sometime in late summer or fall 2024.
(Cue Cookie Monster voice) COOKIES ARE COMING! Schmackary’s, the New York City-based cookie franchise with ties to Broadway, will open its first San Diego location sometime this year. We don’t know much, but we know there will be cookies.
On Sunday, April 28, the first Cocktail Championship Block Party kicks off at 1 p.m. with 21 bars in the mix, including Rustic Root, Union Kitchen & Tap, The Deck at Moonshine Flats, Lumi, and more. Plan to rideshare and drink plenty of water—tickets include 21 mini cocktails (Egad!)
Have breaking news, exciting scoops, or great stories about new San Diego restaurants or the city’s food scene? Send your pitches to [email protected].
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