The most anticipated restaurant to arrive in Costa Mesa in 2015, Spanish-influenced Vaca, opened on Dec. 26, just steps across from South Coast Plaza. Dinner is now available. Lunch will be available on February.
The executive chef and partner, Amar Santana, is attracting wide attention competing as a front-runner on Bravo TV’s award-winning “Top Chef” series this year. Currently, he’s also the executive chef and a partner at the often-packed Broadway by Amar Santana in Laguna Beach, which has received excellent reviews. Broadway serves what he calls “fancy” food.
The food at Vaca, meanwhile, is authentic Spanish, serving everything from tapas and paellas to steaks and fish. In fact, about 90 percent of the food is sourced directly from Spain.
Some of the paellas served include Paella De Mariscos, with a healthy serving of fresh ocean-caught clams, mussels, shrimp and octopus with saffron bomba rice. The Paella De Carne has chunks of the finest pork belly, chorizo, blood sausage, duck confit and beef cheek with bomba rice.
Other dishes include Paleta Iberica Fermin, which is thinly sliced shavings of cured Iberian boneless ham shoulder.
The steaks are sourced from Aspen Ridge Farms in Colorado, and cooked over a crackling orange wood-burning fire. The result means the steaks are not only tender but also the flavors are especially imbued with hints of the wood itself.
The Pulpo A La Gallega, a warm Spanish octopus with fingerling potatoes, pimenton and Spanish olive oil, felt slippery and smooth, its flesh having a tenderness rarely seen in restaurants of any caliber.
Santana goes out of his way to get the best ingredients. A sampler of lightly fried yet tender fish was jet flown from France just one day before landing on the dining plate.
Santana, 33, of Irvine, traveled extensively in Spain sampling food from a wide variety of restaurants before opening Vaca. He went to everything from hole-in-the-walls to finer establishments to do research, he says.
The food at Vaca is essentially what Santana grew up eating. “Vaca is childhood food,” he said. He started cooking at age 5, embellishing what his mom would cook for meals. He took the art of cooking professionally starting at age 16. Santana attended the Culinary Institute of America and subsequently worked under American celebrity chef Charlie Palmer. Palmer then tapped Santana to help open the former Charlie Palmer at Bloomingdales in South Coast Plaza. After a few years, Santana went on his own in Laguna Beach, opening Broadway by Amar Santana.
Santana’s success as a chef stems from his passion for hard work in the kitchen.
“This is heaven,” said Santana, when asked of what work feels like as a chef. “This isn’t work for me. I get mad when I’m at home.”
Santana has been heavily involved, along with partner Ahmed Labatte, in overseeing the opening of Vaca. The two are also business partners in Broadway by Amar Santana. The two in conjunction have decades of experience of operating quality restaurants.
Vaca Contact Information
Address: 695 Town Center Dr. Suite 170 Costa Mesa, CA 92626
Tel: 714.463.6060
Vacarestaurant.com
