Campfire’s octopus, chorizo, and celery-root entrée.
Gage Forster
San Diego, CA
Inside Michelin-Starred Drew Deckman's 31ThirtyOne in North Park
He’s responsible for one-third of Mexico’s Michelin stars for sustainability and has a regular ole Michelin star, too. He’s a failed baseball umpire. His truck smells like Persian cucumbers and quail. He makes his own wine, his own olive oil, and shucks oysters like a robot. And now, Drew Deckman is finally opening his first restaurant in San Diego, with his son Sam cooking on the line with him and Padres pitcher Joe Musgrove, a partner.
Overhyping restaurants is as gross as it is predictable, puts too much pressure on what is ostensibly a dinner party with a permanent address. But, f*ck it. His arrival here, in this tiny New Yorkian fissure of a restaurant space, is the beginning of a new era for North Park.
31ThirtyOne opens Wednesday, August 14.
Deckman’s existence alone is imposing. He’s 6’6” or 6’13”. Sitting in his office, two days before opening night, he has to duck to not concuss himself on a low part of the ceiling.
“It’s an air duct, so we can’t move it,” he laughs.
On the white board behind him, the words “PRECISION” and “EXECUTION.” Below that, in wobblier script, “I love my dad,” written four or five times. His nine-year-old has been here for this whole process, watching her dad gut a failed restaurant, endure protracted delays, beg mercy from governing bodies that must sign-off before he can serve a single grain.
“I’ve had a shaman come in here twice to cleanse the place,” he says. “She’s coming again Friday.”
His hair, whitish-gray like the coals he cleaned out of his grill under that Baja tree for the last decade at Deckman’s en El Mogor, makes him look snow-topped. He is alpine. He has a constant, slight hunch, either the result of many years leaned over a cutting board in famous places run by famous food names (Paul Bocuse, Jacques Maximin, his mentor Madeleine Kamman) or because he’s trying to un-impose himself. Lower his altitude to relate.
Last night was his final “friends and family” dinner—dress rehearsals for his staff. Invite-only, free meals served to investors and friends and loved ones. Grateful guinea pigs who are told to expect everything to go wrong and be kind. Friends and families are an exorcism of last fatal mistakes by staff, before the doors fling open to the savage gen-pop of foodieland.
The food was incredible and imperfect. A 14-day, dry-aged ribeye with potato mousseline is steak and potatoes of your dreams, the crust of the steak so good it turns you feral. The Mindful mushrooms (from growers in El Cajon) with kale and smoked bacon are under-seasoned. At one point, the whole ordering system goes dark. The kitchen staff flies blind. A door handle to the restroom keeps falling off. I pass by the kitchen (everyone passes it, it’s wide open in the tiny middle of the place, a laying bare of the process) and he looks mad, ravenous for a little bit of control, a very seasoned and capable captain on a boat with an engine fire.
The next day, I walk in to see how he’s doing. His staff is gathered around him.
“Last night was terrible,” he says to them. “I was terrible. I never want us to get there again. But this is why we do this. If we did a test run and everyone said everything was great, that does us no good.” He makes six or seven metaphors. At one point he holds up a strainer and equates its perfect circle to the gaggle of humans that make up a restaurant organism.
He’s not chiding. He got his college degree in philosophy. He’s doing that.
It’s such a wild thing to see Deckman here, in a formal kitchen. For years, he’s stood under pine trees in the dry, open wild of Baja, goggles on, smoke billowing around him, giant tongs in hand. I ask him how it feels to be caged again.
“I love it,” he says. “I can handle it now. This was my life for so many years, that decade in Europe. It became my whole life back then, and not in a healthy way. It was 24 hours a day, no ability to have any relationship. I remember distinctly when Bernard Loiseau shot himself because he was afraid he was going to lose a Michelin star. That changed me. I stopped and said, ‘What the fuck are we doing?’”
And so he went free-range. He got work on fishing boats in Hawaii, then Mexico. When he saw how much biomass was being thrown back into the oceans, he got a bigger perspective on food. Deckman’s, and now 31ThirtyOne, is the reflection of that. All produce and greens are from San Diego farms. Oysters from Baja. Food of its place.
“At some point, you get so close to it all you can see is a single dot on the page,” he says of the unhealthy side of the chef obsession, The Bear–type kitchen life. “Then you back away and you see all these other dots that make up the bigger picture. When you’re only seeing that dot it’s all ego. In the beginning it was all about me. I thought I was the best thing since beer in a can. But you can only be a dick so long until people won’t answer your phone calls. As I moved away from the kitchen and found other things. I had to stand back from the fire. And then you realize it’s not about you. There are all these people holding up the ship. So stop trying to be the ship and be the water.”
That’s why there are no titles in his kitchen at 31ThirtyOne. No hierarchy. “We’re all just cooks, we’re all just bartenders and servers.”
At one point in opening 31ThirtyOne, he was so deep in blueprints and permitting applications and sheetrock contractors, he couldn’t see the vision of what the food would be. “My PR team kept saying, ‘What do you mean you don’t have a menu? Do you realize you open in a month?’”
So after construction crews had gone home, he sat alone in the kitchen in the dark and tried to see it. “I sat there for 45 minutes to an hour every night,” he says. “And it finally started to come.”
Wednesday, we’ll see what came.
San Diego, CA
Solans, Luna, Guilavogui help RSL beat slumping San Diego, extend unbeaten streak to 6 games :: WRALSportsFan.com
SANDY, Utah — SANDY, Utah (AP) — Sergi Solans had two goals and an assist, Diego Luna added a goal and two assists, and Real Salt Lake beat San Diego FC 4-2 on Saturday night to extend its unbeaten streak to six games.
Morgan Guilavogui scored his first goal in MLS and had an assist for Real Salt Lake (5-1-1). The 28-year-old designated player has five goal contributions in his first six career games.
RSL hasn’t lost since a 1-0 defeat at Vancouver in the season opener.
San Diego (3-3-2) has lost three in a row and is winless in five straight.
Luna opened the scoring in the fifth minute when he re-directed a misplayed pass by Duran Ferree, San Diego’s 19-year-old goalkeeper, into the net.
Moments later, Solans headed home a perfectly-placed cross played by Luna from outside the right corner of the 18-yard box to the back post to make it 2-0. Solans, a 23-year-old forward, flicked a header from the center of the area inside the right post and past the outstretched arm of Ferree to make it 3-1 in the 37th minute.
Guilavogui slammed home a first-touch shot to give RSL a three-goal lead in the 45th.
Marcus Ingvartsen scored a goal in the 14th minute and Anders Dreyer converted from the penalty spot in the 66th for San Diego.
Ingvartsen has five goals and an assist this season and has 10 goal contributions (seven goals, three assists) in 16 career MLS appearances.
Rafael Cabral had three saves for RSL.
Ferree finished with five saves.
___
AP soccer: https://apnews.com/soccer
When John Resnick opened Campfire on a quaint little street in Carlsbad, Calif., in 2016, some locals weren’t sure what to think. The coastal enclave wasn’t exactly awash in innovative, chef-driven establishments, so it was a shock to see the dining room consistently full. Early on, one woman wondered aloud to Resnick, “Where did all these people come from?”
It’s a moment he remembers vividly. “I was struck by her statement, because I think she was surprised that so many other people in Carlsbad were there,” Resnick says.
The rest of the culinary world would take some time to catch up to what was happening. In 2019, when Michelin expanded to rate restaurants throughout all of California—not just the San Francisco area—Addison was the only one in San Diego to earn a star. But since emerging from the pandemic, the region’s food scene has grown dramatically. Driven by outstanding farms, ingredients, a bumper crop of talented chefs, and a G.D.P. approximately the size of New Zealand or Greece, San Diego County has become one of America’s most underrated dining destinations.
Perhaps no single restaurant is a better emblem for this shift than chef William Bradley’s Addison, which opened in 2006. After landing his first star, Bradley knew he wanted more. To get them, he transformed his French-leaning fare to serve what he calls California Gastronomy, which combines the cultures of SoCal with impeccable ingredients and wildly impressive techniques, prizing flavor over flair. Michelin responded, awarding Addison a second star in 2022, and making it the first Southern California three-star restaurant just a year later. The accolade has created a halo effect, attracting culinary tourists from around the world.
Berry beet tartlets at San Diego’s three-star stalwart Addison.
Eric Wolfinger
“Earning three stars forces the global dining community to pay attention to a place that may not have been on their radar before,” says chef Eric Bost, a partner in Resnick’s four Carlsbad establishments.
Resnick recruited Bost, who spent time at award-winning outposts of Restaurant Guy Savoy, to run Jeune et Jolie, which he led to a star in 2021. They’ve since taken over an old boogie-board factory down the street and converted it to an all-day restaurant and bakery, Wildland. The space also hosts an exquisite tasting-counter experience called Lilo, which was given a Michelin star mere months after opening in April 2025. And as Resnick and Bost grew their successful Carlsbad operation, chef Roberto Alcocer earned a Michelin star for his Mexican fine-dining spot Valle in nearby Oceanside.
The stylish tasting counter at Michelin one-star Lilo in Carlsbad.
Kimberly Motos
About 25 miles to the south, another affluent coastal community is going through its own culinary glow up. In La Jolla, chef Tara Monsod and the hospitality group Puffer Malarkey Collective opened the stylish French steakhouse Le Coq. Chef Erik Anderson, formerly of Michelin two-star Coi, is preparing to launch Roseacre. And last year, Per Se alums Elijah Arizmendi and Brian Hung left New York to open the elegant tasting-menu restaurant Lucien, lured by the ingredients they’d get to serve. “A major reason we chose San Diego is the quality and diversity of the produce,” Arizmendi explains. “San Diego County has more small farms than anywhere else in the U.S., and its many microclimates allow farmers to grow an incredible range of ingredients year-round.”
Wildland’s spicy Italian sandwich.
Gage Forster
Chef Travis Swikard has also been a tireless advocate for the region’s ingredients since he returned to San Diego, his hometown, and opened Mediterranean-influenced Callie in 2021. There’s no sophomore slump with his latest effort, the French Riviera–inspired Fleurette in La Jolla, where he’s serving his take on classics like leeks vinaigrette and his San Diego “Bouillabaisse” with local red sheepshead fish and spiny lobster. Its food is bright, produce-driven, and attentive in execution, while the dining room maintains a relaxed and unpretentious style of service. And Swikard sees that approach cohering into a regional style with a strong network of professionals behind it.
“It’s really nice that we are developing our own identity, not trying to be like L.A. or any other market, just highlighting what’s great about the San Diego lifestyle and ingredients,” he says. “Similar to New York, a chef community is starting to develop where chefs are supporting each other. There is a true sense of pride to be cooking here.”
Top: In La Jolla, Lucien serves ocean whitefish with tomatoes turned into concasse, sabayon, and other expressions.
Authors
Little Debbie is officially expanding its doughnut range.
On April 14, the brand announced a new sweet snack: Chocolate Old Fashioned Donuts. The company says there was “massive consumer demand” for the original Big Pack Old Fashioned Donuts, which quickly became a top seller. Now, they’re just giving the people what they want.
The new snack is a chocolate old-fashioned cake doughnut finished with a sweet glaze and is launching in two formats:
- The Big Pack Carton: This box contains six doughnuts in a retro-inspired package that reflects the brand’s heritage.
- Single-serve doughnuts: There are also 3-ounce, individually wrapped Chocolate Old Fashioned Donuts, which the brand suggests pairing with a morning coffee or eating on a midday break.
The original, which includes six individually wrapped cake-style doughnuts with a vanilla glaze, first hit stores in June 2025 and, according to the brand, has been “consistently selling out.”
“We saw an incredible response to the Old Fashioned Donut we introduced last year,” said Scott Brownlow, Little Debbie’s brand manager, in a press release. We’re doubling down on what works and giving both loyalists and new fans an irresistible reason to head back to the store.”
Little Debbie’s Chocolate Old Fashioned Donuts are rolling out now to major retailers, grocery stores and convenience stores nationwide. As with the original Old Fashioned Donut, they become a permanent addition to the brand’s snack lineup.
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