Rustic Root (July 2018) -
Hip and Happening Spot at Street Level and on the
Rooftop
My spouse and I dined at
Rustic Root for dinner on a Saturday evening in early July 2018. Rustic Root is
open daily from 4:00 pm until 2:00 am, with early opening hours on weekends
beginning at 9:00 am for brunch. You can make a reservation using the online
Open Table system.
Rustic Root opened in summer
2015 on bustling Fifth Avenue in the Gaslamp District. The RMD Group (FLUXX)
operates the restaurant, along with neighbor Volcano Rabbit (modern Mexican
food), 207 (a nightclub), Ciro's (a pizzeria), Float (the rooftop pool bar at
the Hard Rock Hotel), and Side Bar (another nightclub). (Note that the
management of these restaurants automatically adds a 3% service charge to your
bill so that you can help to pay their employees a livable wage; this charge is
in addition to any gratuity that you would normally add.)
Rustic Root offers an
expansive main dining room on the street level, with additional lounge space on
the rooftop. You can dine outdoors on the sidewalk patio (a few “tables” are
trendy stuffed booths), or indoors in one of several sections. Décor is eye-catching
and memorable, including rolling pin wall dividers, lamps made from upside down
red or white enamel colanders, animal topiaries arranged as sort of a diorama, silver
trays on the walls, small framed mirrors at the tops of walls and on ceilings
(actually, mirrors hung down low within view of the tables would enhance the
dining experience of guests who sit facing the wall by allowing them a
reflected view of the entire restaurant), wood-like floors, some exposed brick
(part of which features huge white alphabet letters arranged in no obvious
words or patterns), circular plates and animal heads mounted on long sticks, and
a cheeky water feature near the restrooms (a 1950-ish life-size photograph of a
European woman, but the clever designer has her holding a real 3-D metal
watering can that spurts water into a galvanized oval bathtub below).
Rustic Root serves upscale American cuisine with
Asian, French, and Mexican influences. We shared the bison meatballs with
whiskey sauce as an appetizer (which reminded us of mom’s Swedish meatballs).
As our entrees, we ordered the short rib (which arrived plated in three
“piles”, with a moist chunks of meat atop crispy polenta cakes arranged atop a
sweet potato puree with chimichurri sauce) and one of the daily special entrees
(fish served with baby potatoes and blistered tomatoes, accented by a pea puree
swirl and fresh corn kernels). For dessert, we shared a mixed berry cobbler, delivered
warm and sprinkled with gluten-free crumbles/crust and served alongside a scoop
of vanilla ice cream. If you sign up for
their promo online, you’ll receive 15% off the not unsubstantial menu prices. Our
service was excellent up until the time that a large, higher revenue-generating
party arrived and our server forgot us.
We loved the food and
atmosphere at Rustic Root, but the service glitch left us with a bad
impression.
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