Blue Water Market Seafood and Grill

Better than Rubio's?

We shall see...

This weekend's fish market lunch was at Blue Water Market Seafood and Grill in Mission Hills. It's on India Street, just a few steps away from El Indio, Shakespeare's Pub, and Saffron. We parked a hill (free parking, no meters)...

Bert and I were originally going to go here for our night out then changed it to a more upscale venue (Bankers Hill Restaurant). He wanted seafood but then we wanted to wait until TC was back from camp so we could all enjoy Blue Water together.

Even though the line was long (and this was at 11:30 pm), it moved pretty quickly. You cannot bogart any seats until your food is ordered. Lucky for us, there were still tables left in the outside covered patio.

Their counter filled with fresh fish and seafood:

I liked how they arranged their shrimp and fish fillets here. So pretty!

TC saw this on the wall. Earlier this week when we were looking for casual seafood places to go to, Blue Water popped up on the radar. When we went on their website, they had a link to the episode of "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives". I'm not that much of a Guy Fieri fan but we didn't know that he was even here (I knew that he went to El Indio; it must have been the same episode when he went to San Diego). So this wasn't a factor for our visit. TC was excited to see it though since she likes his show.

Not that crowded if you go early enough.

Their menu...You can choose your fish, marinate and whether you want it as a sandwich, in a salad, or as tacos.

More menu offerings:

and even more...

They were out of Shark and Snapper (I wanted the shark but had to get something else). That's Bert's nose, ha ha.

With our orders places, we grabbed the last open table in the patio. Pretty soon, our onion rings came out. Loved the crispy breading. This was a good amount for the three of us.

The patio had some nice greenery in there...

Our lunch entrees...

Bert's Halibut sandwich which was grilled with lemon garlic butter and served on a soft rolle with lettuce and onion. No tartar sauce. Bert really enjoyed his sandwich but thought the bread was too soft and would have preferred it toasted to give it more flavor. I thought his fish was pretty good; it was quite meaty. It seemed like a big portion to me (too big).

TC had the Fish and Chips with coleslaw; the chips were waffle cut.. These were pretty big pieces of fish. We "helped" her with a few pieces but we pretty much knew we would be taking more than half of it home as leftovers (breakfast the next day!).

I had two tacos - One was Scottish Salmon and the other was supposed to be Grilled Shrimp. Turns out they gave me two salmon tacos. I hadn't eaten a bite yet but made the discovery as I was preparing to take my shots of the tacos. This was one of the salmon tacos. Loved the flavor of the fish and the white sauce they used. There was a lot of sliced cabbage, onions and tomatoes as well. So much, that the seafood was obscured. While Rubio's is cheaper, over here, you get what you pay for. The fish is way better quality and the portions are more substantial (but not Claim Jumper-like).

After what seemed like an hour's wait (it was at least a ten minute wait), the server came out with two new tacos - one salmon and one grilled shrimp. I had the whole shrimp taco and a tiny bit of the salmon (saving the rest for later). If I had to choose all over again, I'd get the salmon or any other fish because they really do pack that fish in there, as opposed to five pieces of shrimp. It's fresh and it tastes awesome.

Who else ate at Blue Water?
Kirbie went here for a Fish Taco Tour in San Diego (while riding cool Chevy cars) back in 2010.

Official Website of Blue Water Seafood Market and Grill

and reviews and a short writeup from
yelp, urbanspoon, and The SD Reader

Despite the slight mixup and the delay in getting my food, we enjoyed our meal here. The servers were quick and efficient. One of the gals working there had really nice toned arms. I was so envious! The place was totally bustling after we sat down and when we left, the line was practically out the door.