I loved seeing all of the jacarandas in bloom...
At a highrise called the Ariel Suites, home of the soon to open Javier Plascencia project Bracero, is a relatively new food Italian hall called Pan Bon...
This seems to be the latest trend now, these food halls, with Bottega America, plus another new one opening up soon on Market St. in East Village plus the one in Liberty Station. Well, consider this place the Little Italy version. They opened not too long ago so we were curious to see what it was all about.
Unfortunately, my interior shots of the soaring ceiling and the multicolored wood panels/boards didn't upload properly. You'll have to look at their website or the yelp reviews for interior shots.
When you do walk in, there are glass cases to your left - mini desserts, plus foccacia, salads, and more. There is also a bread, cheese, and meat station. If you sit near the front, you can select what you want from the cases. If you sit in a separate area in the back, there is actually table service. This first visit, we just selected a few items from the cases and sat in the middle.
We shared a macchiato which came with a small cookie, as well as a roasted vegetable and cheese/prosciutto topped foccacia.
Looks nice but it was a bit too bready for my liking. I ended up just eating the topping.
You can get 3 desserts for $5.00. They all have names but I don't remember what they were except that the first one had avocado mousse filling in a chocolate cup, the middle was a panna cotta with an apricot gelee top and the last is a cannoli.
I probably would have liked that chocolate cup dessert better without the avocado filling, but Bert liked it. Sorry no cross section, haha.
Articles/reviews/blurbs on Pan Bon:
Caffe Pan Bon H2 Architects
"New restaurants, grocer coming to Little Italy" SD Business Journal, July 2, 2014 (although the grocer pulled out of the project last month)
Zagat SD
"Pan Bon dishes out around the clock Italian" SD City Beat, January 23, 2015
"Do they eat hamburgers in Italy?" SD Reader, March 5, 2015
Pan Bon
1450 Kettner Blvd.
San Diego, CA 92101
(619) 928-6157
panbon.us
Our verdict based on this visit? We would pass on getting prepared food in the case because it just wasn't that great. Our breakfast foccacias were too bready. I thought maybe I would try the hot foods made to order in a future visit with the Educator GF's. My plan was to go here the last weekend of April with them but unfortunately, it was the same weekend as Art Walk. Antisocial and crowd hating me immediately nixed those plans so a future visit to try their hot food is in the works before I totally write this place off...
2 comments:
I thought this was "Au Bon Pain" at first, haha. I don't don't why, my eyes were just tricking me and I was thinking of when I went to Au Bon Pain in college, I suppose. Looks cute, but bummer didn't seem like it was that outstanding. Hopefully your return visit will be much better.
I am not really itching to go back here now tjat summer is coming. Everyone and their mother will be there, haha.
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