Carlitos Place

First of all, the food is imaginative and fantastic. But the PRICE! We were a large party and were briefly given menus – I noticed a sushi for $ 28 and thought, okay, this is a budget-​blower – I’m going to have to choose carefully. But then Carlito came out, and since he was a personal friend of the guy who brought us all there, he waved his hand to whisk the menus away and said he would take care of us with a five-​course dinner. Oh great, I thought, we’ll get a nice deal. The food was super and most had margaritas. The five courses were a soup, a clam ceviche, and then sushi and sashimi. No dessert. When we got the bill, we were staggered – $ 88 per person. A couple of us had gotten tequila – these were billed at $ 30 a shot. The guy who brought us was embarrassed and argued with Carlito on the side, but what could he/​we do. A memorable meal was punked by the blistering prices. In guess we deserved it – we hadn’t been savvy enough to negotiate the deal before agreeing to it. Trust but verify, as they say.
Two observations:
1. We stayed nine days and soon discovered that fantastic food is EVERYWHERE in Todos Santos, and even along the highway. You don’t need to pay San Francisco prices to get a great meal. For grabbing a taco, you can’t beat a little place called El Poblano (or Los Poblanos?) along Hwy 19, maybe five miles south of Todos Santos on the eastern side.
2. Carlito came and sat at the table next to his friend to regale about this and that, and this wife was a bit of a showman, too. But the meal was a little too much about them and the food – it took away from the focus of visiting among ourselves and enjoying the evening, and the extremely low lighting outside didn’t help. In retrospect, it seems it was about impressing us and then moving us along.
3. If you’re going to do any cooking yourself, visit the organic agricole store along Hwy 19
. Gorgeous produce and they had a health-​type cookie with grains, seeds, etc, and chocolate on top (it’s in the display case) that was out of this world.

The service is poor, the owner (Carlito himself) is arrogant and the prices are high…$ 18 for a small plate of stir fried veggies?! OH NO! Rip off. Also, the hostess was very friendly and tried but got everything wrong. It was cold, they only had ONE blanket for the entire restaurant, annoying dogs licking my purse and sitting at my ankles waiting for me to feed them food — very distracting and made my dining experience frustrating, I ordered stir fried veggies for my very young kids and it came out with hot spices on it and too spicy for my kids to eat so I sent it back, I ordered 2 bowls of rice but only one came out and then when I paid in US dollars, they wouldn’t give me change in US dollars even though they had it. Owner said «we don’t have US Dollars» so I told him people pay you in US Dollars so you must have it and after pushing back, he finally gave me change in US Dollars but said «we are in Mexico» and so I said «Why charge in US Dollars then if we’re in Mexico?» No response. Beware, they want to charge you in US Dollars and pay you back in Pesos (not as valuable) because US Dollars are more valuable. I felt ripped off and the service was poor. Not a good experience, food was AVERAGE/​UNINSPIRED/​BORING– there are SO MANY other delicious places in that area and nearby Todos Santos but this place does NOT stand out. I wouldn’t waste calories on this place.

Destination Asian fusion restaurant featuring fresh seafood and daily chef-​created specials. Once you find this place, you’ll never want to leave! Sushi, sashimi, and may other lovely seafood options (and some non-​marine choices, too). The owner/​chef is on site most of the time and can walk you through the menu — or you can just trust him and go on a culinary journey that won’t be regretted.
Appetizers and sushi/​sashimi can fill you up quickly, but don’t overlook the entrees! Or the cocktails! Very gringo friendly — including bagged ice in all drinks. Really just an amazing restaurant in an amazing setting.
Cash only, and prices are in US dollars.

This place was amazing! We saw the reviews and had to go here to see what it was about. It was located off a dirt road with very little lighting so it’s not easy to find but once you arrive your greeted by his little dog who is very friendly and Carlito himself greeted us at the entrance. He is a very nice guy and told us all about the dishes he had on the menu. As we looked through the menu we had trouble deciding since it all looked good. Carlito said that a lot of his regulars ask for «Carlito’s Way» which would cost us around $ 50 a head but he would make sure we had enough to eat. We said sure and it was a very good decision. He brought our course after course until we couldn’t eat anymore and everything was delicious. There was lobster rolls, yellow fin rolls, jumbo shrimp, octopus, king kong rolls, and probably about 5 other things. All four of us were stuffed after the meal. We also had passion fruit margaritas and wine which was very good too.
The atmosphere was very friendly and they even had a lady singing and playing guitar. I know one reviewer didn’t like the atmosphere but we had no trouble, everyone was very friendly and waited on us the whole time.
It’s well worth the money if your looking for a really nice place to eat or you’re any kind of foodie looking for unique and worth while.

If you want amazing sushi or imaginative fusion using the freshest ingredients you need to find your way to Carlitos Place. Located on a small side street of the small town of Pescadero, Carlitos is a surprise worth the effort. We had our first meal there 15 months ago. And although we live in Southern California we seem to find reasons why we need to return.
Carlos uses fresh organic produce from local farms and fresh seafood from local fisherman combined with a passion to create imaginative dishes full of flavor. Seating is under a palapa surrounded by lush gardens. Don’t let the location mislead you, the food is as good as you will find in the most sophisticated cities.

It’s a little bit hard to find, but once you do! It feels like you’re back at someone home. There are 3 amazing dogs who greet you, and it just feels so welcoming and relaxing. The owner of the restaurant catches the fish himself everyday. The food is honestly amazing!!! You can ask to have the chef bring you different things to eat on his choice. The drinks are also really really good. Honestly been to a lot of restaurants in Cabo and this one is my favorite. Totally worth going all the way !

A fantastic find! Scallops and white crab were first class. Full five stars for accommodating our table of three couples + kids with a smile.

Carlitos place is insane.
We had grapefruit and passion fruit martinis that were the most delicious drinks Ever! So FRESH!
We had fried rice, a shrimp appetizer, a yellowtail rib and a King Kong roll.
We actually just came for a cocktail as we had eaten an hour before but once we started eating we couldn’t stop!!!
I’ve lived in Cabo for around 5 years now and Carlitos place is magical. He really cares about your experience here and the quality of the food he feeds you!
And of course it’s seafood!!! His restaurant is in Pescadero fresh fish straight from the ocean to your plate. All our his fruits and veggies are locally grown. It’s insane. Seriously just get yourself a King Kong roll and thank me later ;)
Oh AND the restaurant is CLEAN and well maintained!

I so much wanted to give this place a 5 star review, and I am sure others will — deservedly so. I just can’t do that after our visit.
Carlitos Place is in many ways a gem of Baja. It is along a dirt road off of a paved road off of the highway. We drove by it the first time (at night) since the road has no lighting (due to the storm a few months ago) and they have no sign from the road. No worries, we asked some locals and went back and found it.
They offer very fresh seafood, quality grade sushi, innovative dishes, along with ok drinks and a few boring non-​seafood dishes. The entire restaurant is outdoors — basically a large palapa style roof over a concrete pad with tables and a nice bar. Most of the year the evening temps are perfect for this style of place. In Dec/​Jan it can be cool at night so bring a sweater. In Aug/​Sept/​Oct it is very hot, so the ceiling fans will be needed, but may not be enough.
Their specialty is seafood. And for a seafood lover such as myself, I had a hard time deciding on what to get and ended up getting several of the smaller dishes and a small amount of sashimi. Everything I ordered was great.
Unfortunately, us seafood lovers are not always with people who also love seafood. My SO does not eat seafood — but to be clear, she chose this restaurant not me (that is true love). And while Carlitos has non-​seafood dishes on the menu, some were not really appealing. My SO, who enjoys spicy food, ordered the chicken curry. It was one of the most boring and uninspired dishes I have ever tasted. I guess there was a little curry in there somewhere.
We ordered a few of the specialty cocktails and a couple glasses of wine. The specialty cocktails were interesting and had nice flavor, though seemed fairly weak. The wines were fine — mostly local Mexico wines, very few of which I have found that I really like.
The above would have generated a solid 4 star review from me with a strong encouragement for you to go there if you love seafood. BUT there is more to our visit.
The evening we were there (during Christmas high season) there seemed to be only one other table with paying customers — a couple at a nearby table. Additionally, there was another table with 7 or 8 persons sitting at it (8 when our drinks waitress would go join them, 7 when she was serving us), and sitting at the head of the table holding court was Carlito himself. I could ignore the facts that:
— the waitress would go sit at that table everytime she left our table
— that Carlito was sitting 15 feet away and never acknowledged us in any way — even though we were the only
— that our other waiter hovered behind us as if he was peering over our shoulders — he had nothing else to do
— that the people at Carlito’s table were served drinks immediately while it took 5 minutes just to pour and serve our wine
But what I could not ignore is the loud streams of profane language that came from the other table all through our dinner — some of it from Carlito himself. Now don’t get me wrong, I certainly drop my own share of F-​bombs and other choice words, even sometimes in public, so I don’t mind them on occasion. But this was continual, loud, and obnoxious the entire time. Us and the other couple glanced over a few times, but they clearly did not notice that we were bothered by this.
It started with just bad conversation but then degraded to a «serious» discussion of uses of the word «f#@k» — with Carlito participating actively in this discussion. At one point someone at the table pulled up a video on his device and played a video that went into glorious detail on the many forms and usages of the F-​word as a noun, verb, and adjective. It then want on to conjugate the verb. They played this video loud enough to be heard throughout the entire outdoor restaurant and bar area. And while I have to admit the video is fun in it’s own way (yes, I had seen it before), it was totally inappropriate in that setting and the owner of the restaurant himself participated in this obnoxious endeavor.
So this very unprofessional lack of respect for the paying customers in the restaurant as very off putting. If the seafood weren’t so darn good, I probably would have given them a 1 star review. And normally I would write off such an occurrence as an off night, but I got the strong impression by the way Carlito and his court were acting that this is not a 1-​time thing and that this type of behavior happens more than rarely.
Final tally — 3 stars
— Seafood dishes (primary menu items) — 5 stars
— non-​seafood dishes — 1 star
— drinks/​bar/​wine — 3 stars
— Uniqueness to the area — 5 stars
— Service — 3 stars
— Professionalism of management — 1 star
Total of 18 stars /​6 categories = 3 stars