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Blue whales are the largest creatures on earth, maybe the largest that ever lived, and last fall they congregated off our coastline in numbers higher than anyone can remember. Hundreds of blue whales had come together off of Southern California to feed on an explosion of krill—the small shrimp-like crustaceans that make up most of their diet.

At times during the fall, dozens of blue whales were visible right off Laguna’s coast. Blue whales can be distinguished from our more typical passerby, the gray whale, in a few ways. For one thing, the blue whales show up at times when we don’t typically see gray whales off our coast because their southern migration hasn’t yet reached this far south. Also, blue whales are twice the size of gray whales, often reaching more than 80 feet. The most obvious difference is their spout. Blue whales have a spout that is narrower and much taller than gray whale spouts, and the puff of water vapor tends to linger and stay visible for a longer time.

Blue Whale Basics

The largest blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) are found in the Southern Hemisphere, where they can reach more than 100 feet in length. The longest blue whale ever recorded was a 108-foot adult female caught during whaling efforts in Antarctica. Those found in the Northern Hemisphere tend to be smaller, but can still reach up to 80 feet in length. Females are larger than males of the same age—the largest perhaps weighing as much as 150 tons (300,000 pounds), comparable in size to a Boeing 737. 

Blue whales have a long and comparatively slender shape compared to other whales and a broad flat “rostrum,” or nose. Their dorsal fin on their back is proportionally smaller than other baleen whales, and true to their name, they have a mottled blue-gray color pattern.
Blue whales are baleen whales, meaning that they have hundreds of large, brush-like overlapping plates in their mouth. During feeding, the whale can take a huge volume of water and food into its mouth, expel the water and trap the food in the baleen to eat.  During the feeding season, the blue whale gorges itself, consuming four tons (8,000 pounds) of krill or more a day.

Blue whales may be found in all oceans of the world but are more common in the Southern Hemisphere than in the Northern Hemisphere. They migrate to more temperate waters, like those found off of Southern California, during the winter months to mate and give birth.

Blue whales are most often seen in smaller numbers off of Southern California during the early fall and often appear by migrating northward just outside the Channel Islands. They are fast, strong swimmers, capable of reaching 30 miles per hour when alarmed, but they usually cruise along at about 12 miles per hour.

Although they may be found by themselves or in small groups, it is more common to see blue whales in pairs. They are sometimes seen in larger groups, but last fall, their appearance so close to the mainland and in such high numbers was unprecedented.

Back From the Brink

Due to their enormous size and speed, blue whales were not targeted by early whalers because they couldn’t catch them with hand harpoons. It wasn’t until the invention of engine-powered vessels and exploding harpoons in the late 1800s that blue whales could be effectively hunted. Blue whales were hunted mostly as an oil supply, as a single large blue whale could yield up to 120 barrels (5,000 gallons) of oil. Once the whaling industry began to focus on blue whales after 1900, thousands were slaughtered. The killing of blue whales peaked in 1931 when almost 30,000 whales were killed.

At that point, blue whales became so scarce that whalers focused on other, more abundant species. While whale populations are hard to measure with accuracy, it is estimated that prior to whaling, there were approximately 350,000 blue whales in the world. That population was reduced by 99 percent before the International Whaling Commission protected them globally in 1966. Blue whales are also listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act and protected by the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

Presently, there are an estimated 3,000 to 4,000 blue whales in the Northern Hemisphere and more than 2,000 just along Southern California. Recovery has been extremely slow for blue whales compared to other whale species, and there is evidence that their recovery has slowed over the last couple of decades. 

The appearance of so many blue whales so close to the coast is exciting for spectators, but troublesome for the whales themselves because they are often in heavily used shipping lanes and are increasingly at risk of being hit and killed by large vessels using West Coast ports.

Obstacle Course in the Ocean

Today, ship strikes are one of the biggest threats to blue whales along the California coast. While the average number of blue whale mortalities from ship strikes has historically been low, the number of strikes is rapidly increasing.

In September 2007, four blue whale deaths due to ship strikes were reported in the Santa Barbara channel. It is not well understood why, but blue whales seem particularly vulnerable to ship strikes, especially at night when they tend to spend more time at the surface than other whales.

In response to this alarming trend, the Los Angeles-based American Cetacean Society continues to support research to better understand the risks associated with ship strikes and looking at ways to shift shipping lanes to reduce the number of ship strikes.

The Santa Barbara-based Environmental Defense Center has taken things a step further and has threatened legal action if federal agencies do not require slower speeds for vessels and ensure that recovery plans are carried through.

A Beautiful Sight

If you head out whale watching in the future, keep your eye out for a long, sustained spout to witness the stunning majesty of the world’s largest mammal, and remember, this species is at risk due to our past and present actions.

As Dave Rastovich recounts, “At one stage the pair surfaced right next to my kayak and looked us in the eye. To have the biggest heart come and say hello is a very humbling experience. For this to happen right outside of America’s busiest cargo port is a contrast that wasn’t lost on our group.”

Montage Laguna Beach employs its own forager to go out and find the best seasonal offerings. Our recent meal at The Loft started with a fairytale pumpkin salad with pomegranate vinaigrette. Chef Casey was inspired to create the salad after the forager brought in fairytale pumpkins. The result is a singular taste and texture experience.

“It’s all about different tastes because that’s how I like to eat,” chef Casey says of his cuisine. “I like to try different things.”

Other standouts on our menu included lentil soup with carrot foam, heirloom Italian wheat pasta with porcini cream and scallops, and butter poached lobster with veal sweet bread and black truffle sauce. Chef Casey strives to bring in different taste sensations—rich, sweet and savory. The spring menu will showcase seasonal ingredients such as spring garlic, Chino Farms radishes, white asparagus, chanterelle mushrooms, fava beans, artichokes and Harry’s Berries strawberries.

Chef de Cuisine Casey Overton (Photo by John Barber)

The Loft is home to it’s own 6-foot wood-burning rotisserie, has its own charcuterie and makes its own sausages. Another standout element is the interactive cheese gallery. “We have around 90 different cheeses from around the world,” chef Casey explains. “This program is specific to The Loft. What makes this experience so different is the fromagier. We concentrate on pairing the cheese with the perfect complement.

“We also have about 70 different honeys,” chef Casey adds. “We love to pair honeys with cheeses.” His personal favorite is a wildflower honey from France.

The Montage Laguna Beach also employs a team of certified sommeliers and a wine list boasting 45,000 bottles and 2,100 labels from around the globe. The sommeliers are happy to suggest wine pairings and introduce guests to new wines. The Loft also hosts The Artistry Of Wine series select Sundays from 2 – 4 p.m., featuring different varietals and vintages from wine regions around the world. With all it offers, The Loft promises a truly bespoke experience day or night.

Wahoo’s Fish Taco and Subway moved from the upper level down to the Atrium Food Court in part to make way for the new upscale Island Cinema, which offers a bevy of alcoholic beverages and better concession stand choices.The reserved theater seats are comfy and spacious, and it’s cool to sip Veuve Clicquot, Schramsberg or a Stella while watching a film that’s free from the gaggle of giggling tweens that make Fashion Island their personal playground. Only two theaters allow alcohol, and they’re 21+ only. However, the food failed to impress. It’s definitely better than Regal’s norm, but we expected more from the menu, which doesn’t measure up to the wine list. The chipotle chicken panini was tasty, but cold in the middle, and the hot dog condiments still come in little plastic packets. But the staff is earnest and enthusiastic, so we’ll hope for an upgraded (if not gourmet) menu in the future.

For now, our pre-film fast and casual meal will be at Wahoo’s, which has a full bar at its new location down the escalator where Design Within Reach once wasn’t—within reach, that is. That place was pricey! Wing Lam and his brothers have outdone themselves with the new location that includes patio seating on the up-to-now underutilized plaza between Dick’s Sporting Goods and Barnes and Noble. We imagine it will be jamming come summertime.

Up where Wahoo’s once was, we’ll soon be able to satisfy our vegan urges (hey, it could happen!) when Native Foods Café opens later this year. We love our meat, but chef/owner Tanya Petrovna’s restaurants at The Camp in Costa Mesa and up in Aliso Viejo offer oddly (for us!) satisfying meatless meals. Perhaps it’s because you can get anything there on the spicy side, which is also why we love Five Guys Burgers in the Atrium Food Court. It may be sacrilege in SoCal, but we prefer the newcomer to In-N-Out. It’s all about freedom of choice, and at Five Guys, the spicy condiment choices trump all that “animal style” off-the-menu stuff.

If you need some sweet after all that spice, follow the line of tweens to the new Casey’s Cupcakes by the kid-friendly Iris fountain. Former O.C. celebutante Casey Reinhardt and family should be proud of their burgeoning business. While most of the other Laguna Beach show beauties are still famous for doing little but starring in subsequent reality shows, Casey is actually working for a living and doing quite well at it, as her sweet empire continues to expand.
-Kedric Francis

Gary has a prime location, being on the corner of Coast Highway and Laguna Avenue, as passersby, tourists, local school kids and anyone else out taking a stroll can smell the freshly baked pizzas wafting out from the kitchen of the corner pizzeria.

“What makes us different is our topping selection—and we make our own dough and our own sauce. The mark of a good pizza is the dough and the sauce,” Gary explains.

Pizza Lounge has an interior that’s crisp, clean and vaguely familiar—the type of place that feels like you’ve been there before, whether it’s in south Orange County or South Carolina. However, Pizza Lounge (for the time being) is available only in Laguna, where it’s been doing brisk business since it opened in 2010.

Thin crust is the house standard at Pizza Lounge, which offers a whopping 27 designer pizzas to its customers. Some of the acclaimed customer favorites include BBQ chicken, goat cheese and sausage, chicken artichoke and the California pepperoni, which are all available in three sizes: the little personal-sized Schmizza, the 14” medium and the 18-inch large.

“We’re inexpensive, fast and good quality. But also, we’re very service-driven,” Gary says. “Our food is consistent, and we have a quality product.”

Aside from just offering whole schmizzas and pizza by the slice, Gary plans to add a boba bar in April that will transform it from a pure pizza, panini and pasta joint into a local destination for boba milk tea. Boba is today’s newest beverage sensation that blends tea, milk or fruit juice and tapioca (yes, tapioca) into a sweet and refreshing cold drink. Boba is served with an extra wide straw that allows the drinker to get all the tiny bits of jelly that sink to the bottom of the cup, giving them a sweet taste and a chewy texture to enjoy. The Boba Bar at Pizza Lounge, as it will be called, will be Laguna’s first boba hotspot, and Gary hopes that it will become the next great grab-and-run spot near Main Beach.

“Hopefully people hanging out at the beach will come in and grab a boba and a slice. Or people will want to get something and take it down to the beach, ” he says.

Coordinated by the Laguna Beach Visitors Bureau, the second annual Laguna a la Carte: A Food and Wine Experience will present a tantalizing combination of prix fixe menus, chef’s tables and hotel packages designed to allow foodies to dip their fingers in the full experience of lavish wining and dining in Laguna in an affordable way.

“Our goal is to introduce both Lagunans and visitors to additional restaurants they have not seen before and expose the breadth and depth of what Laguna can offer,” says Judith Bijlani, president of the Laguna Beach Visitors Bureau. “We have many more restaurants and deals added to the mix than the last year, and this year’s Laguna a la Carte promises to have a wonderfully wide, ethnic and diverse range of restaurants participating.”

Last year, the event drew more than 400 people at the opening night event hosted by Laguna Culinary Arts, followed by a crowd of upwards of 500 at the events held throughout the weekend at the 20 restaurants that participated, two of which were completely sold out. A lineup of guest chefs exhibited their principal menu items, including Craig Strong, Jeff Armstrong, Craig Connole and other big name Laguna chefs. This year, more than 30 restaurants are expected to offer specials from a free glass of house wine with an entrée at OceanView Bar & Grill at Hotel Laguna, to a rum and chocolate tasting sponsored by Eva’s Caribbean Kitchen.

Whether Laguna a La Carte is a vacation destination or a “staycation” retreat, this year the Laguna Beach Visitors Bureau has coordinated packages at the Surf & Sand Resort and Spa, Hotel Laguna and the Inn at Laguna Beach, which will offer discounted rooms to event attendees who wish to engross themselves in the entire ambiance of what the city has to offer. “We hope that people will want to come to Laguna, stay the night and have multiple restaurant experiences,” Judith says.

To add philanthropy to the edible experience, the visitors bureau has cooked up an event that will feature 30 wineries and 20 Laguna Beach restaurants on the Festival of Arts grounds. The Signature Event on March 10 will benefit Children’s Hospital of Orange County and allow the expected 1,000 or so patrons to bite into samplings of local flavors while enjoying live music. A seminar on wine pairings will be hosted by Peter Neptune of The Neptune School of Wine, a wine educator and one of only 118 individuals in North America to hold the title of master sommelier. Tickets for the event range from $75 online to $95 at the door, to $115 for a VIP ticket that includes an early 10 a.m. entry.

Laguna a la Carte sprouted from the imaginations of Karyn Phillippsen and the late Claes Andersen. “For me, this is a really exciting time to pull it together, to see it grow. My vision—I see it becoming educational. People who were afraid to try octopus might try octopus now because it’s wrapped in cotton candy,” Karyn jokes about the possibilities for new experiences. She serves as chairman of the board of directors for the visitors bureau and is a committee chair of Laguna a la Carte.

While some dishes may not be as exotic as sugar-coated seafood, the visitors bureau has recruited a range of restaurants that will create an event ripe for ingesting and imbibing delicious flavors that may become favorites for years to come.

Special Events

March 8

Eva’s Caribbean Kitchen: Rum and chocolate tasting
French 75: Chef’s table dinner

March 9

Mirepoix at Laguna Culinary Arts: Winemaker Tres Sabores presents dinner
K’ya Bistro Bar at Hotel La Casa del Camino: Private rooftop event

March 10

Signature event benefiting CHOC Children’s Hospital on the Festival of Arts grounds: 1- 4 p.m. VIP ticket option includes early 10 a.m. entry.
French 75: Frank family wine dinner
Mirepoix at Laguna Culinary Arts: Chef’s table dinner
Surf & Sand Resort: Sunset & Savor party on the pool deck

March 11

Tivoli Too: Sunday gospel brunch
The deck: Snack, Sip and Surf CockTail Contest and Taco-Eating Challenge

Restaurant Offerings

March 8

Claes Ovation: Three-course wine paired dinner for $65 per person
Dizz’s As Is: Complimentary dessert with the purchase of an entrée
Las Brisas: Complimentary glass of house wine with the purchase of an entrée
Watermarc: No corkage fee and three course prix fixe menu $25 per person

March 9

The Cliff Restaurant: Free appetizer with the purchase of a dinner entrée
Dizz’s As Is: Complimentary dessert with the purchase of an entrée
Las Brisas: Complimentary dessert with mention of event
OceanView Bar & Grill: Complimentary glass of house wine with the purchase
of an entrée

March 10

370 Common Kitchen: Three-course prix fixe menu for $35 per person
Watermarc: No corkage fee and a three-course wine-paired prix fixe menu for
$25 per person

March 11

Dizz’s As Is: Complimentary dessert with the purchase of an entrée
OceanView Bar & Grill: Complimentary glass of house wine with purchase
of an entrée
Sapphire Laguna: Prix fixe menu on the patio
Beach House: Prix Fixe Dinner Menu
Hotel Packages
Surf & Sand Resort and Spa: Special rate offer for Laguna Beach a la Carte
Hotel Laguna: Special rate for a village view room during Laguna Beach a la Carte

For more information on Laguna Beach a la Carte, visit lagunabeachfoodies.com and the LBM Facebook page.