World-class cook

Just about anyone who’s walked through the doors of Oysters

restaurant can’t be surprised that chef Scott Brandon will be cooking

up a meal for an even more elite crowd than usual this Wednesday:

Brandon will be showing off his Asian-influenced cuisine for the

prestigious James Beard Foundation winemaker dinner.

Brandon has been with Oysters for eight of the restaurant’s 15

years and has helped the East Coast Highway spot stand out in the sea

of gastronomical choices Newport-Mesa offers. The dinner he’s

planning is delicious evidence of how he’s done it: a six-course menu

that included plum-wine-braised veal short ribs with Tuscan kale and

shiitake mushroom gravy, bleu cheese produced in Point Reyes and

oysters.

The invitation is a well-deserved honor for Brandon and the

Oysters staff. It is also a fine feather is the chef’s hat of this

community, scrumptious proof that fine living, and dining, is alive

and well as we begin 2004.