4 /5 Ying Zhang: Visited Monterey over the weekend to celebrate my birthday, and my partner chose Montrio for my birthday dinner. We experienced an excellent dinner service with great cocktails to pair. Ambiance felt intimate and the staff made us feel special.
Tip for those who don’t know, they provide complimentary bread upon request, so be sure to ask or they will not tell you about it. The corn creme brûlée was too sweet. The duck prosciutto combined with the creme brûlée tasted delicious, but it felt weird eating that as our appetizer when it tasted like dessert. Our mains were the pork chop and the scallops. The seared scallops were divine! Perfectly cooked and had a nice meaty bite to them. I thought the pork chop was also prepared very nicely. It tasted very similar to chinese siu yuk actually. Both of these large plates came with risotto, and maybe it’s personal preference but we found the risotto to be underwhelming. A bit too heavy, and did not hit the mark for us. The risotto with the pork chop had a sweet sauce on top that was a bit too sweet for our tastes.
For dessert, we had a very decadent chocolate cake that came with pop rocks sprinkled on top. The pop rocks were fun because I have not had them in years, but too much since the cake itself was already heavy. We received complimentary sorbet for my birthday, and I enjoyed the sorbet over the cake. Thank you for the great service.