Dear Jane's in Marina del Rey is the winning seafood-focused successor to Culver City's soon-to-close Dear John's
As dining rooms go, the open floor plan of Dear Jane’s sets up enough visual cues to convey the essence of the restaurant in less than 30 seconds.
All of this serves as a backdrop to the view beyond the picture windows, framing Basin C in Marina del Rey harbor and its literal sea of boats. In daylight, the scene is a chaos of masts that fill the sky and blot out the apartment buildings across the water. At night, when floating shapes become indistinct, the darkness radiates calm and reflects the action back on the usually full room.
In 2019, chef Hans Röckenwagner and his wife, marketing executive Patti Röckenwagner, aligned with Josiah Citrin, whose Santa Monica flagship, Mélisse, was in the middle of a renovation at the time, to revive once-famed. Actor Johnny Harlowe opened the restaurant in 1962 — supposedly at the behest of his buddy Frank Sinatra, who was an early regular.
As a child of the 1980s who grew up near an East Coast port city, I have my own sentimental streak for this style of restaurant. I passed through Dear Jane’s doors for the first time and blinked at the split-level room configuration and the gorgeous low-slung tongue-and-groove ceiling. Faraway memories lit up my brain with two words: Chart House. There was a location of the higher-end seafood chain — which was founded in 1961 and based for years in San Diego — in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor.
Citrin and Röckenwagner give bacony clams casino a respectful upgrade with smoked piquillo peppers, chorizo and bread crumbs scented with Meyer lemon. Servers materialize tableside to whisk together the ingredients for what is essentially Thousand Island dressing to ladle over shrimp Louie. I’m happy to double up on shrimp with a course of garlicky scampi tangled in tagliolini, the strongest among four pastas.
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