Prep Kitchen Resets With Fourth Location in San Marcos

Prep Kitchen, already established in Little Italy, La Jolla, and Del Mar, has opened a fourth branch in San Marcos. It’s the first location to open since IAM Hospitality Group purchased the brand four months ago; under the new ownership, Prep Kitchen is also expanding to downtown Los Angeles later this summer.

The San Marcos location replaces Stella Public House in Block C at North City, where it joins Urge Gastropub & Common House and Grit Coffee. It’s serving as the launch pad for a revamped menu created by IAM’s chief culinary officer Joe Elevado, a Forbes Five Star award-winning chef and alum of NOBU and Andrea’s at the Wynn in Las Vegas, and corporate executive chef Geno Fontanoza (Katsuya Beverly Hills). The menu, which contains some familiar Prep Kitchen favorites, also includes new dishes that feature Asian influences, from Waygu beef sliders to seared scallops with sweet peas, shimeji and shiitake mushrooms, and black garlic vinaigrette. The new offerings will roll out at Prep Kitchen’s other three locations within the next several weeks.

Open for dinner nightly from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m., with “social hour” from 4 to 6 p.m. nightly and 9 p.m. to midnight Friday and Saturday, the San Marcos eatery will debut brunch on weekends from 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. starting June 16 and launch weekday lunch service from 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. beginning June 21.