Rio Grill
The pork belly is cured, smoked and baked across three days, then flash fried to order and finished with brown sugar and a hit of jalapeño powder. Rio Grill opened in 1983 as Mustards Grill's coastal sister and went independent in 1988.
Why go
It is not in the village. It sits in the Crossroads shopping center where Highway 1 meets Rio Road, which is the last junction before the Carmel Valley turn, and it has been there since the year it opened. Ken Donkersloot and Mona Calis bought it in June 2020 through Coastal Roots Hospitality, which also holds Montrio Bistro in Monterey and Tarpy's Roadhouse out by the airport. The menu names its farms where it can: the fire roasted artichoke is a Castroville one, from the artichoke town you drive through on Highway 1 to get here, and the mushroom risotto specifies Earthbound Farm spinach from the valley up the road.1
Order this / avoid
- Order: the candied pork belly at $19.95, which the kitchen describes as
Cured, Smoked and Baked in Rio's unique 3 day process, before being Flash Fried and Finished with a Brown Sugar Glaze and hint of Jalapeño Powder.
Then the Castroville artichoke, and the haystack onion rings with guajillo ketchup. Menu read 21 August 2026.1 - Avoid: driving into Carmel-by-the-Sea to find it. The address is Crossroads Boulevard, three miles from the beach end of Ocean Avenue.
What locals & experts say
- Ken Donkersloot, owner, November 2020:
The Rio Grill's founding members made that wise decision back in the early 1980s. I couldn't be happier that they did!
2 - Rio Grill (venue site), on the lineage:
Originally opened in 1983 as a coastal sister to Mustard's Grill, Rio Grill became independently owned in 1988.
3
Good to know
- Timing: lunch, dinner and weekend brunch, with a happy hour and a full bar.
- Booking: through the venue's own site, or call for takeout.
- The group: Tarpy's Roadhouse, also on this day out, is the same owners.
- Getting there: Highway 1 at Rio Road, which is where you turn for Carmel Valley.
Verdict
could-visit — Open since 1983 and still running one dish worth the drive on its own: pork belly cured, smoked and baked across three days, flash fried to order and glazed with brown sugar and jalapeño powder. The artichoke is Castroville's, which is the town you pass on Highway 1 to get here, and the risotto names Earthbound Farm for its spinach. It sits a rung below the Carmel rooms with standings because nobody outside the business has written about the cooking in anything we could read, and it is on Jeff's own Monterey list.