There’s a small, grassy area on the back grounds of the newly restored and reopened Hotel El Roblar in the picturesque Central Coast town of Ojai. It’s past the hotel’s idyllic pool and a handful of stylishly appointed bungalows, and it’s where guests can find Abra and Cadabra, the hotel’s two giant tortoises. Although it may seem odd that a hotel would be home to these prehistoric-looking reptiles, one of its owners, Eric Goode, is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker and a conservationist who founded the nearby nonprofit, the Turtle Conservancy.
The dichotomy of a high-end, adults-only hotel dedicating some of its space to nature seems right at home in this elegant valley, which has been a destination for its healing hot springs, spiritual retreats, stunning landscape and overall hippie mentality for many years. With the restoration of the Hotel El Roblar, though, and a handful of new restaurants along its main drag, it’s become a bona fide dining destination as well.
That’s not to say there hasn’t been anywhere to eat or stay in the traditionally agricultural town, which boasts a meager population of around 7,600 (including some wealthy former Angelenos). The Ojai Valley Inn, a luxury resort with several restaurants on its sprawling grounds, has been in operation for more than 100 years. In recent years, smaller boutique hotels like the Capri and the Hummingbird Inn have undergone renovations by the Shelter Social Club group as well.
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The town’s Spanish-style main dining and shopping stretch, Ojai Avenue, only really spans a handful of blocks. It’s had a few bursts of energy in recent years, as pizza place Pinyon opened in 2021, while 2022 saw the openings of bakery/Burmese restaurant the Dutchess and small plates and raw bar specialist Rory’s Place. In 2024, sisters Rory and Meave McAuliffe also opened Rory’s Other Place, the more casual daytime cafe and provisions shop.
This year alone, Los Angeles import Highly Likely, barbecue restaurant Joplin’s and the listening room and mezcal bar Radio Roma have all opened their doors. The arrival (or return, as it were) of Hotel El Roblar and its main dining attraction Condor Bar is simply the latest punctuation mark.
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Established in 1919, the hotel is the oldest in Ojai, although it has undergone numerous iterations since its founding. The property was purchased in 2019 by Goode, architect Ramin Shamshiri, restaurateur Warner Ebbink and filmmaker Jeremy McBride, and after a six-year renovation that included refurbishing the lobby’s stone-stacked fireplace and appointing the room with vintage Monterey-style furnishings, the Spanish Mission-style hotel reopened this summer.
“Right now, you have this great fulcrum of activity in the downtown core,” McBride said. “We have this multigenerational guest: The people who have lived here for 30, 40 years are coming for a cocktail and to hang out, as well as tourists who are visiting.”
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Chef Brandon Boudet, Ebbink’s partner in restaurants like Little Dom’s in LA and Bar Lou in Montecito, was brought on to run the hotel’s culinary program. Condor Bar’s kitchen is outfitted with a Santa Maria-style grill, which informs a lot of the dishes on its Cal-Mexican menu (think: Santa Barbara sea urchin tamales and pork ribs al pastor).
“The original idea was for the food to be Old World California, but then we started digging into that, and of course it’s going to have Mexican influence,” Boudet said. “One of my biggest inspirations was looking at a Baja cookbook that has a map of California that goes all the way down to Baja as one region.”
Other new options in town are leaning into the LA all-day casual genre. Highly Likely, which serves bowls, salads and sandwiches during the day and morphs into a dinner menu of pastas and steak frites, opened a sweeping indoor-outdoor third location in Ojai in May. (Its first two restaurants are in the LA neighborhoods of West Adams and Highland Park.)
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“In the past, I’ve opened restaurants driven by whether it was the next logical step,” said Highly Likely partner Cary Mosier of the move to Ojai. “I’d rather open in locations we’re inspired by than what purely makes sense on an Excel spreadsheet. I love this town.”
Although Mosier and executive chef and partner Kat Turner were anticipating that LA transplants and visitors from the city might not frequent the restaurant because they were already familiar with it, the response has been the opposite.
“They’re excited we’re here,” Turner said, noting feedback from locals has been positive as well.
“It’s an entitlement in LA that you have access to great restaurants all the time. There was a deep sense of gratitude when we opened,” Turner said. “I think that our menu easily translates across many demographics. It has a generally broad appeal with a point of view.”
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Two months ago, chef Saw Naing, who moved from Los Angeles to Ojai in 2021 to open the Dutchess, debuted a dream project with his wife Brittany. (Naing still maintains his role as chef-partner at the Dutchess.) At Joplin’s, Saw Naing is taking traditional Texas-style barbecue and adding Burmese and Indian accents to it, including unique spice blends and sides such as masala potato salad and garlic slaw. Joplin’s is young, but it’s already fitting in with a statewide rise in cross-cultural California barbecue.
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“The big restaurant opening is kind of a dying breed these days,” Saw Naing said of opening the casual counter-service restaurant in a converted home, which is decked out with green walls and rock ’n’ roll poster-plastered bathrooms. “Here, if we sell out, we close the door.”
He added: “I love cooking live fire, smoking low and slow all day long. Yes, I’m using traditional Texas technique, but I’m more about spice. I make my own masalas.”
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Of course, Ojai being a resort town, there is a fair share of challenges, such as a local community that’s driven more by value than by visitors who are willing to splash out on a big meal. The Naings are introducing a Tuesday taco night, for example, to appeal to neighbors.
“There’s what they call Old Ojai and New Ojai,” Brittany Naing said. “Old Ojai isn’t as open to change, whereas us New Ojai folk are like, let’s open some cool stuff. And the Old Ojai folks don’t have as adventurous of palates, but luckily Saw’s food is always f—king delicious.” Others around town have mentioned the same dichotomy between longtime locals and newer businesses. It’s an imperfect balance, navigating generations and wealth gaps and tourism in a town this small.
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“Within a small town, you feel the high tides and low tides more,” Mosier of Highly Likely added. “There was a lot of feedback to us about getting local buy-in, so we made a big effort to connect with local restaurateurs.”
That said, those who have been in the hospitality game in Ojai for a while see this new wave of options as a good thing for both locals and tourists.
“It’s overwhelmingly positive,” said Ben Kephart, the general manager and a longtime staff member of the Ojai Valley Inn, of the area’s growth. “Having more local options enriches the overall Ojai experience, supports the community and pushes all of us to deliver at the highest level.”
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“A rising tide lifts all ships,” said Meave McAuliffe of Rory’s Place. “We’re starting to see a real restaurant community of folks who have the same mentality, who understand the utmost importance of sourcing and being part of that [agricultural] community here.”
She added: “There’s no new building in town. The new spots are actually just filling holes and breathing life into this tiny little main street that’s been kind of abandoned. Plus, we’ve got a lot of new, good-paying jobs for young folks.”