Maro Wood Grill

We were on a search for an organic steak and found this wonderful restaurant! The food was absolutely delicious!!! A must when you’re in Laguna Beach :)

Shishito roasted and edamame… not Argentinian for sure. They don’t have pizza anymore? Empanadas no olives, egg or onions with the beef. And burgers in non toasted bun… liked them in my previous visit a while back… it Feels like they dropped the ball. This visit was disappointing for sure. very American and little true Argentinian food… the waiter does not speak Spanish or knows his Argentinian wines. Dessert is their award winning bread pudding. Where is a flan con dulce de leche… grilled blood sausage and sausages please… it’s a wood grill… need a good parrillada to go with Quilmes …

Always great, particularly if you’re more than 2. Great vibe. Small place, few tables, Chef pays attention to detail. Favorite dishes are burger and the rack of lamb. If you’re looking for a night out with friends, this is a good choice in South Laguna. Great food!

This place is AWESOME!!! One of the juiciest grass-​fed burger I have ever had. The service was friendly and quick. Highly recommended!

Amazing service. We just walked in and they got us an awesome table after a last minute cancellation. Been here before and their food is incredible. Great service. Phenomenal food. Highly recommend.

Don’t believe their posted hours. We showed at 9:08 pm on a Saturday night and they’re «open» till 10:00 pm. The cook says they’re open and to have a seat. We do. The waiter serves another table with food, then stops by and says they’re closed. What? His argument is they haven’t been all that busy, so they’re just not interested in serving anymore. All that was missing was «get lost.» Isn’t that special. These guys must be relatives of Jerry Seinfeld’s «Soup Nazis.»

My wife and I went to Maro this past weekend.
Delicious steak and empanadas. They have a pepper side dish that is also really tasty.
The staff, including Stephano, is supper friendly and attentive.
Sangria is one of the best in OC. Definitely worth leaving Forest Avenue area for fine Laguna Beach restaurant.

This was our first time at this restaurant. I liked the vibe and the décor. Overall, a very good experience. We started with the spicy chicken empanada, very good. I had the baseball cut sirloin and my wife the lamb chops. Both very good with a hint of mesquite. We ordered a nice bottle of wine that paired nicely with our dishes. The server was friendly and attentive.
I’ll be back.
One small negative: ditch the $ 1.00 fee for a substitution. I only sub’d the wedge salad (which came already with the rib eye) for the potatos. After what we paid for everything else, really $ 1.00?

AWESOME homemade empanadas. Yum! The grilled green beans r sooo yummy as well. Friendly staff & good tunes. White & red sangria. What more do you want?

First time here and I’m Argentinian. This was not good. The meat was fatty and hard. My husbands dish was not good either. The only thing that was tasteful was the wine. I think Laguna Beach is so desperate for good food, they have lost what good food is. The empanadas are ok. Had the Argentinian short ribs and the worst I’ve ever had. Husband had the Ribeye Steak and it was like cardboard. We were hopeful for this place to be good and no luck. I don’t understand the hype. Not sure we would ever recommend to our Argentinian friends, they would laugh at us.

I love Maro Wood Grill. One of the best restaurants in Laguna Beach. My favorite dishes are the mesquite grilled shishito peppers, green beens and the extra yummy banana bread pudding (voted best dessert in the OC)! Highly recommended!

My wife and i went to maro grill during our visit to California. We were immediately greeted by a waiter and seated. To start we each had a glass of amazing Malbec from Argentina.
For apps we got the edamame. I’ve never had anything like it smokey flavor and salt with a side of fresh ginger. They were addicting and I wish I could bring some back home with me to jersey. We also got empanadas 1 mushroom and 1 chicken. They were paired with garlic aioli. The dough was so good but the filling sold me especially after dipping into the aioli. I am from Argentina so I have huge standards and this tasted authentic with a twist and I loved it. My favorite one was the mushroom.
For entrees we ordered the famous maro burger, the steak and eggs, and a yellow fin tuna salad. The maro burger is by far the best burger I’ve ever had in my life! It makes a huge difference when you get grass fed beef. Juicy very flavorful and the side slaw was just as good. The steak and eggs were just as good tender juicy steak, ordered medium rare. With chimmichurri and 2 sunny side eggs WITH RUNNY YOLKS!!! I love when the egg yolk compliments the steak. And it came with potatoes that had a kick so addicting especially for me I’m not a huge fan of potatoes. The salad was great. Our server told us the tuna was caught that morning, I’ve never had fish that tasted so fresh.
For dessert we got the banana bread pudding with dulce de leche. Awesome I’m not surprised why it keeps winning awards.
Overall I loved this restaurant, and if i lived in the area I would go here on the regular. But I guess now we have a reason to come back to Cali once a year.

Had dinner here last night and got some empanadas and shared the ribeye. Empanadas are great. The garlic aioli sauce was delicious. Steak was really flavorful. Potatoes that came with it was just alright. It looked like breakfast potatoes. Cut up so tiny!
Bread pudding — YUM!
The patio just gets so loud!
Little too pricey ($ 130 for a dinner on a Tuesday just seems a lot!)
But overall experience was good.

They do things right here. Tried for two days to get a table and finally wrangled a four top at a reasonable hour for the kids. We actually got there early and were seated immediately. The beef empanadas were great. My wife enjoyed the shishito peppers (not my taste at all but I did eat some). My son had the Maro burger. 8 oz of grass fed beef cooked to perfection. The baseball steak my wife ordered to split with the daughter was literally a baseball sized hunk of meat, again perfectly medium rare. I had the short ribs. Delicious! The roasted potatoes have a touch of red pepper bite that was just right. Service was excellent and I took a few minutes to admire the custom built, wood fired grill.
A definite recommend from me!

Want to cozy up with fab food great service and a small intimate Argentine experience? This is IT!
Maro Grille (I love the skirt steak) totally enjoyable. The Empanadas Devine. Mushroom my personal favorite! Hard not to have The Skirt Steak each time we are here but fish, chick even the burger is crazy great.

I had the most amazing experience here! Nick our server was on point. Kind and very handsome! Must try the organic sangria! The empanadas were to die for!!! Please please please try this place!!!

Came here on 4÷24÷15 to celebrate a friend’s birthday as she requested for us to try something new.
I had high expectations for Maro specially because I love desserts so I was really looking forward to their Banana Bread Pudding which supposedly got them the Golden Foodie Most Delicious Dessert award for 2013 and 2014.
Anyhow, I had ordered 2 empanadas (mushroom and spinach) and both were outstanding. I also ordered a clam chowder which was very different from the usual clam chowder as the Argentine version is soupy (not thick and creamy). The soup was just OK.
For dessert, we were given 2 served in ramekins — Banana bread pudding and Tarte tropezienne. The bread pudding was just OK so not sure if this was on off night but I loved the Tarte T.
Service was outstanding though.

Best organic hamburger I’ve ever had!!! Cute little place very clean very nice servers! My hamburger was cooked to perfection, I also enjoyed the red organic wine :)

I had high expectations of this place as we were very warmly greeting by both the host and our waiter upon our arrival, but I was sadly disappointed by the end of our meal. The empanadas were amazingly good, but everything else was not as much. The organic salad was refreshing but nothing special, and the lamb dish was very small given the price ($ 36 for three pieces but each piece was small). I also felt that the brussel sprouts on the lamb dish were a little tough to cut through with my knife — not sure why.
I’m not a huge fan of bread pudding but we ordered it anyway since it was noted as award-​winning on the menu. I thought it was good but I’ve had better. I did really like the peanut butter bread pudding though — that was unique!

OC Restaurant week outing #2.
OC restaurant week did fail me. I wasn’t really impressed with the choices they had on their list. My experiences at the restaurants I tried were OK. Nothing phenomenal about the restaurants I tried.
I chose Maro because the bread pudding is «award winning» so I was curious about the dessert. It was on the pricier side at $ 50 per person but it included wine or sangria and had quite a few options to choose from. I love the open kitchen but I sat right at the corner. The grill was right in front of me so I watched them cook some items and it kept me warm.
I ended up choosing the clams, steak, and bread pudding. I also tried the spinach and the mushroom empanadas. The empanadas were delicious. I would come back and take a few of these home with me. The mushroom empanada was my favorite of the two I tried. It was a good amount of clams for the appetizer. They were tasty. The steak was delicious. Very thick and juicy. The bread pudding was my favorite part of the meal. It was in a bourbon sauce and tasted amazing. I understand why it’s award winning. I wish there was more though. It was so good.
I was disappointed that they ran out of some of the items on the restaurant week menu. I originally wanted the pork with polenta but they ran out of polenta. I didn’t want cauliflower instead. I wouldn’t touch that so I decided to get the steak instead. My cousin wanted the lobster but they ran out of that. She doesn’t eat red meat so her choices were limited. They let her get the salmon instead but it isn’t lobster and it isn’t worth the $ 50 price for restaurant week.
It was ok an experience. The atmosphere was nice in this small restaurant. The staff was friendly. I’d want to come back for the empanadas or maybe a drink. I have been obsessed with my Laguna Beach visits so hopefully i’ll be back in the area soon.