With over a decade of culinary experience, Mar Monte Hotel’s Executive Chef Gunnar Scott Planter is dedicated to serving the highest quality food with an emphasis on local ingredients and purveyors. Planter oversees the hotel’s two restaurants, costa Kitchen & Bar and Café Lido.
Before joining the team at Mar Monte Hotel, Planter spent the last 16 years cooking creative delicious dishes in the San Diego Area. Born in San Diego County and raised in Escondido, Planter got his start at the young age of 16. Planter first began his training in 2006 at French restaurant Mill Fleurs in Rancho Santa Fe, under the mentorship of James Beard Award-winning Chef Martine Woesle, who remains his mentor and friend to this day. He worked there for six years and advanced to Sous Chef, while obtaining his Bachelor’s in Culinary Science from the Art Institute of San Diego. Planter went on to train at several private social clubs, hotels and restaurants where he honed his experience in fine dining and banquets.
From 2014 to 2016, he served as Executive Sous Chef at the Inn at Rancho Santa Fe. Then in 2016, he opened Viewpoint, a restaurant in Del Mar, CA, and developed a menu based on coastal Californian cuisine as the Executive Chef, sourcing his ingredients from local farmers and fisherman.
In 2020, during the Pandemic, he moved on to open Ebullition Gastronomy, a fine dining gastropub in Carlsbad, Calif. specializing in dry aged meats and charcuterie, where he served as Executive Chef, before going on to join the team at Mar Monte Hotel.
