3350 Avenue of the Arts
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
Breakfast, 6-10am mon-fri
Lunch 11am-2pm mon-fri
Brunch 7am-2pm sat/sun
Dinner 5-10pm every day
Bar and Patio 12-11pm daily
Happy Hour 4-7pm
Room Service 24hrs a day
MEET OUR TEAM
We invite you to meet the culinary team of chefs at Silver Trumpet. Their commitment to provide a farm to table dining experience supports this starred restaurant as a culinary leader in Orange County.
Carlos Garcia, Executive Chef
Chef Carlos Garcia approaches his art with an infectious enthusiasm. Carlos says that he has found his professional niche after spending his twenties exploring all the major sectors of the culinary world and, as he put it, having way too good of a time during that process. He began his career working at fine dining eateries in Southern California. His restaurant experience lead to a stint in the Sports & Entertainment sector of the food business working in large stadiums and special event pavilions for a national food service corporation. Then he learned what it was like being his own boss with a successful catering company for a couple of years. “While each position taught me valuable skills and lessons in my chosen profession, none provided a clear path to the success that I knew I could achieve given the right career environment,” admitted Carlos. “That is, until I had the opportunity to move into the hospitality industry with the Sheraton Cerritos. I immediately realized that this was the type of environment that I had been looking for.” Then given the opportunity to create something from scratch, Carlos left the hospitality industry to launch the successful LA Brewing Company in downtown LA. Designing a menu to compliment the vast selection of craft beers, Carlos wowed patrons and critics alike.
Despite all this success, something was still missing for Carlos. With a desire to combine his experience in the hospitality industry with that of an intimate dining restaurant he took the job as Executive Chef at the Silver Trumpet Restaurant. Conveniently located in the heart of Orange County’s Cultural and Business Center and just steps from the Segerstrom Center for the Performing Arts and South Coast Plaza, the Silver Trumpet Restaurant and Bar is the featured restaurant at the Avenue of the Arts Wyndham Hotel. Besides providing a luxurious getaway setting for guests from Los Angeles to San Diego, the hotel is a premier location for corporate functions, conventions, wedding receptions and other special events. Chef Carlos oversees all food service activities for the restaurant and hotel.
Designing menus crafted from the freshest free-range and organic ingredients, Chef Carlos Garcia’s finely prepared contemporary California cuisine is served in a sophisticated dining room surrounded by tranquil lake views and a relaxed modern bar with expanded patio overlooking the Segerstrom Center for the Arts. Each season, his dynamic menu is re-imagined around the freshest locally grown and raised bounty and paired with an expertly chosen selection of wines from around the world.
Paul Rivera, Pastry Chef
Paul Rivera was born and raised in Orange County, and grew up the grandson of a professional artist. He started developing his own obscure abilities as an artist at an early age, beginning a career as a graphic artist just out of high school. Having an interest as a home cook, he was lured to the campus of the Los Angeles Culinary Institute for a demonstration in the early 1994. That night he was so inspired by the controlled chaos in the kitchens, that he made the two year commitment to study under Certified Master Chef Raimond Hoffmeister in preparation for his own journey to some of the finest and most terrifying kitchens in the country.
The connection of art and food, particularly pastry, drew Paul to the pastry chef’s kitchen where he began developing his unique style and worked his way up the chain of command in number of Los Angeles establishments from patisseries to fine dining restaurants. During this time he also won gold, silver and bronze medals in extensive hot food and pastry competitions.
In 2001 Nobu Matsuhisa asked Paul to run the pastry kitchen of his flagship restaurant Matsuhisa Beverly Hills, where Paul combined his strict classical training with Japanese ingredients and aesthetics. In early 2005 Chef Keegan Gerhard recruited Paul to Las Vegas to be a part of the team of chefs to open the pastry kitchens at the Prestigious Wynn Hotel Resort. In 2008 Paul Bartolotta approached Paul with an offer to be the Executive Pastry Chef of his restaurant, Bartolotta Ristorante di Mare, inside of the Wynn Hotel, where Paul would use the finest products and ingredients imported from Italy to maintain the strict Mediterranean ideology of the restaurant.
In 2010 Paul left the Wynn Hotel to move back home to Orange County and begin focusing on catered events, with weddings being the focal point of his interest.
Paul now heads the Pastry Department Operations at the Wyndham Hotel Orange County, where fresh seasonal produce will be the emphasis of the new pastry menus for Hotel Operations and the the newly renovated Silver Trumpet restaurant.
