Scanned from our menu
THE FISH THAT ONLY LIVES HERE
Totoaba macdonaldi swims in the Sea of Cortez and in no other water on earth. The fillet on your table was raised a few hours up the coast, in that same sea.
- One sea
- Endemic to the Sea of Cortez. It lives in no other water on the planet.
- Wild fishing closed since 1975
- Mexico shut the wild fishery more than fifty years ago. It has never reopened.
- 100% farm-raised
- Every gram we serve is farmed, certified, and traceable to the pen it grew in.
Why it isn't on the menu back home
Wild totoaba sits on CITES Appendix I — the strictest tier of international wildlife protection, the same list that covers sea turtles and elephants. Taking one from the sea is a crime on both sides of the border, and it was the black market for its swim bladder that put it there.
So the only totoaba anyone can legally serve is farmed. Mexico first cracked the export door open in 2022, and very little of it leaves the country. That is the honest reason you have probably never seen this fish on a menu at home — and why ordering it here is the easy part.
You scanned a code to meet this fish. It came with one too.
Santo Mar tags its totoaba so every fillet traces back to the pen it grew in. Here is what is behind yours.
- Species
- Totoaba macdonaldi
- Water
- Sea of Cortez, Baja California Sur
- Farm
- Santo Mar — open-ocean pens off La Paz
- Method
- Farm-raised. Never wild-caught.
- Certified
- 4-star BAP (Best Aquaculture Practices)
- Wild fishery
- Closed since 1975
270,000+
sent back to the sea
Santo Mar — formerly Earth Ocean Farms, the operation that showed CITES farmed totoaba could be traded at all — has run a release program called Totoabas a la Mar since 2015. More than 270,000 juvenile totoaba have gone back into the Gulf of California, 40,000 of them in 2025 alone. The farm that stocks our kitchen is the same one restocking the sea.
Release figures reported by Santo Mar.
Where to find it on the menu
Six dishes are built on it. The Mayan Fish is the one the kitchen is known for — a traditional El Squid Roe recipe, fillet under spinach, garlic cream and Monterey Jack.
- $35
Billy's Ceviche
200g Totoaba fish fillet or 200g shrimp + lemon + celery + cilantro + serrano chili + tomato + cucumber + onion + orange juice + clamato + tostadas
- $35
Fish & Chips
200g Totoaba fried strips + fries
- $35
Totoaba To Taste
200g grilled, devil (spicy) or garlic Totoaba fillet + mashed potatoes + grilled vegetables
- $35
Mayan Fish
200g Totoaba fillet + spinach + white wine + diavola sauce + Monterey Jack cheese + garlic cream + mashed potatoes + grilled vegetables. A traditional El Squid Roe recipe.
- $59
Surf & Turf
200g Totoaba fillet + 450g rib eye + mashed potatoes + grilled vegetables
- $35
Three of Totoaba
200g — three tacos, sustainably sourced Totoaba from the Sea of Cortez (Santo Mar)
Kitchen 9am–10pm daily.