2773 N Main St, Santa Ana, CA 92705
Pricing - $$/$$$ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - Japanese, Fusion
www.geishahouseoc.com/

I really wasn't expecting much when I came in, and I got what I expected. To be honest, I came to Geisha House because the food truck my friend and I wanted to catch wasn't at its scheduled location for lunch; he was hungry for Asian fusion food so this was the closest place to where we were. I didn't have high expectations because the reviews on Yelp had it at 2.5 stars. Walking inside and sitting down, we ended up both making fun of the decor and the restaurant's attempt to be "posh/chic." Also, he noted how the chefs weren't actually Japanese which is why they didn't respond when he spoke to them from the entrance in Japanese.


So we were there for lunch, and the place was fairly empty. Complimentary edamame was given but it was unsalted/unseasoned. I ate it for healthiness' sake. The lunch menu was cheaper than the dinner/regular menu but still considerably priced for unauthentic Japanese fare. Our meals came with miso soup which I found to be a tad grainy and uninspired.


My friend got the "Screaming Geisha" roll and let me try some. I didn't really want to order sushi there considering the look of the place but since he ordered, I gave it a shot. It was okay. I couldn't really tell that I was eating sushi though. I know that a sign of good sushi is the lack of fishiness but there seemed to be a lack of flavor in general in the roll aside from the spiciness in the spicy tuna filling. I think what did it was that the sushi wasn't cold either. Lackluster sushi makes me sad but hey, props on presentation!


My entree was the filet mignon. I didn't think that it would be such a small piece for the price I paid nor did I expect for the meat to be drenched in teriyaki sauce. That definitely masked the natural flavors of the beef; not all that great. The other food on my plate was pretty good - I actually liked the salad and its dressing. The rice was nice and sticky as Japanese rice ought to be. Unfortunately, the main star of the dish was supposed to be the beef, and I was unimpressed. I don't have any plans on returning.

415 S Main St, Orange, CA 92868
Pricing - $ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - Mexican
http://anepalcoscafe.com/

After some dress searching, my friend and I decided that it was time to fill our tummies with deliciousness so she suggested this place that had been bookmarked on her Yelp for a while. It was a bit after the lunch rush hour so luckily the place wasn't crazy. Though the Yelp reviews had praised chilaquiles immensely, I was in the mood for a meaty sandwich so I didn't go with the suggestions - however, next time I definitely shall!


My meal was the Cuban sandwich, a monster of a meal. It had chicken, pork, AND ham on Ciabatta bread with lettuce, tomato, and chipotle aioli. It came with a choice of soup or salad as well so I went with the soup of the day which was a roasted red pepper bisque. I thought that the sandwich was quite yummy but a different take on a Cuban sandwich than what I was used to. The meat was overwhelming actually so I only managed to have half the sandwich. Taste-wise, pretty good. As for the soup, it tasted like I was drinking cheese dip. I wasn't impressed with that part. My friend had the green tomatillo crepe with chicken. I found it tasty but with less than desired sauce. Overall a pleasant experience but I'll have to come back for the star of the show next time!

The summer is pretty much over but a few fruits/foods of the season are still around. With the impending lack of in-season peaches upon us, I finally decided that I needed to make a peach cobbler since Duc had mentioned it so long ago. Actually, it was supposed to be the prize for him for whenever he fixed his oven but since that ended up being quite the hassle, I took it upon myself to make one at home. My search for cheap peaches at Korean supermarkets was fruitless so I went with nectarines instead. What a great alternative! The nectarines stopped the cobbler from being overly sweet and definitely added a nice tang and firmness to the dessert. I'm going to make this again fairly soon I believe. It was especially delicious warm with vanilla ice cream.

Step 1: Ingredients

• cinnamon, to taste
• nutmeg, to taste
• 1/2 cup butter, unsalted
• 1/2 large lemon, juiced
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup + 1 tbsp flour
• 2 cups sugar, divided
• 4 lbs nectarines, diced

Step 2: Prepping the ingredients
Dice up your nectarines. If you want to remove the skins, blanch them and take the skins off. I didn't because a lot of nutrients are in fruit skins so I wanted to keep them on. The pieces of the nectarine don't have to be perfectly diced though because a cobbler doesn't have to be perfect by any means. In a separate bowl, combine 1 cup of flour w/1 cup of sugar, the baking powder, and the salt. Add milk slowly until ingredients are moist; add remaining flour and mix until smooth.

Step 3: Creating the filling & layering
In a large pot or saucepan, heat the nectarines, lemon juice, and remaining sugar (1 cup) on high, stirring constantly. Preheat the oven at 375°F. While that is going on, put the butter in a 13x9 baking dish and let it melt in the oven. When the butter has melted, pour your batter into the dish WITHOUT stirring. When the nectarines have softened, use a slotted spoon to add the fruit to the dish WITHOUT stirring the contents. There will be a lot of leftover juice/liquid that you don't want to add to the dish lest it mess up the consistency of the cobbler.


Step 4: Finishing
Once you have all the layers in place, sprinkle on the cinnamon and nutmeg as you see fit. Put in the oven for 40-45 minutes or until the dough is golden brown. Take out and enjoy. This tastes great when warm and with ice cream!

BACON MANia - Food Truck, Orange County, CA
Pricing - $ | Dining - Casual, To-Go | Cuisine - American
http://baconmaniatruck.com/live/

I used to think that the food truck sensation was just something that was a part of Durham when I was in school but then I realized that it was something big in Los Angeles and Orange County as well. I'm glad that I'm in the area! In my friend's and my hunt for The Lime Truck for free lunches, we came across this truck that I had read about through Yelp - the BACON MANia truck!


Because I had already eaten lunch, I wasn't feeling like snagging any food for myself but I knew how much Duc loved bacon and that his workplace was nearby; the decision to purchase from this bacon goldmine of a truck was made. I wanted to bring him stuff for lunch so I settled on the E-I-E-I-Ouch Sliders and Brownie Bites though the rest of the menu was pretty tempting as well.


I was really curious about the bacon bites so I decided that I would have one of them and save the other for Duc. It was seriously a heart attack on a toothpick. The bacon-covered brownie was very rich and chocolatey on the inside but the fact that the entire thing was deep-fried and then doused with chocolate syrup was overwhelming. I think that it would have been perfectly fine without the frying and syrup but they took it overboard. I learned my lesson not to have that again. As for the sliders, they were so delicious. I mean, lamb, beef, and applewood smoked bacon with jalapeno Chevre goat cheese and Havarti crisps on lettuce and toasted buns was phenomenal. I only took a bite of one but thumbs up for BACON MANia!

My friend called me the day before The Lime Truck was going to give away its free 100 lunches as part of its participation on The Food Network's Great Food Truck Race and asked me to go with her. I'm always up for free food and was actually a tad excited about hunting down the truck at a "secret" location. Apparently it wasn't all too secret since they were normally in one of two places but the fun part was figuring out exactly where the free lunches would be. My friend guessed that the correct truck would have the chef present so she and I drove there early in the morning to stalk out the location. I got some stalker-ish pictures too.


When we got to the location about 15 minutes before the location would be tweeted out, we saw a modest camera crew interviewing the chef. Score! We sat there for a while until we saw other people start arriving. Though we were technically the first people there, we weren't the first in line according to the numbers we were handed out.


7th in line for me still meant that I'd get a free lunch though! Instead of waiting until noon, they actually started rolling out the lunches before then so I didn't have to wait too long.


The goodies for the morning were smoked wild coho salmon, crispy potato, haricot vert, bacon, and tomatillo aioli for the entree with a cup of limeade to wash it down and a container of tomatillo sauce from a sponsor. To be honest, we both found the salmon way too salty but figured that it was probably a result of the truck having to churn out 100 meals very quickly. The rest of it was very delicious though and the limeade was great to cleanse the palate of saltiness. It was a nice chunk of salmon for free as well.


Other food trucks were smart enough to park their vehicles nearby since they figured there would be a crowd. We got tempted by the Mun-chee5 truck which had a red velvet funnel cake on its menu. How could we resist? It was pretty good but not as amazing as we figured. With sweet blackberry cream cheese, powdered sugar, whipped cream, and fresh berries, it was a great way to supplement our salt with sugar, haha. Fun times were had on a food trucking adventure!

1740 S Euclid St, Anaheim, CA 92802
Pricing - $/$$ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - Vegetarian, Vietnamese

A fellow cooking friend suggested that we check out this place he had driven by often but not eaten at before; he referred to it as Pho Veggie because that was the prominent sign on the restaurant though its official name is Thuyen Vien. We had looked up dishes to try out based on Yelp reviews but we were also curious in general about how one could recreate pho and its broth without using meat. We decided that we'd try a couple of dishes together instead of having to choose one on its own.


The first thing to do was to choose our drinks. One of the common accolades on the Yelp reviews was for the fresh coconut so my friend was interested in that but not right away; we got Thai tea instead. Pretty standard if you ask me to be honest. It came pre-mixed so it was probably either powdered stuff or from a bottle. At least it wasn't bad.


The first plate to come out was the garlic "chicken" which many had said was delicious. Boy was it! I liked the texture immensely, and the sauce that was used had a good amount of tang. I actually didn't think it was very garlicky but more tangy. My only complaint was that there wasn't enough of the chicken. I mean, we shared the dish but even if I had had it alone, I probably would not have gotten full. Rice costs extra too by the way.


The next thing to come out was the "beef" pho which was mainly mushroom. I believe the broth was made from mushrooms from its taste. However, when I say that I could taste the mushroom, I don't mean that it was a vegetable-tasting broth. It did taste like beef pho. It was chock-full of white and Enoki mushrooms, tofu, vegetarian beef, and noodles. We both agreed that it was a great bowl of "beef" pho.


The last plate was just of stir-fried tofu and bamboo shoots. Interestingly enough, my friend had never had bamboo before so we ordered this by my urging. He ended up really liking it. I thought that the star of this dish was the sauce the tofu and bamboo shoots were in. It went really well with white rice because it had a sour kick to it but was appropriate for the shoots and their pungent smell. The tofu in general at this restaurant was good (I mean, it's a vegetarian restaurant so it needs to be good at this stuff, right?), and I liked the casual atmosphere. I feel like sometimes specialty restaurants have a pompous air to them but this one was very nice and family-owned. I'd definitely come back for more of their options; they had probably more than 75 dishes. Good stuff indeed.

Kaisen Kaiten - 3855 S Bristol St, Santa Ana, CA 92704
Pricing - $$ |  Dining - Casual | Cuisine - Japanese (Sushi) | Reservations - Unavailable

[My first review of this place can be found here.] I had a craving for sushi one day and figured that since one of my interviews was going to be near the place, I asked Duc if I could take him to a revolving sushi bar for his first time ever. Of course he said yes; who would deny a sushi dinner courtesy of me anyhow? We got there at 4pm to have a late lunch/early dinner on a Monday, and it was empty enough that we could seat ourselves at the bar and take our time with the meal. Though Kaisen Kaiten is a revolving sushi bar, you also can write down your order and put it into a container that is conveyor-belted to the chefs. We got a lot actually.


While waiting for the food, I couldn't resist and grabbed a 99 cent plate of seaweed. I love this crunchy, crisp seaweed because it is covered in a savory sesame oil with plenty of flavor and goodness. For under a dollar, it was a steal!


The first things to come out from our order were the hand rolls. We got two of the specials for the day which meant that hand rolls were only $1.75. I had the negitoro which was just divine while Duc had the spicy tuna. I love how jam-packed the rolls are with fish - it seems like hand rolls are things that sushi places tend to skimp on in terms of fish but these were fantastic.


We naturally ordered the crunchy roll because that is just a non-traditional guilty pleasure every time I go to a sushi place. It was okay here. I've definitely had better but I think what ruined it for me here was that avocado was included which generally overpowers other flavors.


Hamachi sashimi! My goodness - this was the first sashimi we had for dinner and oh my did it melt in our mouths. The fish was cool and so appetizing; it felt like yellowtail heaven on my tastebuds. It gleamed on our plate and on our palates. Delish!


Duc was curious about the baked mayo salmon, and I wanted my other staple - Inari. The inari was pretty good with the rice being cooked just right; a lot of places will have the rice too sticky or dry but this was great. The baked mayo salmon was very interesting because it looked to me like the chef had gone over the top with a lighter since the sides were fresh and raw (the slight burn marks on the plate were also clues). Great technique and great dish! I wouldn't choose it again though only because I prefer my sushi to be completely raw and because there was mayo on it.


The one and only dish we didn't like that night was the amaebi (sweet shrimp) because the texture was just so foreign and gelatinous to us. I had to wash the taste and texture down with a lot of water. However, the unagi (eel) was just fantastic. It was definitely the meatiest eel serving I've had at a sushi place and so rich. Fantastically prepared.


We finished off the meal with green tea ice cream which came with half a wafer. It was a generous amount considering it was only $1.25 and was delightful. What a thoroughly enjoyable sushi experience! For all we ate too, it was barely a dent in my wallet at just a little over $30.

Pho 79 Restaurant - 9941 Hazard Ave, Garden Grove, CA 92643
Pricing - $ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - Vietnamese | Reservations - Unnecessary

[My first review can be found here.] Phở 79 is a staple of being back home, so when a friend asked to meet up for lunch, it was a natural choice to go there for lunch. Despite it being one of the hottest days of the month, we craved the noodle soup after having brought it up. Luckily it is incredibly air-conditioned inside so the phở was still quite appropriate. What I like about this place is that they have phở down. You walk in, sit wherever you see seats available, and are immediately brought menus and a ready notepad to take down your order. If you actually get phở, it comes out very quickly because that's what they do all day. I opted for Café Sữa Dá as always at Vietnamese restaurants and prepared myself for a great meal.


My medium bowl of Phở Tái Nạm Sách was hot and heaped with meats when I got it. The price has gone up by at least 50 cents from what I remembered the last time I visited but perhaps that is merely a reflection of the upward costs of food. The food itself, however, makes the price well worth it. Again they had the phở science down just right. The noodles were firm and delicious. The steak slices were raw when they came out but thin enough (and the soup hot enough) to be pushed under the noodles for cooking. The tripe was a tad scanty like last time but still enjoyable, and oh my was the flank great. Another great meal, Phở 79!

10130 Garden Grove Blvd, Garden Grove, CA 92844
Pricing - $ | Dining - Casual, To-Go | Cuisine - Desserts, Crepes
www.facebook.com/GenkiLiving

I had only been to Genki Living one time before, and it was a few years ago at night for an ice cream crepe. My friends from San Diego wanted to meet up briefly here and considering it took less than a minute for me to drive over (I had to go somewhere after so I drove), it was quite the convenient place. In the daytime, it doesn't look very impressive inside and I felt bad that only one person was working. I mean, there were several customers! Service was quite slow because of this. Anyhow, I saw that they had mini crepes for $2.22 on Tuesdays so I opted for one of those and some popcorn chicken. They weren't making sandwich crepes that early in the afternoon. Oh also, anything under $10 cannot be charged on a credit card without a small $.50 fee so keep that in mind.


Now I admit that I was a little wary about getting the popcorn chicken because one of the Yelp reviews for the place had stated that the chicken was undercooked. However, I really really enjoyed my order of popcorn chicken. It wasn't overly salty like most places make it, and it had a good crisp to it. The dipping sauce was delicious and was where the "heat" came from. Thumbs up for a great box of chicken.


As for the mini crepe, mine had red bean and vanilla ice cream. It was good but not mind-blowing. I think it was generally very basic and could have done with more red bean. I guess I was hoping for something similar in taste to a red bean ice cream taiyaki like I've had before in Korea. Ah well. It wasn't bad except for my finding a broken plastic fork tine inside. I wonder how that happened...

Remember my post on what makes a martini a martini? Well, a lot of things can be called martinis nowadays but I still think that martinis should at least have gin. The other day, Duc bought some Domaine de Canton, which is a ginger liqueur. I had had it before when I was in school, and it is quite the tasty liqueur if you're a fan of ginger. It's got a great strong gingery taste but the sharpness is also smoothed out by the inclusion of vanilla syrup in the ingredients. We first had it straight up on the rocks and then decided to experiment a tad. Using one of the recipes available on the Canton site, we tweaked it a bit for our own purposes and made a good strong drink (after one failed drink). However, I wouldn't mind taking some more time to perfect it. Also, it was the first time I got to use my cocktail shaker ever but my apologies for not presenting the drink in an actual martini glass. We only had wine glasses.

Step 1: Ingredients (serving size: 2 or 1 strong one)

• ice, for shaking
• .75 oz gin
• 1 lime, juiced
• 2.25 oz Domaine de Canton
• 6 strawberries, muddled

Step 2: Prepping the ingredients
Wash the strawberries and slice off the green. If you have a muddler, use that but if not, you can try what I did by slicing up the strawberries into small pieces and smashing the berries with the big end of a knife. Slice your lime in half too and remove the seeds.


Step 3: Finishing
Squeeze all the lime juice into a shaker and add the strawberry mush. Then add in your gin and Canton. Fill with ice and shake! Strain into a glass and enjoy (for the second drink, we included the strawberry pieces inside the drink so we could eat some).


Photos courtesy of Duc Duong.

8082 Adams Ave, Huntington Beach, CA 92646
Pricing - $$/$$$ | Dining - Casual | Cuisine - American
www.slaters5050.com

My first review for this eatery can be found here though actually, the review was for the Anaheim location while this time, I went to the Huntington Beach one. The food was pretty much the same though, so this is a "revisited" eatery review. The main difference was that this Slater's seemed much more upscale in terms of architecture and crowd than the Anaheim one. Unfortunately, it was also much louder. Anyhow, my friends from San Diego were in town and wanted to grab dinner so we opted for this place. Only one of them had been to the restaurant before so it was a good chance to introduce everyone else to it (we had 8 in our party). I believe every person opted to build their own burger too - craziness.


My brothers, my friend, and I decided to split a 4-combo appetizer dish which consisted of sweet potato fries with a tasty sweet sauce, fried pickle chips, fried artichoke hearts, and fried mac-n-cheese. There wasn't very much of the mac-n-cheese but that was really good. The sweet potato fries paired perfectly with the pumpkin-y dipping sauce they came with but I've had better fries before. As for the pickle chips, they beat the ones I had back in Durham because they weren't overbearingly juicy. The artichoke hearts was just delicious because they're artichoke hearts! Though we shared the whole plate, we all felt quite fat afterward.


Then came the burgers. My little brother and I decided to share a one-pounder. You should know that Slater's measures its meat weight after it has been cooked so this was a sandwich with a full 16 oz. half beef-half bacon patty. We stuck on some vampire dip, homemade pesto sauce, grilled onions, sauteed mushrooms, roasted red pepper, green leaf lettuce, and pepperoncinis on white brioche. The green stuff actually came out later after we asked for them (they were forgotten in the burger making) but that seemed better actually because they weren't soaked in patty grease. I only finished 1/3 of the burger and made my brother eat the rest. It was delicious and heart attack-inducing. I guess I was also full because I got a large Stone Russian Imperial Stout which was quite, quite large. Yay Slater's for another fantastic filling evening.