好年春
5408 Walnut Ave #A
Irvine, CA 92604
(949) 654-8542
We're going up to San Mateo for my cousin's wedding this long weekend. We managed to finish all the leftover food in the fridge at lunch. For dinner, we wanted something that we could finish right there without leftover. Also I was in the mood for some noodle. A quick search on the internet, I found Nice Time Deli. I've been to Nice Time Deli couple times in San Gabriel, and thought their food was pretty good. But.... I found out later that the Nice Time Deli in SGV and the Nice Time Deli here are actually not affiliated with each other.
The Chinese name for Nice Time Deli in SGV is "Good Year Winter." The one in Irvine is called "Good Time Spring". Ha! Tricky eh? Nice Time Deli has been in business in SGV for probably 20 years. I can't help but feel that the Irvine Nice Time Deli is copycat. At least I was fooled. The place did looked nicer and newer. The place was packed when we got there around 7:30pm. After a short wait, the 2 of us were seated at a 6 people table.
白切腮邊肉 Boil Pork Cheek Meat w/ Special Sauce ($5.50)
We ordered Boil Pork Cheek Meat w/ Special Sauce as appetizer. The meat was tender. I like the garlicky thick soy sauce.
大腸蚵仔麵線 Chitterlings & Oyster Thin Noodle ($5.95)
DO NOT order Chitterlings (AKA intestine) & Oyster Thin Noodle at this restaurant. It was not good at all. The broth tasted like thicken sugar + soy sauce water. The thin noodle wasn't as soft as it should be. Intestine was white and slimy. It was pretty bad.
沙茶牛肉炒麵 Satay Beef Fried Noodle ($6.50)
We hated the Intestine and Oyster Noodle, but loved the Satay Beef Fried Noodle. The satay sauce was a little spicy. Beef was tender. The crunchy bean sprout added good texture to the noodle. Very flavorful.
This place was alright. I'd come back to try their other items. It was the first time we came to the 99 Ranch plaza. There are so many restaurants in here. Any recommendation?
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There is a "Chef Chen" in the same plaza.
ReplyDeleteI like it a lot, but it gets pretty busy during dinner hours so go early to avoid the wait.
I like their 牛肉捲餅
Most of the dishes we tried. We like it!
Yeah that restaurant was packed!
Food looked really good (yeah we were trying to peek at people's food from the window haha)
Definitely will try that place soon!
Hi, I am one of those anonymous readers of your blog so hopefully this post doesn't freak you out =0... anyway, i used to be a student at UCI [several years back] so i have spent a good few years in the irvine area. i'd like to give you a few recommendations from the top of my head... its possible you've already found/know about all these places(since you are a hardcore foodie) but i figure it can't hurt to shoot them out there... anyway, here it goes:
ReplyDeleteLaguna Hills: Break of Dawn <--------you MUST go!! [barbecue pork pulled plate]
Tustin: Honda Ya[japanese];
Freschia Supermarket[around 6:30pm everyday, they give 1/2 off on MANY korean Banchan! look for the red
stickers that say 50% and on friday evenings they have this sorta korean pancake dessert thing in front
of the market for $1 each]
Westminster: Tay Ho[go for the "banh cuon"... only go to the one next to asia mall; others are NOT as tasty]
Ramen: Kohryu, Mentatsu(good portions) [both nearby mitsuwa]... speaking of which, mitsuwa discounts their daily refrigerated meals sometime in the LATE afternoon... tho only like 15% or something]
Irvine: Kaya Tofu[yummy Banchan]
Fountain Valley: Nhu Y Ca 8 Mon(8 courses of fish); ShinsenGumi Yakitori or Ramen side; alertos [greasy,hole in the wall mexican food - "carnitas plate"]
and there's more but these places were among some of my favorites in orange county... as for irvine chinese food, its "horse-horse-tiger-tiger" compared to SGV... anyway, i hope this helps!!!
Hi Dan. Thank you so much for the list!
I am going to write down all the restaurants and try them all! ^^
I like the Ham Fried Rice and the chilled intestines with the special sauce at Nice Time Deli. The two combined together tastes so good :). And the restaurant decor in Irvine does look so different compared to the ones in SGV! Looks so much more upscale in Irvine.
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like a good combo!
Maybe I'll try that next time! ^^
You ordered the wrong dish!
ReplyDeleteThe 2 items to order are 排骨飯 and 青椒牛肉炒飯..
Personally think the rest are just okay...
haha ok. We'll go back again and order these 2 dishes.
Pork chop rice is my favorite dish of all time! Gotta try Nice Time Deli's version.
I was at Chef Chan friday night for dinner!! We were right next door!
ReplyDeleteReally? haha.... If we ran into you outside, we could have dinner together!
好年冬賣給韓國人就改名為好年春了 不覺得裝潢很有韓國人的品味嗎 原來的waitress也被趕走了
ReplyDelete本來就只有soso的口味 換人之後口味是unbearable
賣給韓國人？韓國人賣台灣小吃？好奇怪啊！