Tastea Garden Grove

I haven’t had a chance to go here often but the boba here is top-notch. I have only tried the “Mango all the way” with boba. It’s mango and raspberry juices mixed with crushed ice and bits of green mango. It’s slushy and quite beautiful with streaks of red, orange and green. The boba has a light green color which is also unique and interesting. The “gigantic” drink (their smallest size) plus boba will set you back about $3.50 but it’s worth it.

Be prepared to listen to very loud R&B music and wait in a long line.

Tastea Garden Grove
10189 Westminster Ave.
Garden Grove, CA
714-539-1832
http://www.tastea.net

Houston’s Manhattan Beach

I’ve had the steaks here because that’s what they are known for and they are good but not the greatest ever. What I absolutely love here is the Thai Steak Salad (formerly known as the Evil Jungle Thai Salad but Thai people must have complained). The salad has egg noodles and chunks of mango, avocado, tomato and medium-rare filet (or maybe another delicious cut) mixed together in a sweet spicy sauce, basil and peanuts. It’s $15 but it’s definitely worth a try. A side of their crispy shoestring fries for $4 completes the meal.

Houston’s Manhattan Beach
1550-A Rosecrans Avenue
Manhattan Beach, CA 90266
(310) 643-7211

Roscoe’s House of Chicken’ n Waffles Pasadena

I think this place serves other Southern foods but the thing you go for is, you guessed it, the chicken and waffles. Item #1 on their menu is the “Scoe’s special” which is 1/4 fried chicken and 2 waffles. Item #2 is the same thing but covering the fried chicken with gravy and onions. Both specials were delicious. The fried chicken was appropriately crispy on the outside and moist on the inside. Covering the chicken with gravy hides the crispiness but you can never go wrong with covering anything in gravy. The waffles were big and fluffy. I normally like crispier waffles but these were tremendous. They give you 2 small scoops of butter and 2 small vials of syrup and I used them all up. Both specials were just under $10 each (adding gravy costs $0.10) so isn’t inexpensive both to your wallet or your heart but a once-in-a-while trip is great.

I only had to wait 10-15 minutes to get a table for lunch but the wait for our food, once we ordered, was strangely much longer.

Roscoe’s House of Chicken’ n Waffles
830 N Lake Ave.
Pasadena, CA
http://www.roscoeschickenandwaffles.com/

Senor Fish Alhambra

I love Mexican Seafood and this is one of the best restaurant chains that serves it. There are so many choices on their menu that I often feel overwhelmed. Since I don’t eat at Senor Fish that often, I always end up getting the same thing: a shrimp burrito and fries. Someday, if I go there often enough I’ll try some other stuff. The shrimp burrito has battered and fried shrimp with rice, beans, salsa, and maybe some other stuff I don’t recognize because I’m too busy eating it. I think all the burritos have the same ingredients besides the meat of your choice. Other meat choices, beside shrimp, include fish and scallops. The fries are OK but tend to get soggy by the time I take it home. The salsa bar is nice. They ran out of Pico De Gallo when I was there but they also have at least 4 other salsa choices. If you eat there, you get chips but if you get it to go, you don’t get chips. The burrito is not cheap at just over $6 but is reasonable considering they give you a decent amount of shrimp.

There are many Senor Fish locations and they all seem to have unique and fun decor.

Senor Fish
115 West Main Street
Alhambra, CA
(626) 299-7550

L&L Hawaiian Barbecue Hawthorne

I usually get the “mini” chicken katsu, panko-breaded chicken pieces, and that comes with a scoop of rice and macaroni salad. The chicken is so crispy and delicious and among the best katsu I’ve eaten, even in Hawaii. I once got the “regular” chicken katsu and that was WAY TOO MUCH FOOD! I also get the gravy fries. It’s the same price as regular fries ($1.75) but comes with free gravy (like turkey gravy) for dipping. As an added bonus, they use the “krinkle-kut” fries. This whole meal costs just $6.50 with tax and I often can’t finish the whole thing. Since everything I mentioned above is either fried or a carbohydrate or both and I didn’t mention any vegetables, I don’t recommend you eat here very often.

Order before going there because it can take a little while to prepare the food and there’s usually a wait. There are many L&L locations throughout the US and at least in Southern California, the taste is very consistent from location to location.

L&L Hawaiian Barbecue
5257 W Rosecrans Ave.
Hawthorne, CA 90250
310-643-5195
http://www.hawaiianbarbecue.com/

Golden Deli

This place has been written about in a lot of books so I tried it. Besides the wait (see below), the food is excellent and fast. I always get the pho (Vietnamese noodle soup) with rare flank steak. It’s filling, delicious, and cheap ($6). I also get the shrimp spring rolls here. They are quite good and probably in the top 2 or 3 I’ve had (though I don’t eat it very often). Go across Las Tunas to the Tapioca Express for a drink/dessert.

Sign in as soon as you get there and be prepared to wait 10-15 minutes for a table. The restaurant and the parking lot are usually crowded during lunch.

Golden Deli Vietnamese
815 W Las Tunas Dr.
San Gabriel, CA 91776-1071
(626) 308-0803

Tapioca Express San Gabriel

Of all the boba chains out there, I like TE the best. It’s cheap (mostly $2 for a small drink) and they have a pretty sizable array of choices. I like the watermelon juice (made with real watermelon) with boba or a mango icy with boba when I can’t drink caffeine. I usually get either the boba milk tea, almond milk tea with boba or the coffee icy with boba if I want a boost. I’ve never tried the food here but it looks good.

There are many TE locations but this is probably my favorite because of its clean, fun ambience.

Tapioca Express San Gabriel
800 W Las Tunas Dr. #100
San Gabriel, CA 91776
(626) 284-3088
http://www.tapiocaexpress.ws/

Ono Hawaiian Grill San Gabriel

The Kaarage chicken here is great and relatively inexpensive (~$7 for the plate). Kaarage chicken is fried chicken pieces covered in a spicy-sweet sauce. The plate comes with lots of rice and a scoop of macaroni salad and green salad. If you don’t care about the sides, you can get just the chicken as an appetizer and it looks identical to the “plate version”. You won’t find many restaurants that serve Kaarage chicken, much less, serve it this well. Loco Moco, hamburger patties topped with sunny-side up eggs and gravy on a plate of rice, is also really good here though it can be salty at times. Walk a couple doors down to Tapioca Express to get a drink/dessert.

Be sure to call first as I think they are not open on Sundays anymore.

Ono Hawaiian Grill San Gabriel
800 W Las Tunas Dr. #300
San Gabriel, California 91776
(626) 284-6600

Lee’s Sandwiches Rosemead

The sandwiches here are delicious, filling and cheap ($2-3). I got the “combination” (#1) sandwich which was filled with a mystery red meat, pickled carrots, picked radishes, cucumber and cilantro with a light sauce in a warm and crusty 10-inch baguette. To me, it’s the quintessential Vietnamese sandwich. I even drove past MANY Vietnamese sandwich shops along the way to get there.  I think if I had tried a different meat, one I actually recognized, this sandwich would have been a home run. I also had the shrimp spring rolls. They were not bad but not the best I’ve had. For my drink/dessert, I had some “Lee’s Cafe” (iced Vietnamese coffee) with boba. It was a little bitter but ultimately sweet, just the way I like it. It did cost more than the sandwich I bought and had lots of ice but I didn’t mind because it’s hard to find this type of high quality coffee. I also tried the Deli Manjoo, an inch-long diamond-shaped piece of sponge cake filled with custard, for 25 cents. It was not bad and definitely for the person who likes the brown “crust” of a sponge cake because it covers the outside of this small dessert.

There’s another Lee’s Sandwich in Alhambra (west a few miles) but that location has no inside seating.

Lee’s Sandwiches Rosemead
8779 East Valley Boulevard @ Muscatel Avenue
Rosemead, CA 91770

http://leessandwiches.com