Disneyland to Legoland

We'll be spending a kid-oriented trip in California in November. We'll be spending half the time at Disneyland and half at Legoland. Any good places on the drive between the two?

teddybear wrote:We'll be spending half the time at Disneyland and half at Legoland. Any good places on the drive between the two?

Candyland for dessert?

G Wiv wrote:

teddybear wrote:We'll be spending half the time at Disneyland and half at Legoland. Any good places on the drive between the two?

Candyland for dessert?

Gary, that was horrible! Take that back lol...

hmm.. off the 5 freeway essentially?

in Anaheim:
Las Palma Chicken Pie Shop, 928 N. Euclid

Thee White House
887 South Anaheim Blvd
(i think i came here for a prom? hah.. so long ago)

Sang Dao
1739 W La Palma Ave , Anaheim 92801
714-956-8105
(Laotian, but darned close to issan styled food i think)

Special Thai Restaurant
511 S Brookhurst St , Anaheim 92804-2415
714-635-2920
(this place, forgotten by foodies, is in a dilapidated strip mall. i used to live up the street, and always found it strangely full of Thai patrons. i believe, if they're still open, the fried pomfret? fish w/ the mango fish sauce is to die for)

The Filling Station
201 N. Glassell Street, Orange
(714) 289-9714
killer pies, baked goods, trad. American style desserts, etc.

from anaheim, you're just going on 5 south.. thru Santa Ana, Laguna, San Clemente, Oceanside.... i don't know squat about SD region food, but you can always search:
http://www.chowhound.com/california/index.html

also, see this thread:
http://www.chowhound.com/california/boa ... 52183.html

enjoy!

I love the fish tacos at El Siete Mares. You'll have to back track up the 5 about 10 miles. But, it's well worth it.

Siete Mares
3914 Whittier Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90023

Also, dont forget that you're not far (slightly south) of the well thought of Thai Place Renu Nakorn. It's not what it once was. But, the menu is still impressive and the food is very good.

Renu nakorn
13041 E. Rosecrans Ave.
Norwalk
(562) 921-2124

teddybear wrote:Disneyland to Legoland

I guess you could say I’m going from Legoland (our house, on many days) to Disneyland, except that I have no intention of setting foot in the House of Mouse. But I do have to be in Anaheim for a few days for a conference at the Hilton. (Boy, after reading tripadvisor, I am not expecting too much of the accommodations there…)

I thought I’d bump this thread since it contains TonyC’s recommendations for places to eat in or near Anaheim:

TonyC wrote:in Anaheim:
Las Palma Chicken Pie Shop, 928 N. Euclid

Thee White House
887 South Anaheim Blvd
(i think i came here for a prom? hah.. so long ago)

Sang Dao
1739 W La Palma Ave , Anaheim 92801
714-956-8105
(Laotian, but darned close to issan styled food i think)

Special Thai Restaurant
511 S Brookhurst St , Anaheim 92804-2415
714-635-2920
(this place, forgotten by foodies, is in a dilapidated strip mall. i used to live up the street, and always found it strangely full of Thai patrons. i believe, if they're still open, the fried pomfret? fish w/ the mango fish sauce is to die for)

The Filling Station
201 N. Glassell Street, Orange
(714) 289-9714
killer pies, baked goods, trad. American style desserts, etc.

Tony, this post of yours gives me hope that I won't be reduced to eating at Rainforest Cafe or the like.

And, looking at the LA CH board, I see that there are some other potentially interesting spots nearby, such as a stretch of South Brookhurst in Anaheim called “Little Gaza”, a branch of Zankou Chicken (Armenian) on Ball Rd in Anaheim, a Gujarati place, Yogiraj, on W Lincoln in Anaheim, and Thai Nakorn in Garden Grove.

So I have a couple questions for Tony and any other folks who may know the area – first, will I be able to get to all or some of these places without a car? I mean, if I take a cab there will I be able to get a cab to come back?

Second, is there any chance of a decent lunch in the vicinity of the hotel? Maybe a Japanese place? Dare I hope for a taco truck parked next to the Anaheim Convention Center?

thanks in advance for any guidance

Amata wrote:and Thai Nakorn in Garden Grove.

I don't think Norwalk is too far from Anaheim...at least I remember passing the stadium while I was on my way to Renu Nakorn, which I highly recommend if you can get there. Renu Nakorn is the restaurant that Bill Chutma and his wife, the owners of Lotus of Siam in Las Vegas put on the map before leaving town to start LOS. The restaurant was very good when I visited, although you may have to convince the person waiting on you that you do indeed want some authentically spicy food. Here's a link to Jonathan Gold's review, which was part of the 99 Essential L.A. Restaurants article. Have Fun!

Renu Nakorn
13041 E. Rosecrans Ave
Norwalk, CA
562 921-2124

Amata,

In probably two dozen trips to LA I've not only not ever taken a cab, I can't even remember seeing a cab. I'm sure they must exist in at least a few tightly-packed parts of town, but in spread-out parts like Orange County the economics quickly become unfeasible-- from what I assume is your Hilton to Renu Nakorn is only 12 miles, on the overall map of LA they look like neighbors, but if you figure $2 flag plus 20 cents per eighth of a mile (I'm just making that up, but it's likely ballpark) that's $20 each way. $40 for one meal, $80 for two (and that's assuming they're all as close as Renu Nakorn)-- suddenly those $189 car rentals for the week don't look so bad.

That said, my recent trip to LA showed me that there are vast and fascinating amounts of authentic Asian food scattered over parts of Southern California where the hipsters rarely tread, even Gold and the LA Weekly (by far the best source) have only dipped their toes into what all exists in the San Gabriel Valley and beyond, so happy hunting!

How about the chicken place (Mrs. Knotts) that is associated with Knott's Berry Farm. That was always pretty good to me.

A--

Not too familiar with that part of the Southland, praise Jesus, but I do know that you should forget about catching a cab anywhere other than directly in front of your hotel, in which case the driver is likely to refuse any destination save LAX. In these United States, there are maybe 4-5 cities where you can count on catching a cab (and only NY, Chicago and Vegas are solid bets); LA is not among them. This from someone who has spent hours waiting for cabs in downtown LA.

Okay, got it. Rent a car.

So... if I have a car, maybe I could stay someplace more interesting? Any suggestions? (I have NO CLUE about Southern California at all.)

Amata wrote:Thai Nakorn in Garden Grove.

I personally liked Buena Park Thai Nakorn more but alas it's gone.... It was what I knew, the first Thai joint i've eaten at.... first dates, last dates, blah blah blah.

If you're going to venture to Garden Grove, then you have every pho joint available in Westminster. Holy cow, that's a whole d'frent ball game. I have no personal recs for pho in WM, i know where they are, but often not even their names. you can try pho 79 and pho hoa, both venerable and popular:

pho 79
9200 Bolsa Ave Ste 117
Westminster, CA 92683

pho hoa
9211 Bolsa Ave
Westminster, CA 92683

but really, this place is MUCH more interesting

Banh Cuon Tay Ho
(714) 895-4796
9242 Bolsa Ave Ste F
Westminster, CA 92683

BCTH is a banh cuon-only shop. try to find that in Chicago. only about 300 sq ft big. it's a DIVE but you'll feel extremely satisfied after the dive.

in OC, there's of course the Yaohan (mitsuwa) in Costa Mesa:
665 Paularino Ave
Costa Mesa, CA 92626

and a million omakase/kaiseki/master sushi chefs:
Sushi Shibucho
590 W 19th St
Costa Mesa, CA 92627

Blue Fin Newport (highly rec'd by Katsu-san of Tama Studio City.. if it's good enough for Katsu-san, it's good enough for everyone but God)
7952 E Pacific Coast Hwy
Newport Beach, CA 92657

beyond Asian, i'm completely useless so enjoy finding other things!!

=== moving south ===

carlsbad is a culinary wasteland, tho i do have a lil blurb on oceanside which is ~5 miles north of Carlsbad.

=== finally ===
i highly recommend borrowing a Thomas Guide if you are renting a car. it's a huge city. If you need, you can borrow my older version of the Thomas Guide (after Jan 2nd).

Is your conference in your hotel or close by? Is it a most of the day, every day thing? Then stay near your conference, and drive to dinner. Reason being, you'd much rather be on the freeway at 6:30 heading to dinner, than at 9 AM heading to your meeting. (I think TripAdvisor attracts more than its share of malcontents, I wouldn't entirely worry about what you read there.)

Not that TonyC hasn't got you well fixed up, but if you have a car, the Chinese food in Monterey Park and thereabouts is not that far out of your area, either. Gold and the LA Weekly and LA Chowhound crowds have written a fair amount about that, even if Orange County remain mostly myth and legend.

Oh, and given that you're in the area... no, not Dizzyland... the Nixon Library. Quite well done by self-monument standards, occasionally surreal (the famous hall of bronze statues of leaders, milling about as if at a party-- General DeGaulle, could you pass me the pigs in a blanket?), only subtly revisionist about Watergate. Great Christmas gifts for next year!

Reason being, you'd much rather be on the freeway at 6:30 heading to dinner

Uhm. good luck with that. Anaheim Conv. Center to MP will kill you during rush hour. or saturday evening. or sunday afternoon. it's a 30 mile drive. that's like saying one can just simply stop by naperville for dinner if you worked in in the Loop.

Even going to Renu Nakorn from Disneyland (i5N exit Rosecrans) can completely ruin your appetite. Granted 5 freeway has 6 friggin lanes near Disneyland but...

myth buster 101: you can't get ANYWHERE in LA in 20 minutes.

Amata, my suggestion would be to completely blow off anything off of the 5 (which would eliminate Renu Nakorn)and head west on the local streets from Anaheim to Westminster and Garden Grove. It takes a little time, but its an interesting ride on which you may just find some really great Vietnamese/Thai Options, interspersed in the strip malls, as I did a few months ago.

I concur with the advice on not taking a cab. Orange County is auto land. The stretch of Little Saigon that runs through Westminster and Garden Grove is easily 5-15 miles long and teeming with great chow possibilities.

A good reference source to start is www.littlesaigon.com


I particulary enjoyed the Pho at:

Pho 54
15420 Brookhurst
Westminster, CA

Thanks for all the good feedback. I think TonyC's suggestions in Westminister/Garden Grove/Anaheim will give me (plus friends) plenty to explore, and Will's recommendation to avoid the freeways sounds wise.

By the way, Renu Nakorn in Norwalk is closed for remodeling (according to a poster on LA Chowhound yesterday). So that removes one temptation to hit the freeways...

Tony, it's very kind of you to offer the loan of your street guide. I'll PM you and see if we can meet up after you get back. (Are you currently eating your way through the Bay Area? )

thanks again, y'all.

it's a 30 mile drive. that's like saying one can just simply stop by naperville for dinner if you worked in in the Loop.

Dude, what do you think this board is all ABOUT?!?

All right, TonyC's no doubt right, though I will say, Koreatown to Monterey Park at around that time the freeway was surprisingly empty (but coming back from Legoland through Anaheim et al. was a slog, no question).

Not as empty as the night of the O.J. verdict, when I was the only fool driving (it was like being the Omega Man), but surprisingly easy.

I unfortunately had to cancel my planned trip to Anaheim. I hope that I'll get to the LA area sometime soon, though, to try out some of the great-sounding suggestions given above.

But -- for future readers who might consult this thread -- here's an update: apparently Thai Nakorn in Garden Grove burned down last night.
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/358084

Amata wrote:But -- for future readers who might consult this thread -- here's an update: apparently Thai Nakorn in Garden Grove burned down last night.

Amata,

Sorry to hear of your change of plans and equally sorry to hear of Thai Nakorn burning down. I've had two quite memorable meals there.

Enjoy,
Gary

G Wiv wrote:[Sorry to hear of your change of plans and equally sorry to hear of Thai Nakorn burning down. I've had two quite memorable meals there.

Gary, I thought that you visited Renu Nakorn in Norwalk, which was previously owned by Bill and Saipin Chutima of LOS fame, not Thai Nakorn. Or, am I mistaken? At any rate, yes, that is very sad.

E.M.

Renu Nakorn is remodeling. May I suggest Can Coon Thai?

next to a tiki bar:


is: Can Coon Thai


son bringing out the hoy tawt:


house made issan sausage: (just as Ponzu described in his thread)


I have the menu which I can post u. Eddie, owner, explained food as NE Issan food, a bit different from Renu Nakorn's. On the entree side there's fried fish salad, the garlic raw shrimp, housemade fish cake, jungle curry, various pad phets, but "no duck meat". On the noodle side, there's khao sowy, yen ta fo, etc. no secret thai menu, just a transliterated menu. It's darn good. the environment is similar to Renu Nakorn; clientele, per owner, is 90%+ Thai:

Can-Coon Thai Food
9887 East Alondra Blvd
Bellflower, CA 90706
Phone: (562) 925-0993

Searching CH/LA yields nothing. The power of LTH witnessed yet again. I vowed to visit Eddie again before NYE '07, but was unable to make it after Christmas Eve.

Erik M. wrote:Gary, I thought that you visited Renu Nakorn in Norwalk, which was previously owned by Bill and Saipin Chutima of LOS fame, not Thai Nakorn. Or, am I mistaken? At any rate, yes, that is very sad.

Erik,

Happily, you are correct, I was mistaken. I've never been to Thai Nakorn, I had my Nakorn's confused.

Enjoy,
Gary

Nice thread - I have to be in Anaheim next month on some business, and I will try to hit one or two of these spots. I might have tried to haul up to Monterey Park, but I think Westminster sounds a lot more practical.

I do have a query, though. In June I need to host a business dinner for 20-30 people in the Anaheim area (I think the conference we will be attending is in Garden Grove, to be exact). Any suggestions? The parameters for this annual dinner are a nice, but not extravagant place, interesting food, reasonably convenient.

Any suggestions appreciated. Will be reconnoitering next month.

While doing a bit of research for my research trip to Anaheim (in preparation for my real trip in June, which will be less fun than this one, but I digress) I ran across this in the OC Register food blog:

Thai Nakorn update!

Here's some fantastic news for all the Thai Nakorn patrons out there:

I spoke with one of the owners of the family-run business, Wanida Sreewarom, who says that the family is "OK" and "Hanging in there" since their (and our) loss, and that they are looking to rebuild shortly. Sreewarom will find out Monday if the restaurant can rebuild at the same site. If it will take longer than three months to rebuild, she says, the family will look into locations nearby or in Westminster.

Surprisingly, some of Sreewarom's regular customers have offered money to help the family rebuild, and one of the restaurant's biggest fans even said he would foot the bill for a whole new restaurant.

There is still no known cause of the fire, but Sreewarom states that it was not from the restaurant's kitchen and they are still investigating. It is also confirmed that the family does not own the Mission Viejo location anymore.

Come Monday evening, look for an update in this blog entry as to when and where Thai Nakorn will be built. Three months and counting !

Update 01/22/07: It will take longer than three months for Thai Nakorn to reopen at it's Garden Grove Location, so Wanida Sreewarom will be looking at possible new locations Wednesday.

- Cynthia Furey

Not sure if anyone is looking for info on Thai Nakorn, as opposed to Renu Nakorn, but there it is.

Bumping this thread to ask if anyone has recent experience with the Anaheim area? Will be joining my husband on a business trip in June. We will have a couple of days together before his meetings start, then expect to have a lot of time to explore and eat on my own. I am interested in anything involving food or drink! Fine dining, ethnic specialties, fun markets--if I can consume it and it tastes good, count me in! I have only been to the LA area once, and that was in the early 90s, with minimal money in the bank account, and mostly in the Valley except for a day in Malibu before driving up to San Francisco. Thanks in advance! And yes, I'll have a car!

Smassey wrote:Bumping this thread to ask if anyone has recent experience with the Anaheim area? Will be joining my husband on a business trip in June. We will have a couple of days together before his meetings start, then expect to have a lot of time to explore and eat on my own. I am interested in anything involving food or drink! Fine dining, ethnic specialties, fun markets--if I can consume it and it tastes good, count me in!

Anaheim is home to La Palma Chicken Pie Shop (mentioned above by TonyC), a sixty-year-old throwback serving some of Southern California's best old-style chicken pies.





I hate the term comfort food but this is it.

La Palma Chicken Pie Shop
928 N Euclid St
Anaheim CA
714-533-2021

can I reneg (punny!) everything I wrote back in '05?

Anaheim was/is all about Middle Eastern food these days. Anything on Brookhurst. Literally anything: Olive Tree, Aleppo, Pappa Hassan's, Zait & Zaatar, Forn Al Hara, Al Amir Bakery, Al Tannour, Sahara Falafel, ad nausea. Some of dingier than others, but the Persian, Armenian, Lebanese., etc., food is top notch. You can also smoke hookah for days.

E-San Rod-Sap should be a dream come true, it's a small Issan restaurant attached to a small Thai market. Next to it are Thai video store and Thai hair salon.

Also, there's a sushi bar housed inside a strip club in Anaheim. I think that's a must visit.

If you can travel a wee bit south to Garden Grove, you'll have some of the best Vietnamese eats in the country, and some of the finer Korean food in the country (probably behind... Ktown LA, Ktown NY, but not far behind). I won't toss out any recs, since there are just too many, but search for "quan nhau" on Yelp if you enjoy an otherworldly seafood experience. Also, one of the few true Laotian restaurants in all of LA: Ventianne, is in Garden Grove.

Finally, Orange has 2 microbreweries: Noble and Valiant. Noble's IPA is... really hoppy/citrusy, both sorta close to The Unhappiest Place on earth.

TonyC wrote:can I reneg (punny!) everything I wrote back in '05?

Anaheim was/is all about Middle Eastern food these days. Anything on Brookhurst. Literally anything: Olive Tree, Aleppo, Pappa Hassan's, Zait & Zaatar, Forn Al Hara, Al Amir Bakery, Al Tannour, Sahara Falafel, ad nausea. Some of dingier than others, but the Persian, Armenian, Lebanese., etc., food is top notch. You can also smoke hookah for days.

E-San Rod-Sap should be a dream come true, it's a small Issan restaurant attached to a small Thai market. Next to it are Thai video store and Thai hair salon.

Also, there's a sushi bar housed inside a strip club in Anaheim. I think that's a must visit.

If you can travel a wee bit south to Garden Grove, you'll have some of the best Vietnamese eats in the country, and some of the finer Korean food in the country (probably behind... Ktown LA, Ktown NY, but not far behind). I won't toss out any recs, since there are just too many, but search for "quan nhau" on Yelp if you enjoy an otherworldly seafood experience. Also, one of the few true Laotian restaurants in all of LA: Ventianne, is in Garden Grove.

Finally, Orange has 2 microbreweries: Noble and Valiant. Noble's IPA is... really hoppy/citrusy, both sorta close to The Unhappiest Place on earth.

Renege granted. Thank you for the great info. Trip is still a few months out, and given this Chicago winter, can't come soon enough.

Going to be staying in Anaheim this week. You mentioned Persian food. Any particular restaurant? I will try to trek out to Santa Monica sometime during my stay. I understand there is a lot of Persian restaurants east of Santa Monica. Would it be better to hold out for that.