Although Quizno’s has some good sandwiches, I’m not normally a fan of it because of it’s high prices. For the money, I think Panera has better sandwiches. I decided to give them another shot at the new Irvine location which is north of the 5 freeway on Jeffrey.

This Quizno’s is nestled in between a bunch of other chain restaurants in a typical Irvine shopping plaza. There’s La Salsa (which has some uber-fancy decor for some reason), Fatburger and Extreme Pizza right around it.

The most positive thing about the Quizno’s is the Monday special at this location which lets you buy 3 large sandwiches for 21.99 (which is pretty good at Quizno’s prices).

After coming to this Quizno’s I understand why the quality controlled food at other chains is so nice. The guys working the shift didn’t exactly put much effort or enthusiasm behind each sandwich creation. They took an incredibly long time and just threw the the ingredients onto the bread. My cheese wasn’t even in slices – it was in clumps because he couldn’t get the slices apart. And no amount of toasting can make up for the fact that after cooking the meat in their little hot water thing he barely drained the water from the meat before plopping it onto the bread.

I’m going to the super fancy looking La Salsa next time.

We passed through here on our road trip from CA to Chicago and we were able to just make it for the late night happy hour with discounted wings and beer. I forget the exact cutoff time, but basically the promotion is meant to drive traffic to the restaurant at night since the mall sort of dies down at night. We even called in our order of wings on our way to the restaurant just to make sure we got the happy hour price – how accomodating :)

The service, of course, was friendly.

Btw, it’s in the Mall of America, which was very cool seeing for the first time.

Like Cliff said, this place is small, but the ice cream is great. It’s thick, rich and creamy. I got the double cone which was actually way too big. I’d recommend going with the double mini. Nothing like a nice evening of eating rich ice cream while standing in the parking lot :)

The inside of this bbq place is definitely more impressive than the outside. Once you step inside, the wooden chairs and marble tables make it feel fancier than the ordering process at the counter. The food comes quick and is relatively filling. I was still a little hungry, but I eat alot :P

The selection of meat draws both from korean and japanese heritages and is quite good for a quick meal. The other bonus is that you get free wifi either from the tea shop next door or from Google wifi.

Meat and wifi – can you ask for more?

Cafe Iberico is always a great place to go to have good food, good drinks, and a loud time. They have some of the cheapest tapas around and the food is excellent. It reminds me of the good times we had in Spain :)

Finding this place was so refreshing after eating tapas in San Francisco – they’re so expensive there!!

Be sure to go early if you go on a Friday or Saturday, but any other time there’s barely a wait since the restaurant is huge.