As we might have pointed out many times before, Irvine has the densest concentration of Taiwanese eateries in OC. What's more proof of this when the Taiwanese eateries bleed over to its neighboring cities?
This is exactly what has happened. A restaurant called O'Shine Taiwanese Kitchen has now opened in a space that was formerly Pho Hana on Redhill near I-5 in Tustin. While I'm not sure that Tustin doesn't have other Taiwanese eateries, what I'm sure of is that this O'Shine is by the same people that opened the old O'Shine in Irvine nearly twenty years ago. You might remember that it was in the spot that's now Shik Do Rak on Jeffrey and Walnut.
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Though I ate at the old O'Shine as a younger lad, my memories of that restaurant are starting to fade. I may be mistaken, but I seem to recall that old O'Shine was actually a Hong Kong-style cafe, or was that the short-lived restaurant that replaced it?
In any case, this latest incarnation of O'Shine seems ready for this millennium and further proof that Taiwanese cuisine is “disproportionately popular” in California. It has even put up a Facebook page with pictures of pork marinating for eventual pai gu fan. Most importantly, there are snapshots of their menu.
13834 Red Hill Ave., Tustin, California, (714) 852-3383; https://www.facebook.com/oshinekitchen
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Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.