Food Porn: Weekend of Great Food and Filmmaking

Last weekend I worked in the art department on the Dodge College 2nd year cycle film, Girl with a Camera. It was a truly great and amazing experience working with 2nd year students, and I learned so much from them both from a film production technical standpoint, and also how to interact and handle a film crew. The shoot occurred almost the entire weekend, Thursday-Saturday with 12-hour days. I've come to the conclusion that filmmakers are masochistic (myself included). After a hard days' of work, I was met with great and amazing food to keep me going. Here's a recap...

Thursday (or was it Wednesday?) night: Guppy House (Irvine, CA)
Price: basically everything is under $10 (yay!)

Going to the Guppy House greatly appeased my Asian food withdrawal. My fellow art department buddies, Chih-Hao and Meng brought me here and I am most grateful. Good Hong Kong tea house style joints are hard to come by in Orange, but thanks to the high Asian population in Irvine and UCI, there are plazas filled with Asian restaurants and grocery stores. It's heaven. I was greatly craving a tea house staple, popcorn chicken. They're not just Asian style chicken nuggets, and it's utter and complete blasphemy if you think so. Popcorn chicken is given enough spice and topped with crisp, fried cilantro and garlic on top. While Guppy House's version was basically the popcorn chicken I've tasted at boba places like Quickly and Davis' Old Teahouse, Guppy makes it into a cheap, yummy entree, adding sides: rice with pork on top, sweet corn, potato salad, and cucumbers drizzled with some rice vinegar.

I totally forgot to take pictures of the place, but this is basically what I ate.

Next time I head over there I'll definitely try the Kimchi fried rice. There's also something called Shaved Ice--very similar to Filipino halo-halo. It's basically shaved ice topped with ice cream, fruit, and other things like boba or sweet beans. It's about $11, but it comes in a ridiculously huge bowl that you can easily split among friends.

Oh god how I want you, shaved ice.

Saturday night: BCD Tofu House (Garden Grove, CA)
Price: $8-9 for tofu soup, about $12 for bulgogi (Korean BBQ)


This is my new favorite place. It was the last day of the shoot and we striked set. To celebrate, Chih-hao bought me dinner here. It's great, cheap Korean food in a restaurant that's open 24 hours! It doesn't get better than that. This place is definitely the spot for tired, sleep deprived film students who finished a 12-hour day on set. Like any respectable Korean restaurant, they serve you unlimited banchan, or sides for free (!). I definitely ate a few servings of much needed kimchi.

Assorted tofu soup with banchan in the background

I ordered assorted tofu soup, and by assorted, the soup had beef, shrimp, and clams in it. The sides and the soup were just yummy and a great thing to have in your tummy after a long day's work. A fresh egg is included with the soup, so you have the option of cracking it open and putting it in the soup. The soup is served sizzling hot so the egg becomes poached in just a few minutes. The order also includes a side of rice with peas in it. The server scoops the rice out of a bowl and transfers it to a different bowl. With the original rice bowl, you have the option of having the server put barley tea in it. The remnants of rice and the barley tea make a great drink to end the supper and settle your stomach.


Sunday lunch: Blue Bayou restaurant (Disneyland)
Price: $20-30

Pirates of the Caribbean ride in the distance...

This is definitely the kind of restaurant for those "once in awhile" moments. It was great sitting very close to the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Next time I want the seat closest to the ride just so I can stare blankly at the people passing by on the boat. Since it was lunchtime, we all got the dish the restaurant is most famous for--the Monte Cristo. That sandwich alone was $21. It's a pricey place, but after all it is Disneyland and you are partially paying for the atmosphere, which in my opinion, is worth it. The meal starts off with bottomless bread and butter. Then you have the option of starting your meal with either a salad or gumbo. I chose the gumbo and it was absolutely delicious albeit the small portion. We decided to use our rolls of bread to create a bread bowl--best impromptu dining suggestion I was ever give. The Monte Cristo itself was absolutely delicious and I tried to forget the amount of calories and oil that was used in the making of it. There was also a very sweet/sour berry sauce reduction that enhanced the sandwich's taste. The meal also included scalloped potatoes and sauteed asparagus and broccoli rabe. The sides were also very delicious, especially the potatoes. Yummy creaminess. The meal gave me leftovers that lasted 3 other meals, so my $21 was used quite well.

Lusciousness...

My only real complaint would be the random blue M&M that was in my scalloped potatoes. I complained to the waitress who was very gracious and who immediately gave me a new plate of food that was freshly made. She even added an additional 10% off to our existing 20% from our season pass. Strangely, the waitress asked the chef about the M&M and even he didn't know how it got into my food. It will forever remain an amusing mystery whose story will be used in many cocktail parties to come.

Yep, that's an M&M...in my potatoes.

It was definitely a weekend full of great filmmaking, great people, and great food. Now that I know these places exist I actually feel better about myself.


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