Here finally is the long-promised/threatened final restaurant report from our trip to California in June. This was the last meal we ate out on the trip, a Korean dinner at a place I’ve reported on before: Mo Ran Gak in Garden Grove. I should explain here something that probably bugs people who know the geography of southern California well: I use the place name “Los Angeles” quite loosely in my meal reports from southern California. Garden Grove is not in Los Angeles. Nor for that matter are the cities in the South Bay (Torrance, Gardena, Long Beach etc.) or in the San Gabriel Valley (Monterey Park, Alhambra, Rosemead etc.) that I’ve previously written meal reports from. Indeed, Garden Grove is not even in LA County; it’s in Orange County (as is Costa Mesa). I just lazily bundle them all together as “Los Angeles” because in my head Greater LA is a larger agglomeration than it is in reality. Please forgive me (I do a similar kind of thing with Delhi, but that’s another story).

Anyway, Garden Grove, as I’ve noted before, is a major Korean enclave in Orange County. It does not begin to approach Koreatown for density and variety of of restaurants and stores but Koreans living within range of Garden Grove (as my mother-in-law does) find everything they need there. On our last couple of trips to visit my mother-in-law we’ve eaten and shopped there a lot. For larger extended family outings we usually end up at Mo Ran Gak. So it was on Christmas 2021 and so it was on a regular Tuesday in June this year.

In December 2021, still in the throes of the pandemic, we had sat in the heated tented area they had set up in their small parking lot. That tent is now long gone. There is some regular outdoor seating alongside the front of the restaurant but the older people in our party wanted to sit indoors and so that is where we were. I should say we only got there after a good’ish wait. And I should also say that parking is a bit of a hassle so you should factor that in if you go.

We were a party of 11, spread over three generations. The quartet of elders were seated at a four-top and the rest of us were at a larger table alongside. We got a lot of meat to share, getting an order of both their Combo A (non-marinated brisket, black pork belly) and Combo B (the same plus boneless short rib). Each combo also came with a big serving of steamed egg and a choice of doenjang or kimchi jigae (we got one of each). We also got an order of their haemul pajeon (or seafood pancake) The elders ate some of the meat and the haemul pajeon but mostly ate other things: bibim naengmyun, mul naengmyun and dolpan nakgi deapbap (seasoned octopus with rice in a hot stone platter).

The food was all very good—though after our recent extended sojourn in Seoul I won’t make very high claims for any of it. It should go without saying that we’d kill to have anything of this quality in Minnesota.

For a look at the menu, the restaurant and what we ate, launch the slideshow below. Scroll down to see how much it all cost and to see what’s coming next.

Service was the usual Korean brusque/efficient. Prices have risen since December 2021, quite markedly in some instances. Still the total for 11 people, which came to about $360 after tax and tip, was still quite reasonable in the abstract for what we ate.

Ok, what’s next? Nothing from California, that’s for sure. Indeed, I’m not sure if we’ll get back to California for most of 2025. The missus is about to make a solo trip to see her mother (after I get back to Minnesota this week) and I don’t think we’ll get out there this summer. I won’t have any Twin Cities reports for a couple of weeks either probably. But I do have a bunch of reports from this brief Delhi trip and one report from a short side trip I made to Coonoor in South India. I hope to get those all done by the start of the new year. Let’s see how it goes.