A couple months passed between our visits to Thai Bamboo Bistro, and this time, on our third stop, we knew a little more.
Sometimes, a little more information is dangerous and just enough to convince you not to return to a restaurant.
Not this time.
Our first visit was on a summer Monday. We were a little ahead of the lunch rush, our 2-year-old was a little subdued, and so we took a chance on a place we’d noticed in the new Quail Hill Village shopping center in Irvine, not far from where the San Diego (I-405) and Santa Ana (I-5) Freeways converge in central Orange County, California.
The center sprang up in the shadow of the Shady Canyon estates seemingly overnight. It’s out of the way — you don’t just happen by.
It’s in one of those new-generation neighborhood centers that has an all-too-familiar feel about it: anchor supermarket on one end, Starbucks on the other, generic fast-food and fast-casual restaurants between. This one was a little different — some of the franchise names were not quite so ubiquitous, and it appeared that the Irvine Co. took a chance and leased to some non-franchise operators,...