Thuan Kieu Noodle & Grill

Pho broth is so good. I eat out alot and was so happy to have found this place,

thanks

Found this restaurant during my search for good Vietnamese Restaurant in Irvine, without having to drive all the way to Westminster. If you're doing the same, this might just be what you're looking for!

[SERVICE]
They're pretty on top of it. Always refilling our water and even gave us soup refills (might have to ask for it).

[FOOD]
Soup (complementary with rice plates)-- I really like their soups! They always gave me a decently sized, slow-cooked meat. I have tried asking for refills before and they're pretty generous about it.

Garlic Noodles ($0.99)-- I would recommend substituting for rice. Although it's more bland than other Garlic Noodles I have tried, it complements the saltier meats pretty well. Subtle taste of garlic, but not too much to cover the taste of everything else.

TK 10 item plate ($15.99)-- Had leftovers even after sharing with my boyfriend. Definitely worth it! You're not allowed to get short ribs and pork chops, so they'll add the rest of the 10 items to your plate. I love trying a small bite of everything.

Create 3 item plate ($8.99)-- I had to get it just to try their short ribs and pork chops, since it wasn't a part of the 10 item plate. A bit pricey for this plate when they only give you 1 small piece of pork chop and 2 pieces of short ribs... Would rather just get the other mix platter.

TEN ITEM COMBO PLATE. Do it.

Thank goodness Asian people don't believe in American holidays, because coming in here for brunch on July 4th was a wonderful decision!

The one thing I struggle with when going to Vietnamese places is not being able to make up my mind what items to get because everything sounds amazing. This reasonably sized combo plate can be split between two people or works great as a plate of appetizers among a big group. I can't rave enough about the variety you get for the price you're paying - I didn't want the heaping pile of com tam to end! We also ordered pho tai, but I wasn't a huge fan of the broth because it comes with more cilantro than usual (the bitter stems too, not just the leaves).

The service here was very fast, and they'd always come back to refill our water.

Overall, stoked that I live near here and will definitely be back for that $15 ten item combo plate!

Greeting with a smile, that is something you don't see very often in Vietnamese restaurants.  That said, service was very good, food came out fairly quick & they checked on us several times.
Broken rice is their specialty here.  I had rice with grilled chicken & fish.  Son had rice with grilled beef, egg rolls, Chinese sausage & a fried egg. My son was not to impressed with fried egg, but everything else was pretty yummy.  Shrimp spring rolls were freshly made.  Portion is big, we both had left over.  Lunch on weekday is certainly doable.  No wait line & ample parking.  I'm glad we finally checked this place out. We enjoyed the food & will be back for more.

This place is nice. Like any other Vietnamese Restaurant this one serves Pho as well.

What maybe caught my attention was the "Create your Plate" which allows you tho choose between Vermicelli and Broken rice. After that you can choose either 2 or 3 items. This menu comes with a small soup.

I tried it and it was nice. The dishes came out fast and there was no wait to be seated.

Unfortunately it's CASH ONLY.

After watching two games of intense NFL, we headed to Thuan Kieu Noodle & Grill for some good ole' ph. Most Yelpers seem to opt for the broken rice dish, but I typically don't order that so I went for the soup noodles. I have to say I wasn't overly impressed but it definitely on the top half of the median for me. The soup was good, light, but still the same as it should be for ph. The meat quality was average, it definitely wasn't the tastiest fall-apart meat I've gotten before. The egg rolls were just as expected with the fish sauce.

The A/C was broken on this 104°F day though. Not their fault, but yeah, damn it was hot in there.

The service was really good and prompt, very friendly. The ice waters were huge so we didn't have to ask for a refill. Not really too much to say about the place, it was a good choice if you're local, but I wouldn't say it's the best I've ever had. I would come back though, based on its convenience.

LOVE that this place is now in Irvine so i don't have to drive all the way to Westminster for this amazing food.

I will say that the Nem Nuong and the sauce is a little different than the one in Westminster.

BUT the 10 item dish is still the same and it's still amazing!!

I will definitely keep coming back because i love Vietnamese food and this restaurant is like HOME in my mouth.

If you ask for more Nuoc Mam, they're more than happy to give you some. They aren't stingy like other Vietnamese restuarants.

The Pho broth is also very sweet, so if you don't like your broth on the sweeter side, you might not enjoy the Pho, but i love it!

I thought i was walking in late by coming into the restaurant about 40 minutes before it closes, but people were walking in 15-20 minutes before close and they still took everyone. GREAT SERVICE!!

For under $10 I got the tu chon (make your own combo):  garlic noodles with egg cake and shrimp. It is served with a bit of salad and pickles and some fish sauce. There was a good amount of food..6x shrimp and a slice of fluffy, well seasoned steamed egg. It was a delicious takeout lunch.

Make sure you're clear on your order. I said egg and some shrimp and almost got shrimp cake instead... Not whole shrimp.

4 stars for being near home. I'd come here again for the rice dishes. I haven't tried the Pho. The service was a bit slow, but probably because the staff were also having their lunch at 2.30pm.

Came by for dinner the other night and this place is located right next to Albertsons in the mall owned by The Irvine Company...

Staff was very friendly and the restaurant is clean and spacious.

Egg rolls came out hot and fresh but they were the "smooth" egg roll wrapper vs. the "wavy" type they had in the pictures...

Combination Pho was very good with a flavorful broth and tender cuts of beef. There were also two huge pieces of tendon! Noodles were al dente too!

Grilled Beef and Pork from the broken rice plates were decent too!

Cash only!

~$10/person after tax and tip for dinner.

I now have a favorite Vietnamese restaurant in Irvine! =)

I highly recommend trying their build your own plate options. You can opt for noodles, broken rice, or garlic noodes (add $1 extra) and also choose 2 or 3 items for your plate. I chose garlic noodles, tofu fried wrapped shrimp, grilled pork, and steamed egg quiche. Everything was delicious! The garlic noodles were good, and I was very pleased with the tofu fried wrapped shrimp - this was probably my favorite one! The egg quiche was delicious along with the pork.

Overall, the food was good and prices are pretty reasonable. But remember, this place is cash only! It's located in the plaza by Albertsons near the intersection of Culver and Irvine Blvd.

3 stars for the pho, 4 stars for the broken rice and 4 stars for service.

I was glad to find this place so close to the Tustin Market place since we were starving after some holiday shopping.

Im usually the one who orders the pho but since my husband ordered it, I decided to try the broken rice dish this place seems to be popular at.

Pho was ok. The tendon was very soft and chewy but the broth was a bit bland even after adding the lime and mint.

Broken rice was pretty good. Rice was fresh even though we went half hour before closing time and the 3 meats we ordered (short rib, chicken and beef) were all grilled to perfection, not too burnt, and still soft. It came with a little soup bowl that was very tasty.

Coconut water was also good and refreshing and not overly sweet like other places.

I'd go back for the rice! Cash only for now but I overheard they're expecting to get a credit card machine soon.

Quality and portions seems to have decreased here. The rice combo plate had a huge mound of rice with very small portions of egg quiche, a few bits of sausage, but everything tasted good. I hope the location in Westminster didn't decrease their portions too.

My husband had a take-out from here for dinner and brought the menu home.  I was astounded to find that it's Thuan Kieu.  My family and I love the Com Tom Thuan Kieu in Westminster.  Whenever they want some, I have to make sure I get to work early so I can leave early from Anaheim and drive to Westminster to pick up the order then to fight the traffic back.  Finding out it's now closer to me, this is awesome!  

Our take-out order include the sausage and shrimp spring roll and 10-item combo.  Granted it cost a little more but it will save me some gas to make a detour.  Taste wise, it's pretty good.  Overall impression, it's less salty than the ones in Westminster but nothing that a little fish sauce can't cure!

The spring rolls were decent and of course Brodard was better but good enough to satisfy the cravings.

Okay, so I got take-out from here today and I'm glad that they now accept Visa and MasterCard.

I got two orders of the two-item entrees. I opted to get the garlic noodles as the base for both, and the grilled beef & grilled chicken for one and Chinese sausage & egg quiche for the other.

I was pretty hungry so I plowed through most of my food pretty savagely. But I didn't particularly think it was that great. The grilled beef was VERY chewy and had a sinewy texture to it. That was really the only "flaw". Everything else was just fair. Garlic noodles were a tad dry, but I prefer that over greasy noodles any day. The Chinese sausage is still pretty good, as was the egg quiche. I have yet to try the pho so that will be for next time.

The Pho is really flavorful - I love the broth and the thin slices of tender beef with onions and cilantro.  They give a generous side of basil, bean sprouts, jalapenos and limes for your add ins too. It's small inside but they also have outdoor tables.  We also ordered their appetizer the ground pork rolls and those were so delicious in the dipping sauce.  Thai tea was really good too. :)
My picture came out horrible on this....I will have to visit again and fix that. ;)

Another one bites the dust. This location didn't survive and closed down in October 2016

I'm jumping for joy to have a decent Vietnamese restaurant so close to home.  Not only is it from a famous Com Tam chain in Westminster, it's also the cheapest Vietnamese food in Irvine.  $6.50 for Com Tam or Noodle meal deal which includes soup, chicken & Egg Rolls.  They have a Pho deal for $6.30 and it taste pretty decent.  Their spring rolls are $3.50 for 2 pieces.  Anywhere else in Irvine you will spend at least $2 more per entree.  I suspect I'll be hitting this place weekly.

I wish there was something like this in SD. It's a Vietnamese Com Tam place that lets you add on "items" to your rice entrée. For 3 entrees you can get it for $8-9! Super cheap. They also have a 10 item plate for $15 fed a family with that! There is a long wait for this place, but if you ask them to seat you outside they will serve you outside. Just service is slow because they don't have enough employees to serve during dinner time.

I got the 3 item plate-I chose the egg quiche, pork, and shrimp. The pork and shrimp had a lot of flavor, but the egg quiche could be more flavorful (used to my mom's egg quiche). But it was still good. The amount of rice wasn't much though, just one bowl...I guess in portion wise one bowl of rice should be just right, and it was. I guess I was used to the ones you get in pho places! I didn't try their pho. Good to see a place like this in Irvine!

I normally wouldn't order com tam at Vietnamese restaurants, but I would come back here for it.

Nice, clean restaurant with a good amount of seating. Each table had condiments of soy sauce, hoisin sauce, sriracha, and chili paste.

Boyfriend and I ordered the nem cuon (or spring rolls with the pork sausage patty) & these were really good! Comes with two and the crunchy egg roll stick on the inside was still got so these are freshly rolled. The sauce was also delicious - my favorite part.

We also ordered the seven item combo ($13) with garlic noodles (+$1) to share and it was more than enough. I love love love the garlic noodles!! Also the Chinese sausages, shrimp/tofu patties, the meat ball quiche slice of pie shaped (ok, I forgot what it's called) thing, and the pickled veggies. Their fish sauce for dipping is perfect for this meaty dish.

My only complaint is that they try to trick customers into thinking their saving money on the pho by marking it 30% off... But the "normal price" is $9+ which is outrageous for a bowl of pho anywhere. So you would be paying the normal price of $6-7 dollars of a regular bowl of pho. For the month of May though, it's 50% pho on weekdays - but hopefully they don't change their prices! Because stating $10 on their normal price would be outrageous.

CASH ONLY & you pay at the counter after your meal. Service is really good & everything comes quickly and you don't have to struggle to get the attention of the waiters even if they're preoccupied.

The girlfriend and I came here one night for dinner and I was really in the mood for some Vietnamese food, com tam (broken rice) in particular. Now typically you'd want to go to Garden Grove or Westminster to get yourself great Vietnamese food for cheap in general but since we decided to stay local and catch a certain showing at the movies that night, decided to check this place out.

Reviews of this place seem to be all over the place but what really sold me on coming here was mainly the portion of the 10 item plate they had to offer. Although I had high hopes of getting my com tam fix in that night, I was saddened to see that they apparently use regular white rice instead of broken rice and hence opted for garlic noodles instead... You may be asking then, "was the rest of the food good at least?" Well, although we didn't get everything on the menu, here's a breakdown of what we got that night:

TK 10 item plate (3/5): As I previously mentioned, I was expecting to get com tam with this dish but decided to opt for the garlic noodles instead. To start with that, the garlic noodles were decent... then again it's kind of hard in my opinion to mess garlic noodles up. As for the remaining items on the plate... I either enjoyed it or didn't. For instance, the egg cake, Chinese sausage, nem nuong, and tau hu ky were great, especially when complimented with nuoc cham. The rest of the meats... well, let's just say I would have rather got double of the other items I just mentioned in substitution of the rest. And with all of that at the price of $15.99, I find it hard to justify to ever get this plate again with all things considered.

TK Pho Dac Biet (4/5): Out of the two dishes we got that night, I'd say this was probably the one I would have enjoyed most. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it's THE BEST pho I've ever had; although that may be true if we were just talking about the Irvine vicinity. The broth was tasty and the noodles had the right consistency I usually expect from any noodle dish. However, I found the meat, with the exception of the meatballs, to be a bit overcooked for my liking. This dish doesn't come with meatballs right off the menu, and you'll pay an extra 0.50 cents for maybe a couple of them with your pho, but I'd say it was worth it.

T.K. Special (5/5): It's hard to classify this as a drink or more of a dessert. This came out before anything else and my first sip of it had my taste buds jumping! To be fair, I'm a sucker for sweet things and so my take on this item might be a bit skewed, but *shrug* it is what it is. It's essentially a drink with young coconut, pandan jello, longans, and basil seeds with a strong emphasis and taste of the coconut. If you're into these types of drinks and/or love che, I'd suggest you try this mug out!

Overall, I'm not going to say this place is horrible, but if you're going to label your establishment with the words "com tam" on your name, you should at least serve actual broken rice and not your typical steamed white rice.

Tasty convenient n fast

Can get crowded fast.  Luckily there is seating out in the patio area as well...

Service very good.

Food very good n well prepared... presentation excellent.   Well worth the visit..