Noodles, soul food and more: Fresh new flavors headed to Irvine Spectrum Center

The Irvine Spectrum Center is already home to popular Orange County dining destinations like Javier’s Cantina & Grill, and it’s an outpost for some fast casual brands like Sweetgreens and Shake Shack‘s first ventures into the O.C. market. Now the outdoor dining, retail and entertainment center is expected to get even more fresh new flavors in the coming months.

Authentic soul food concept Georgia’s Restaurant will open a location at the Spectrum as early as next week. This will be the fourth Southern California location for the family-owned restaurant. The first opened 10 years ago at the Anaheim Packing House, in Eastvale and the Long Beach Exchange. All four are run by co-owners Nika Shoemaker-Machado, her husband, Marlon, and her mother, Gretchen.

Inspired by “Nana Gretchen’s” home cooking and the catering company she ran out of her kitchen until the 1990s, Georgia’s serves a menu of family-driven recipes like crispy fried-green tomatoes accompanied with a lemon aioli, slow-roasted St. Louis barbecue ribs, Creole-seasoned farm-raised fried catfish and the family’s signature buttermilk fried chicken, which is herb-seasoned and cornmeal-crusted.

“Featuring only dark meat chicken and a special brine, our fried chicken has developed quite a following for being extra crispy, insanely juicy, perfectly golden and utterly addictive,” said Shoemaker-Machado in a news release.

Other Southern favorites include red beans and rice, jambalaya, collard greens, black-eyed peas and of course, mac ‘n’ cheese. Owners anticipate a soft-opening for Georgia’s by next week at suite 732, near the Regal Irvine Spectrum movie theater.

Also expected to open soon is Le Shrimp Noodle Bar, a concept from the Singapore-based Paradise Group, which operates Paradise Dynasty inside Bloomingdale’s South Coast Plaza.

Le Shrimp Noodle Bar will open more locations in Orange County, including one at the Irvine Spectrum.

(Courtesy of Le Shrimp Ramen)

Best known for its umami-rich shrimp ramen made from a flavorful prawn broth, Le Shrimp Noodle Bar is expected to open at the Spectrum before the end of the month at suite 705, near Dave & Buster’s. A Fountain Valley location is also slated to open this summer. Both new locations will feature an expanded menu that will add to its selection of vermicelli, ramen and rice noodles as well as appetizers and sides like silken tofu in oyster sauce, chilled crunchy cucumbers, vegetable spring rolls and teriyaki chicken.

Looking even further ahead, the Tustin-based traditional Thai cuisine restaurant Manaao Thai Comfort Food has plans to expand with a second location at the Spectrum in mid-2025.

“This new location will allow us to share our passion for Thai cuisine with even more people while maintaining the authentic experience that our loyal customers love,” said Manaao owner, Kanate Ungkasrithongkul, in a news release.

The idea for Manaao began during the pandemic when the engineer and web-developer used his time in lockdown to work at recreating the food from his childhood in Thailand. Ungkasrithongkul and his wife, Anita Lin, opened the first Manaao Thai Comfort Food at a small space in a strip mall in Tustin in 2023. Open for lunch and dinner, the restaurant often has a long wait list. Ungkasrithongkul said he hopes the new space, which will feature an indoor dining area and an outdoor patio, will help them serve more customers more efficiently.

“Our Tustin location is quite small with just 30 seats,” said Ungkasrithongkul. “It was important to me to ensure that this location was big enough to cut down our guests’ wait times while being easily accessible to visitors.”

Manaao Thai Comfort Food at the Irvine Spectrum will be located near Old Navy.

Khao Soi Noodles at Manaao Thai Comfort Food in Tustin.

(Emily Davis)

If those forthcoming eateries don’t have you hyped, sources have confirmed that xiao long bao giant Din Tai Fung will open a location at the Spectrum in the near future too.

The Taiwanese soup dumpling restaurant already has a large presence in Orange County with a busy location at South Coast Plaza and an even busier one at the Downtown Disney District in Anaheim that opened earlier this summer. There is no word yet on when diners can anticipate the opening of Din Tai Fung, Irvine.