Inka Grill – Costa Mesa
260 Bristol Street
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
(714) 444-4652
HOURS:Mon-Thur 11AM – 9PM / Fri 11AM – 10PM
Sat 11:30AM – 10PM / Sun 11:30AM – 9PM
Do you like spicy food? I like spicy food but I don’t want an ulcer. So when I eat spicy food I make sure to do it every once in a while and not to over-do it. But if you are like me you like it when you get a little burned from time to time. Well, if you are willing to give your taste buds the ride of their life, come to Inka Grill in Costa Mesa!
I’ve been to Inka Grill twice now and both times I’ve loved the food. I went there for dinner yesterday and I had a blast. The meal started when I ordered some water and I was brought some french bread. Seems normal right? French bread and water…you can get that almost anywhere. NOPE! There’s a twist. I looked to the right side of my table and what did I find? Some crazy pastel green sauce called Gringo Killer! This stuff is delicious on your bread. I poured some of it on my bread plate and dipped the bread and I was in heaven. The Gringo Killer sauce is creamy and spicy and it has a perfect spicy aftertaste. It is not jalapeno style spicy. Nor is it hot chili pepper spicy. Double-nor is it wasabi spicy. No, Gringo Killer is a special kind of spicy that at first stimulates your taste buds with a crisp spicy. Then it soothes your tongue with it’s creaminess. And finally kicks you again with spice with its aftertaste! It’s just bread but it tastes great and it is a killer way to start your dinner.
I shared 2 entrees with my friend so we could try two different things. Also he brought a coupon for buy one entree get the other one half-off that he found in some magazine or something. So we were pretty stoked that we were going to save some bucks. Especially because the dishes here cost from $11-$19 and they are worth every penny. We got one pasta entree and one rice and meat entree. The pasta dish was called Spinach Basil Spaghetti. It had slightly creamy pasta with green sauce that was mildly spicy. The basil and spinach flavor was very good. The pasta was cooked perfectly and had the right kind of tenderness. The cool part about the Spinach Basil Spaghetti is that it is topped with lightly breaded chicken breasts. You have the option of having it topped with pan seared Top round steak instead, but this time I went with the chicken, and boy was I glad I did. The chicken was thin and wide and was perfectly breaded. The flavor of the chicken mixed extremely well with the pasta spiciness. I found myself lathering the chicken in the pasta sauce. If you order this item you might want to share it with a friend or be prepared to bring some of it home, because it is a lot of pasta to have in one sitting.
Now the delicious Chimbotanos with beef and vegetables was one of the best food decisions I have ever made. The rice was well prepared and not to wet or dry, just moist enough to go well with the beef. The beef was mixed with some green beans and it was amazing. The beef was tender, but not quite as tender as the chicken in the other dish. And that was ok because the beef was cut into bite size strips that were easy to chew. The sauce for the beef and vegetables was spicy but not overpowering and when I mixed a bite with the rice it was great. A great part of the Chimbotanos was that it had Andean organic potatoes that were made into a type of potato stew-like concoction. The potatoes were brownish-white and they had a very unique flavor that were way better than mashed potatoes or a baked potato. It was like having a thick potato stew with medium sized to small chunks of potato in it. And a thin brown sauce kept it all together.
Inka Grill was amazing and I am going to definitely visit this restaurant again. I had such a good meal that I am probably going to venture into other dishes and find out what they taste like. Their lamb stew sounds interesting. Just take note that there are a lot of spicy seasoning s and flavors in their dishes. So if you have allergies or ulcers you might want to pick a different place to eat. But if you are in good health and like a little spice in your life, then Inka Grill is the way to go!