Driving to Irvine for just brunch (an hour away from LA with no traffic) takes extra motivation. You have to wake up earlier to walk the dogs & get ready. Though, who am I kidding – waking up at 8:30 AM is now considered (a geriatric) “waking up late”. And, LA is not lacking in brunch places so why even drive out that far?

I had seen a lot of social media photos of Habana’s new restaurant & Sunday brunch in the Irvine Spectrum shopping center.  The food looked good – I love Cuban food – and the brunch was at a discount for the first few weeks. If there’s a time to try the Sunday brunch, it is now. Their Costa Mesa location is so popular that on a Saturday night sans reservations, the wait can easily extend over two hours for a table of four. Knowing this, I made reservations online for a four top a week in advance – pretty easily done since this location is still in its infancy.

The food ended up being as delicious as the photos (ropa vieja + buttered white rice + beans = a pleased C) and the space was impressively beautiful. I usually find service at these hyped up spots very terrible but service was great (minus one haughty hostess)! Since the brunch was at a discount, we thought we would be pressured to leave after a certain amount of time. To the contrary, the server seemed disappointed when we asked for the check.