Kat's 9 Lives

Ever since the Diamond Jamboree Plaza has been built, it has become a hot spot for locals. They have a dessert place called Guppy House that attracts the "young'uns", especially late night. Hey, it is the OC... not much to do and even less to do at night. This place tends to be busy at night. The first time I went there was a long line for a seat inside. HT and I opted to sit outside in the freezing cold to eat ice cold desserts! lol Yes, we are that crazy. O=) Some seats don't even have heat lamps! Of course we ended up in one of those. lol *shivers*
From a long time ago, Ms. Lin told me that they have a combo deal that was not bad for a group of people. Of course I ordered the combo even though there were only 2 of us! O=) For $19.99 you get Popcorn Chicken ($6.99), a small Shaved Ice ($11.95), and a Brick Toast ($6.99). It is not a bad deal as a whole. I they they are WAY over-priced normally. $12 for a small shaved ice? Are you kidding me? I'm Asian and $6 is pushing it! lol Albeit the shaved ice is HUGE, but you know the main component is water! lol The shaved ice was humongous and they do put a lot of fresh fruit on top. Still, you can easily make this at home... but at least the big size and plentiful amount of fruit help justify the price. That day we had a pretty decent amount of condensed milk seeped into the shaved ice, so the flavor was very good. Needless to say, I brought many boxes of leftovers home! lol
The Popcorn Chicken was not bad. To me, the flavor was just okay because it had more of a curry flavor. It didn't taste like the typical popcorn chicken I'm used to. The chicken had a different breading that makes it not as crispy, but still good. It's just a matter of personal preference. Ordering this combo allowed me to try a lot more things here that I would if I ordered separately.
What really tempted me to try out this combo was the Brick Toast because I have been a big fan of brick toast ever since Half & Half Tea House. The brick toast was very different here. Now I can sort of understand why it is so expensive here. It's super thick and glossed with tons of sweet syrups. I think I still like the simplistic way where there is only the special milk powder atop a beautifully buttered piece of toast. The toast they use here is huge and the ratio with the special milk powder is lower but of course the plentiful sweet syrup helped to compliment the huge chunk of bread. Still, $6-$7 for a brick toast is quite hefty in my opinion. Good thing is I will finally be making a trip to SGV and I can get me some more yummy brick toast. O=9
Since it was so freezing outside, I decided to get a large cup of Hot Milk Tea. The drinks here are so-so. You can taste the subtle flavor of the tea. All in all we were freezing to death, but we still enjoyed our time. The downside is there was absolutely no service at all! Yes, we may be sitting on the outskirts of the store but we are still paying customers! They didn't really have a bad attitude but I just couldn't get anyone to serve or help us as we were freezing away. I had to go up and wait to ask for boxes to take home. Then it took forever to get the bill and nobody came by to take the check away. We probably could have left without paying and they wouldn't have noticed. HT went to the bathroom so she went up with our bill. Whilst she was there she was observing them work and she noticed that they use the same knife to cut fruit and non-fruit items without washing. She was a bit grossed out at how they don't separate which knife is used to cut what and she wasn't too happy about service so she left no tip. I was a little taken aback because I always feel bad not tipping but she convinced me that no service means no tip. -_- It made me a bit frightened that the next time I come that they might spit in my food! lol I got over this and have been back since. O=9 **and yes I tipped**

Guppy House