Following the Stampede to Elephant Bar - CLOSED

Elephant Bar

24155 Laguna Hills Mall #1055

Laguna Hills, CA 92653

It is rare that my friend, Laurie gets out of the house for happy hour. She is a mother of two and is always busy running around taking the kids to school, working at her job, and trying to find time to keep up the house duties. So when she got a spare minute to meet up for happy hour, the only hesitation from us was, where should we go?

We headed to Elephant Bar at the Laguna Hills Mall. We had been here one other time and remembered that they had good deals during happy hour. Elephant Bar has 47 locations in 10 different states. They have two Orange county restaurants, the other OC spot is in Irvine. Elephant Bar has been around since 1980, and they specialize in Asian inspired food. Their happy hour is from 3 to 7, Monday through Friday, and 9 to close seven days a week. Let's see if this happy hour will make us happy.

To start off we both got two of their $4 cocktails. Laurie got the Classic Mojito with Cruzan Estate Rum. I went with a Long Island Ice Tea. We both thought that these were decent prices for these drinks. I thought my Long Island was okay, not the best tasting one I have ever had, but not the worst either. Laurie felt that her Mojito was refreshing, and she must have liked it because she ordered another one later on. Some of their other drink specials included a $2 Margarita, $3 well drinks, and $4 Mai Tai's and large draft beers. Let's check out the food.

Laurie's first choice for an appetizer was the $4 Vietnamese Shrimp Spring Rolls. I made a point of telling you that this was Laurie's choice because these were awful. The only reason I knew that these had shrimp in them was because it said so on the menu. Tasteless is one word comes to mind, and avoidance is another. The two sauces that came with this barely added any flavor to these spring rolls. Stay away from these!

Laurie redeemed herself with her next pick, the $4 Artichoke Dip. I am not saying that this was the best artichoke dip ever, but after eating the tasteless spring rolls, this was a big improvement. This came out piping hot and had a good consistency. We polished this off pretty quick.

The start of round two of appetizers arrived, and leading off were the $6 Niu Niu Coconut Shrimp Skewers. These heavily breaded shrimp were just okay. No coconut taste present, let alone shrimp. This dish that had flavor written all over it, disappointed us with its mediocrity.

Our last appetizer of the evening was the $4 Baja Chicken Quesadilla. Now, this had to have some flavor right? No, it did not. This was your basic quesadilla, it did have a fair amount of chicken in it, but the taste was pretty bland. Still, this quesadilla was our second favorite appetizer of the night, although that does not say too much.

The happy hour at Elephant Bar is a good deal for people who are not too picky when it comes to food. The way the restaurant was packed, it seems like a lot of people fit into this category. The drink specials are pretty good, and the only redeeming value about the food is, that it will soak up some of the alcohol in your system. So the next time Laurie gets an afternoon off, we will have to find another happy hour to try. If you have any advice on where we should go for a great happy hour, please leave a comment.

Out of five Stampy's, (Bart's pet elephant on the Simpsons), five being best to zero being worst, Elephant Bar gets 2 Stampy's.

For more information on Elephant Bar, click here: http://www.elephantbar.com/