Mesa

Pretentious. I love the style and atmosphere of this place. But the food is just ok. I feel as though they try too hard to pretend to be so great… like it’s a 5 stars club with impeccable food. Which is not the case. Just be real.

I’ve been there a few time but I like it. usually recommend it to anyone new to the area or someone visiting. I like the atmosphere in general. It’s classy and the ambiance is very nice too.

Horrible employees. Went there last night with a gf new to California and the lady Who served me my drinks was so rude and had so much attitude then as we were standing by the bar a couple was getting up called us over to take their seat then a set of girls pushed me and my friend out-​of-​the-​way to steal the seats. They said somebody was saving those seats for them and we said who this couple? They were lying. The lady who gave us her seats started to argue with the girls and told them to get up we asked management to make them move and they didn’t care and said its not their problem and the two girls ended up getting our seats after we waited close to an hour I will never come back to this place again everybody is rude.

Atmosphere is nice. It’s casual and trendy. So, you can either dress down or dress up. There are lots of seating areas, but if you go on Friday or Saturday night, it could be hard to find a table, as many are either taken or reserved. The bar is in the very center, with two sides. Usually there are around 2 – 3 bartenders. When it’s busy, expect to wait a bit until they get a drink started for you. Finding creepers in bars is inevitable, but for some reason, there tend to be a lot lurking here… :(

Tasy food and delicious drinks. A little pricey and the wait at the bar can get long but the vibe is great. Love on warm nights how they open the roof up!

Let me start off by saying the restaurant and the food themselves are great. I hadn’t been here in a few years (maybe 5 yrs or so) but I remembered it being a really cool restaurant with great food and a good vibe. OC lounge with good music, pretentious a little but not too Newport Bch crazy. That is why when me and a girlfriend of mine were looking for a great HH spot to meet and catch up in Orange County I thought lets try Mesa. It was Friday so I went online and checked their hours and made a reservation at 6pm (when they open) for 2ppl.
We met, got past the young’ns/gate keepers at the front desk got a table right next to the bar. We started ordering food and drinks. Our server was good, she made some recommendations on HH bites and we were off to catching up, enjoying the food, the background music and just the overall atmosphere. We sat and ate and drank for couple of hours… then it happened. Downhill from there… a woman who looked like the keeper/​manager of the young girls throughout the restaurant and at the front desk came by our table and asked my friend if we were ready (motioning to the check that was left at our table). Since I was in the restroom, my friend responded «in a minute». She started to walk away and returned to the table with this «K well just to let you know our tables have a 2 hour time limit and you guys have been here past that so…». My friend, completely annoyed at this point but returning a polite response again says «Got it. Just a minute.» I get back to the table and hear from my friend that we need to leave based on what was just said. We put our cards down and throw our jackets on. WOW.
I mean really? We were being kicked out of the dinner table that we reserved??? Unaware of the interaction that just took place, our server comes back & asks if she can get us anything else. We tell her evidently we need to leave based on the woman that came by. So strange to because its not as if our server had come by trying to wrap us up. To have her come over and push us along was completely unnecessary and rude. We looked around us and there were open tables. That was completely uncalled for. For 1. there wasn’t a line outside the front door or people waiting 2. this is Mesa… not the château marmont. Way overboard! Come to find out that woman is a manager and her name is TAWNY. Our server was apologetic and tried to fix it by asking us to stay. I believe our server escalated our leaving on account of TAWNY to another manager named AJ. He came by and he too apologized and said he would work on «training her better». Our server was great and we made sure her tip did not reflect the ending of our night. But man, I guess BEWARE of the 2 hour time limit. Eat and talk fast… so rude!
ps. I noticed in reading a lot of the reviews on here that their customer service is really lacking. This place could easily be a regular go to, but it sounds like they need to work on how they treat their customers.

This is the only happening lounge in OC! The crowd is diverse and the ratio of guys to girls is a close 1:1. If you arrive after 10pm there’s cover charge (what? Really??) and is super crowded inside! Even with a table it took our server 15 minutes to get our orders! And good luck asking for anything after your first round! The drinks are good. Lychee martini is my favorite! The food isn’t bad either!
Music: loud? Not something you can dance to although they do have a dance floor.
Fun tips: bathrooms are unisex!
Overall: this place is pretty fun if you don’t feel like driving to LA!

I would love to give this place 5 starts but the service was so horrible I simply can’t budge from 4 starts.
I went during happy hour with a party of 10 to celebrate a birthday. We had no problems being seated and everyone was more than welcoming.
Everyone ordered off the happy hour menu, a deal you can’t beat! This is where all the chaos happened. Our server forgot food and drink orders on multiple occasions and some food did come out until a hour after everyone had finished their meal.
Other than that the experience was awesome!

I’ve been to Mesa several times, and have concluded it’s alright… But not really worth a wait.
I’ve come for dinner on weekdays and it’s nice. Little to no wait, friendly service, nice atmosphere, dim lights, comfy lounge-​type seating. Food is good. I’ve tried the shrimp dish, sliders (so tender!), temporal green beans (bomb!!), calamari (ok), pork belly (yum!), cauliflower Mac and cheese (meh), and others that aren’t really worth mentioning. The pizzas were a big hit, the mushroom and leak is really good! The desserts was basic. We tried the bread pudding and it’s not worth the calories, in my opinion. If I was reviewing off dinner alone, id give 3 stars.
Side note: Lots of drinks to choose from. The lychee cocktail is my go to when I come here, or sangrias if it’s happy hour.
Now… I’ve also come on a Friday, and I had a terrible time. It is CROWDED as hell. No place really to sit and relax. Drinks are expensive. Ugh. I just wanted to leave as soon as I got there. Not a place to chill, just claustrophobic. If I were reviewing off this I’d give 2 stars.
Wouldn’t come back unless I had to. 2.5 stars, rounding up to 3.

Im trying to figure out how deep i want to go into this review lol. Let’s just start.
Entry: the first time i came, no issues. the second time though… the girl was SO rude. She told me i wouldnt get a table, and then didnt even offer that the bar was open seating (this is an obvious thing so its not like i needed her to tell me i can sit there, but she really just shut me off after «oh. there’s nothing open». She was the epitome of a royal pain in my… nvm
Food: SO. GOOD. 5 STARSSSSS. The shishito peppers are insanely delish — i loved them i ordered them twice. lol
Drinks: Malbec girl here — their selection is smooth and also not pricey at all, always a plus.
Atmosphere — wonderful. super sexy set up that is fun and intimate. The music is phenomenal every night, and its such a wonderful vibe. you can come here with a bf, friends, anyone.
The first time i was here, it was for a friends bday. We got a cake, and gave it to the hostess who was said to bring it out later. But when later came, she said they lost the cake. How do you… lose. a cake? It was so weird and confusing — even the manager said she had no idea where it went or what happened. That, to me, is kind of ridiculous. They didnt even offer to compensate us for the cake, or something else we paid for that night. Now, this was no ridiculously expensive cake — but can you imagine this happening to a party that did pay a LOT for a great cake? A little bizarre.
See, based on mesa itself — food, drinks, vibe, — i love it. i could easily come here weekly. Little glitches like the shorties at the front door and the mishandling of cakes are things they truly need to work on. I plan to come back here a lot, but just avoid all the BS ive seen here in general lol. Mesa is fantastic — just get it together y’all.

So it’s our first time out in a few months since we had a baby. This should be a good night! We made an early reservation so we could get home to the baby. We arrived at opening to find an empty restaurant and the hostess sits us right by the door at the worst table in the place. Hmm is this the best you can do for my wife’s birthday?
So I ask for a different table only to receive eye rolls, looks of confusion, and a collective level of disgust from the three hostesses behind the desk… welcome! They start checking the computer frantically as if this has never happened before and I’m really putting them out. Then they tell me that this table is all they have because they are fully booked. I expressed they should easily be able to switch us to any other 4 top unless every other guest happened to reserve specific tables (I didn’t know that was an option)???
As I’m standing there another hostess walks back and complains to the other girls «omg the other table wants to move too» right in front of us. They’re all staring at us annoyed and confused. What a cluster. I just want to sit down, girls.
So finally they seat us in an okay place. The waitress is very sweet. She tells us about the craft cocktail of the week-​a whiskey sour. Sounds interesting enough and we order 3 and a beer. We taste it… not half as good as I make at home… what craft are they using? This isn’t starting off too well.
I read the menu and say «ooo scallops yummy» and the waitress says, «we’re out of scallops». …Perfect!
We ordered a few small plates to start and found the ahi tacos and calamari to be less then impressive and we’re glad to have the sweet potato fries to carry us through to the main event. We felt like steak and the waitress said that the «special» is even better than the grilled Angus steak only to find out it’s a small serving of skirt steak– no different than any piece of skirt steak you’ve ever had. The only thing «special» about it was the half ear of corn which was perfectly cooked and would have been preferable to the mediocre appetizers we tried. I’d hate to taste the non «special» steak on the menu.
Wine list, ho hum. Check was somehow $ 250. Nothing stood out or was memorable (except for the greeting of the hostesses).
I didn’t even realize until after we got home that they forgot to acknowledge my wife’s birthday altogether. Thanks guys!
The restaurant has a nice design and ambiance though their attempt at a culinary menu falls flat in the back of house. This restaurant is pretentious. I won’t be going back…

It was my best friends birthday and she wanted to have it here with a group. She called a week or so beforehand to reserve the table. When we got there, we didn’t ha be to wait in line which was nice. We just walked right in.
She reserved a table for 11 and it was a nice long table by the fireplace. It took them a while to allow us to sit– and the entire time I saw that our table was empty and clean. weird. Also, I would recommend this place for small groups of 5 people max, because when the groups get bigger, it’s such a hassle to deal with the check, seating, and once you sit, it’s hard to mingle.
The food and drinks were pretty good, and I really liked the modern ambiance (especially the tree in the middle of the place!), but there were WAY too many tables in that place! When they started to play music and people started dancing, be dancing area was like the size of my apartment kitchen! Super small. I feel like they should move some tables out of the way once «dinner time» has passed.
Overall, I would come back, but only for a date night or small group. Cool vibe, decent food & drinks, but again way too crowded for the space there is. I would say it’s one of the better spots in the area though!

Juicy bar hangout in the OC
They have really great lychee martinis here and that is probably one of the best drinks. The food always smells so good and looks so delicious when the servers are bringing them to the tables. I have personally tried the mussels and they are so juicy. I would definitely recommend their food and drinks here. The place is pretty nice and the ambiance is classy and upscale.
Usually the entrance is free before 10 during weekends but a lot of times if you have a big group you can probably try to talk to them if you want to really get in for free. Otherwise, all the workers are pretty chill and cool.
Crowd is very chill and definitely a melting pot. There are all kinds of nationalities and all walks of life that come in this bar. I would say the ages vary from like early 20s to almost 50s here, there is broad range of different ages that come here.
There is a smoking section outside, but the smoke sort of gets inside the place when you sit by the entrance. It is not very secluded which is not a big deal but can be a big deal if you hate smell of smoke,

HOLY CHEF’S MUSSELS!!! «Secret menu mussels.» Run. Go. Order them now. The spices and the chorizo bits make this lightly spicy dish incredible! Chef Niki is a joy and you can tell from the way she speaks that she is extremely passionate about her menu. Sipped on the «little dragon» which was refreshing and adorable. I love the vibes in this place. Cute décor, great music and fabulous service from Kaley!!! We sat at a booth with a private TV, dominos, cards and poker chips. Obviously we played war. Haha! My ONLY complaint is the menus are awkward and gross looking. I vote changing them to a book feel because the plastic cover is cheap and cheesy. I can’t wait to return!!!

In the middle of our bar hopping, we came to this spot in Costa Mesa. We drove in from the street, and I could immediately tell that this place was pretty good. Great sights with a classy feel.
The line took about 10 minutes, since they were at capacity when we got there. Once in, we paid the cover, and to the bar we went. I ordered my standard redbull and vodka, and my buddy got a heff. My redbull/​vodka was pretty good, and very strong.
The ambient is nice, but seating is scarce unless you dine there as well. There is seating along the bar, but that gets taken up fast. The place gets pretty crowded, but navigation around the place is not impossible.
The restrooms are interesting. They have eight stalls, each with a toilet and its own sink. Hence the area is co-​ed, which sucks for my buddies and I because the line is inevitably longer.
I will return here, as I saw a bit of what I liked.

I love everything about this place! Whether you sit at a table or at the bar, it’s sure to be an enjoyable visit. The staff is knowledgable and friendly (and super hot!) They kept the sangria coming (perfect on a warm Southern California day).
The music is great, they play a little bit of everything.
As for the food… We tried a little bit of everything. Definitely recommend the chorizo chimichanga (to die for!!)
Eat, drink and be merry

I really like this place. Good food, good drinks, and the ambiance is great.
Drinks could be a little stronger but don’t mind me the alcoholic. I am a mussel fanatic. The mussels here are delectable! I also had fries and calamari. All very much fried and mouthwatering. But then again everything tastes better when you’re intoxicated.
Mesa is fancy and classy. Dressy casual attire? Mesa draws in more of the mid to late 20’s to an older crowd lol. I would take out of town associate here if I had any hahah. Definitely reminds me of the New York scene. After work drinks anyone?

If you’re looking for something classy, this is the place! Drinks are tasty (lychee martini), however it is very expensive!
Friday & Saturday nights get super busy, so if you’re looking to grab food, make sure to make reservations, otherwise the bar area is open! Although it gets very crowded & it’s often hard to find a spot to sit so get there a bit early!
Parking is always troublesome around this area so choices are street parking in the back or valet!
Mesa overall has a good vibe, bar tenders are great & service is friendly!

I love this place! The service is always great and I really enjoy just simply being here. The atmosphere and the ambience of the entire restaurant is really cozy. The food is pretty tasty and the drinks are typical bar prices, in my opinion.
I recommend just self-​parking instead of using the valet, the parking lot isn’t that far apart. Friday and Saturday nights have a 10 $ cover charge and can be a little more crowded than other nights. I think it’s always best to make a reservation because it may be tough to get a table sometimes. You may have to speak a little louder (border line yell) to carry a conversation with someone at your table.
I love this place because people are well dressed here and it’s a classier bar than others. Presentation is definitely on point.
They don’t have a large beer selection, but they have a handful of variety of drinks to choose from.
From the food items that I’ve tried, I really enjoyed the Cauliflower Mac and Cheese and the Shoestring Fries. The fries were complimented well with the aioli sauce. The sweet potato fries were mediocre to my liking.
* I may be wrong, but I think after 9pm tables are self-​seating instead of reservations

I just can’t figure out why someone wouldn’t love this place. First, they take OpenTable reservations which is always a plus in my book. The vibe is intimate and trendy, and the service is great. The staff is very friendly and concerned about the customer experience. This time my fiancé and I were out celebrating his birthday and were really happy with the experience, even more so than my previous visit. When our waitress found out it was his birthday she really took care of us.
We started with the ahi tuna tacos which were so delicious and fresh tasting. The «shells» were made of radish which just made them so light! Then our waitress surprised us with a complimentary little apple salad which was again very fresh and crisp. We then shared the sweet and spicy pizza and the lamb shank on gnocchi and peas. Both were so good, especially with some of their super spicy red crushed pepper (they have some good stuff). Our waitress then brought my fiancé a tiny piece of bread pudding with a candle, and we then also ordered a full order of bread pudding. Oh my gosh it was sooo good and light, and delicious with the ice cream it came with. Finally our waitress brought us some complimentary after-​dinner liqueur. During our dinner we had both also tried a couple drinks — I loved the lychee martini. Overall a great meal and such fabulous service!