Revolving Door of Malaysian Cuisine: Belacan Grill To Replace Defunct Tropika

​As excited as we were to discover last night that there's a new Malaysian restaurant in town (Tustin, to be precise), we soon realized that it's on the very same site as Tropika, also Malaysian, which closed in June.

The new joint, Belacan Grill, is the second venture of the people who own the original in Redondo Beach. The Tustin location (17460 17th Street, right next to Zov's) is due to open on September 1, although owner Jimmy Niwa concedes that it may end up being a day or so later than that. The windows are currently obscured, so it's hard to tell how far along the refurb is. Apologies for the bad shot, by the way (blame my right-hand man, who shot it on his iPhone).

The website also promises a "free gift" if you sign up, which, according to Niwa, will either be a 15 percent coupon or $10 gift card. Not that we need an incentive to try out what will once again be OC's only outpost of this criminally underrepresented cuisine.

I, for one, can't wait to try the petai (sator beans), which, claims Gustavo, "taste like garbage," and, which, argues Edwin, "are awesome...even better what they do to your pee.  Worse than asparagus!"

Yum!