Maji Curry

Like several of its Walnut Village Center neighbors – Omomo Tea Shoppe, Stacks Pancake House, and Wanderlust Creamery – the 20-seat katsu curry shop Maji Curry debuted in Irvine to lengthy lines and plenty of interest in its story: It’s the first U.S. location of a Japanese chain founded in Tokyo, where it won an award for its unusually cheese-topped pork cutlet curry plate. And like most of those neighbors (besides Omomo), the lines dissipated fairly quickly, here most likely because the curry’s in the okay to good range.

To Maji’s credit, the menu is larger than one would expect given the restaurant’s small dining room: in addition to pork katsu, you can mix rice and curry with hamburger steak, chicken in cutlet or karaage forms, beef, fried prawns, sausages, eggplant, spinach, and/or vegetables; the first three are available with or without cheese topping for a roughly $3 upcharge, and four spice levels are available, two for free and two for $1.25 (“level 5”) or $2.25 (“level 10”). Omelets can be paired with curry and several of the  proteins, while side dishes include fries, salads, and chicken karaage, plus two “limited quantity” pasta dishes.

We ordered three items: the pork katsu with standard spice ($14.50), a pork katsu with vegetables and level 5 spice ($20.05), and a fried chicken karaage side dish ($4.95). To Maji’s credit, the dishes were all roughly on par with similar items at Curry House CoCo Ichibanya: moderately sized pork cutlets – not super thick or juicy, but not too dry – paired with six ounces of inoffensive, barely sweet base curry that becomes lightly spicy with the level 5 addition, plus enough rice (roughly 8 ounces) to sate rather than overload most people. Larger and extra rice portions are available for those who want them.