Hand-Pulled Noodle Bar Near Me: Lan Noodle's Eight Shapes in Arcadia

Lan Noodle pulls every order of Lanzhou beef noodles by hand at 411 E Huntington Dr, Suite 102, in Arcadia, and the signature bowl is $15.99 on the restaurant's website menu. Searching noodle bar near me in the San Gabriel Valley usually turns up a dozen options, but this is the shop The Infatuation ranked first in its 2024 guide to hand-pulled noodles in LA and the SGV. The website lists the Arcadia shop as open Monday through Sunday, 11am to 9pm.

Lan Noodle came to life in Arcadia in the summer of 2019, according to a 2021 LA Taco profile by Lauren Teruya. Partner and manager Esther Yuan told LA Taco she could not find the flavors of home in Los Angeles, so the team brought in chef Chengshan Gao, whom the article described as one of the top five Lanzhou noodle makers in China. The original shop sits in a strip mall on Huntington Drive, and it has since grown into three locations.

The website now lists the Arcadia original alongside a West Covina shop at 1428 S Azusa Ave and a West Hollywood branch at 7100 Santa Monica Blvd. Arcadia is the one to visit if you want the shop that built the reputation. Kat Thompson's Infatuation guide, published in May 2024, put Arcadia at the top of its list of eight hand-pulled noodle spots and pointed to the chef working the dough behind a kitchen window, which is still the best seat-side show in the room.

The ordering decision here is the noodle shape, not the price. Every soup on the menu comes in eight cuts at the same cost: Thick Round, Thin Round, Thinnest Round, Angel Hair, Wide Flat, Thin Wide, Chives Leaves Flat and Triangle. The Infatuation wrote that the eight shapes put most noodle spots to shame. The round cuts slip easily through the clear broth, while Wide Flat is the cut to pick if you want a broad, chewy ribbon in every bite.

Triangle is the shape most first-timers skip, and it is worth one try. The menu lists it with the Chinese name for a buckwheat-style triangular cut (qiao mai leng zi), and its ridged edges make it the most unusual of the eight. Each bowl also comes with a cilantro choice, none, regular or extra, which the online menu treats as a standard option. Ask for extra if you want the herb to cut through the beef broth, or none if cilantro is not your thing.

Start with the Signature Lan Noodle at $15.99. The menu describes a traditional Lanzhou beef noodle soup with sliced beef, small beef chunks, clear beef bone broth, daikon, cilantro and garlic greens. Reviewing the West Hollywood branch in 2024, Sylvio Martins of The Infatuation noted wafts of star anise and scallion in the broth and wrote that the wide flat noodles taste like toasted flour, which tells you how much the noodle itself carries the bowl.

If you want something deeper, the Braised Beef Noodle is $16.99, with braised beef bone broth, slow-cooked beef chunks, spinach, cilantro and garlic greens, and the Spicy Beef Noodle is also $16.99. The Pickled Mustard Green Beef Noodle Soup, $17.99, adds sour mustard greens to the clear broth. The meat-free option is the Lanzhou Street Noodle at $13.99, a mild, spicy sesame paste and peanut butter soup on beef bone broth, while the Vegetable Noodle Soup is $14.99 with mushroom, silken tofu and bok choy.

For a full lunch, Combo A is $18.99 and pairs the signature noodle with a tea egg and a soft drink. Combo B adds a vegetable appetizer for $19.99. On the side, the Sesame Paste Liang Pi, a cold wheat-starch noodle dish, is $10.99, and the Chinese burger, or rou jia mo, is $7.99 with pork or $8.99 with lamb. Ten xiao long bao are $13.99 if someone at the table wants dumplings with their noodles.

Our honest take: skip the xiao long bao. The San Gabriel Valley is full of dumpling specialists, and the reason to sit down in this strip mall is the hand-pulled noodle. The dish to share instead is Big Plate Chicken at $24.99, bone-in braised chicken with potato, onion and green pepper served with wide flat noodles. It is a dish built for the table, so order it when you come with friends rather than solo.

LA Taco described Lan Noodle as a counter-service shop, and the website runs online ordering through Toast. If you take your noodles to go, LA Taco noted that the noodles are packed separately from the broth so they do not go soft on the drive home, which makes takeout a better option here than at most soup shops. Reviewing the West Hollywood branch, The Infatuation also described fast service and constant takeout traffic.

If the dining room is full at the dinner rush, the simplest backup is to order through the website and eat at home, or to head to the West Covina location on Azusa Avenue, which keeps the same 11am to 9pm schedule. Arriving at the 11am opening on a weekday gives you the best chance at a seat with a view of the noodle window.

The best nearby stop is the Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden at 301 N Baldwin Ave in Arcadia, a short drive from Huntington Drive. Its visit page lists daily hours from 9am to 5pm, with last entry at 4:30pm, and adult admission of $18. An early lunch at 11am leaves plenty of time to walk the grounds afterward, and the Arboretum lists a calendar of October 2026 events for anyone planning a weekend afternoon around the trip.

Lan Noodle is at 411 E Huntington Dr, Suite 102, Arcadia, CA 91006. The Arcadia phone on the official website is (626) 618-6686, and the site lists Arcadia hours as Monday through Sunday, 11am to 9pm. By transit, Foothill Transit line 187 runs along Huntington Drive, and the Metro A Line's Arcadia Station at 73 E Santa Clara St is about half a mile away in a straight line, so plan on a longer walk than that number suggests.

Prices from the website menu: Signature Lan Noodle $15.99, Braised Beef Noodle $16.99, Lanzhou Street Noodle $13.99, Combo A $18.99 and Big Plate Chicken $24.99. Do not confuse this shop with 1919 Lanzhou Beef Noodle, a separate restaurant also in Arcadia. Ask Karpo in the Karpo APP for more San Gabriel Valley noodle shops near you, or for a dumpling stop to pair with your bowl.