Celestino’s Meats

This is a great little butcher shop, but by far it has the best beef jerky I’ve ever had. I may have some bias having grown up in Costa Mesa but I will make a trek to it just for that jerky.

Over 30 years in Orange County, and believe it or not, we just found Celestinos. It’s a lot like the Meat House, with more marinades. They have a nice selection of quality meats and extras at reasonable prices, and the variety of flavors is a joy. We recently fed a party of forty, with lots of left-​overs to be enjoyed for days.

My sister found this spot because of a particular bottled sauce she REALLY likes LOL! She also came in here to browse around the meats and came home with maple sausage, I was kind of intrigued since I’m a Jimmy Dean fan. The minute my mom started cooking the sausage the smell of it made me so SICK! The meat shriveled up into what looked like raisins and tasted bad! None of us liked it so it wasn’t just my picky taste buds!
I also came back 2 weeks ago to go buy Alexis’ more sauce and what struck me was the very old and fragile man was running the shop! He could barely walk, it made me nervous because someone could easily knock him over and rob the store.
Overall, their product is a bit pricey, their specialty items which I totally get, but the sausage was such a turn off I have no desire to return or buy other meats.
:/​

I cure and smoke my own hams for the holidays. I always get my fresh hog legs from Celestino’s. I have to special order them, but it is worth the wait. They are not cheap, but high quality meat never is. I always feel like I get what I paid for and it is nice to know there are still real butchers around. Last time I only needed a 10 lbs. cut and they had no problem trimming the hog leg I ordered down to size.

I hadn’t been to Celestino’s for several years, and when I stopped in recently I saw that it now occupies only half of its former space. An Australian pie shop has taken over the other half. But I was relieved to see that Celestino’s delivers the same excellent product and service that I remembered.
I’m so disappointed with supermarket-​quality beef and lamb roasts that I almost never buy them these days. But I decided to try out Celestino’s well-​marbled pot roast (boneless chuck) and boneless grass-​fed American lamb. Both were truly EXCELLENT — flavorful and tender. Now, we all know that fat = flavor, and some of the meats are probably hardly low-​calorie, but for special meals I plan to shop at Celestino’s again. It’s a pleasure to be in a store where the owner is so knowledgeable about how to prepare the meat as well as the meat itself. I don’t mind paying a little more for such high quality and so much expertise.

My boyfriend and I tried the Texas Spicy, Original and Sugar Free jerky and they’re great and ideal if you love dry dry jerkies.
The Texas isn’t very spicy, but makes up in taste.
The Original is a good go to.
The Sugar Free sounds unappetizing but if you like dry jerky, this was recommended to us as the very driest. We were pleasantly surprised by the taste and it happens to be gluten-​free.
The jerkies are expensive, but they do have a deal to buy 3 and get a 4^th free which we did. Still expensive with the deal, but we have a real penchant for dry, thin sliced jerkies.
The guy who helped us was super friendly and generous with the samples, which helped in our decision making a lot. We’ll definitely be back for a jerky refill.

I’ve been going here for years and loved it. The meat is great and the marinade is so tasty.
I used to the love the beef jerky but that the last few times I found mold on the jerky so I am staying away from that.

Good service and very friendly staff.
Not a fan of the jerky. $ 12 for a 4 ounce package– yikes! First package: Texas spicy. Meat was not spicy; meat lacked consistency from piece to piece; and it was very dry. Second package: Maui Jerky. It was OK. However, the meat lacked consistency in texture and each piece tasted different. Both packages of jerky tasted «processed.» Definitely not worth the $ 12 per package. Also, had a sample of the Buffalo… no comment.
Pass on the jerky products.
In one word: ripoff.

Lamb Chops to die for! Seriously the best tasting we’ve ever enjoyed! Tiny little butcher tucked away in a very busy strip center on 17^th St. Dennis is super nice and helpful, knows his meats!!! No antibiotics and hormones, delicious!

Great meat! Great service! Dennis is great! What more can you ask for? Everyone is educated on what they sell and it’s quality meat. It is just a little more expensive than what you will find at the normal Ralph’s, vons, ects… But you should be paying more if you want quality meat that tastes better and the fact that these animals weren’t in-​humanely cared for.

THIS PLACE NEEDS MORE RECOGNITION because the meats here are MUY DELICIOSO (very delicious).
Wanted to prove to my boyfriend that I can make an AMAZING STEAK so I went to Celestino’s searching for that PERFECT MEAT to cook for him on Valentine’s Day. Actually, I never cooked a piece of steak in my whole life, so I was hoping good quality meat would help me get through the moment… AND IT DID.
The store is pretty tiny, but there were TONS of meats EVERYWHERE including various kinds of pork, veal, chicken, lamb, and of course, MOO.
RIBEYE was what I wanted to prepare and they had both bone-​in and boneless… I went for the 8 oz. boneless and those two sexy pieces of meat were marbled to PERFECTION with beautiful fat strips bordering the sides of each steak. OMG DROOL… and they weren’t even cooked yet. They came out to be about $ 16 each piece of steak and the price was totally unbeatable for its amazing quality.
The sirloin looked pretty desirable as well… and it was only $ 11 per steak!!! I definitely will be getting it next time!
The two butchers working at the time I came in were extremely helpful and dedicated to giving me the best options amongst all of their meats… I was pleased and felt like I was in great hands.
Cooked the ribeyes… they were BOMB… just the right amount of tenderness, juiciness, fatness, and meatiness. Satisfaction guaranteed.
This wonderful establishment gets 5 STARS for QUALITY AND SERVICE!!! I definitely will be coming again and will tell all my friends :)
Hope this helped! ;)

I love this place! Quality meat from real farm with healthy animals! I literally went to Ralphs right after to compare prices and it was the same! I will never go to the supermarket for meat again! Celestino’s is the place for quality meat at competitive prices!

This place is the best place to get high quality and delicious meats. Everything we’ve tried has been so flavorful and fresh. You can really taste the difference. The owner is always friendly and super helpful and provides excellent customer service each time we visit.

High quality jerky. They let you try free samples. Plenty of flavors to choose from. Selling for $ 12 per 4oz. bag, but if you buy 3, you’ll get one free.
–Teriyaki sounds traditional, but it was the best flavor I tried.
–Venison tasted like spicy teriyaki.
–Santa Maria Style is softer, moist, and kinda sweet.
–Maui Style is slightly sweet.
The jerkies are better after being refrigerated — it tones down the saltiness, allowing you to taste more of the flavor.

You know you’re a grown up when you’re laying in bed on a Saturday morning and you say, «Damn, I wish I could find a good local butcher». Enter Celestino’s, whom we happened to find out after leaving Sidecar Doughnuts 2 doors down.
We initially just wanted to pop in here and see what it was about. After walking in and especially seeing how nice everyone was, we knew we were leaving with something. Everything looked fresh and delicious. So much that we almost bought short rib without having ever made short rib or having a recipe or the necessary equipment to make short rib.
We sampled some homemade turkey jerky and loved it. It wasn’t tough. Ya know, some jerkies always make me feel like I’m gonna pop a tooth. This didn’t and it was very flavorful without being spicy.
We settled on some marinated carne asada and picked up some delicious tortillas to make tacos. When we grilled it, it was delicious. Very flavorful and the quality of the meat was definitely better than what I normally pick up at the grocery store.
I like this place and I love that it’s a local spot. I probably won’t go here often because it’s not very close to me, but on some occasions I might have to make the trip from Irvine.

Discovered this little gem as we explored the new donut shop (Sidecar) a few doors down. What a quaint find! Friendly owner and great selection of meats, kabobs, jerky… Owner told us they’ve been there 45 years… QUite an accomplishment for any busy, and after entering their doors you know why. I have frequented some of the best butchers in the OC (Beef Palace, The Meat House) just to name a few. Those are all excellent choices, but I’m going to make it a point to do business at Celestino’s (and simply because I can grab a donut next door). It’s small, and it’s not beautiful, but the quality and the service make all the difference in the world. They won a new customer today, and I wasn’t even looking to buy, but I did… That’s a good endorsement!

45 years in this same location, and still family owned speaks for itself. Top quality, and offers grass fed. Not to mention the delicious marinades. Fantastic!

I thought these guys had closed down… Nope, they’ve just packed themselves into the wee spot in the corner.
You know when you go into an art supply store that is the size of a closet, but it’s full of just the best stuff along with staff that knows where everything is in every little nook and cranny? That’s this place, for meat.
They have a dryer to make jerky the size of your closet and a staff that knows everything about all the meats they stock. Trust me, I grilled them, since I found myself the only customer in there for a few minutes!
We got a few kinds of jerky to sample and the rundown on all the premarinated kabobs and frozen stock. I’m not sure why you’d get your jerky anywhere else! Great stuff– and they have a sugarless, gluten-​free option on the beef jerky!

I am always a big fan of acknowledging when some one does something so right, that it really makes you step back at look at the experience you had compared to all other like it. And I can tell you that no experience, when it comes to buying meat, I have ever had in my entire life can relate to the experience I had at Celestinos yesterday.
After eating at Thasos (
) during lunch on friday I said to myself that I could make something like this for the rest of my family for dinner over the weekend, and I set out to do exactly just that! I do have to give big credit to the duo combination of Unilocal and google though for helping me find Celestinos. What my plan was to grill an entire leg of lamb with greek seasonings/​marinade, but the only problem was I had no clue where to buy a lego of lamb, not to mention one that was deboned and over 5 pounds!
So what do you do when your in a pickle like this… google it! I googled «whole leg of lamb orange county» and through the power of google and Unilocal Celestinos popped up. I knew this wouldn’t be your average every day run of the mill order from a butcher shop so I though it best to call. I called at around 230pm and said I wanted a 4 – 5 pound deboned leg of lamb and would it be a crazy request to pick it up by 530… Dennis, the owner, said of course not and asked me a few more questions about exactly what I was looking for.
I bailed on work a bit early friday and ended up showing up here around 5, and to my surprise my order was ready for me! The owner introduced himself, asked how I found out about them (i wish I knew earlier when I lived down in balboa for 2 years) and then we talked for about 10 – 15 minutes… this guy was one of the friendliest, nicest, and most helpful people I have ever dealt with! I explained to him exactly what I was doing and he also gave me a few suggestions, which worked out perfectly. The quality of the meat here is incredible, this lamb was some of the freshest meat I had ever seen and he left a perfectly nice even layer of fat on the top so that meat would be super flavorful.
I know butchering is a true art and the guys at Celestino’s have it mastered! I kid you not, I would come up from SD just to buy the meat from here… thats how superb the quality is and how great the staff is!!!

Good selection of meats and premium deli meat + cheese to choose from. Marinated olives, random goodness, etc.
And I walked away with tamales and jerky. :)
$ 10.99 for 4 tamales but they were pretty big and had tons of meat in it. They’re best steamed to be re-​heated as there isn’t much sauce in the meat.
I got the buy 3, get 1 free on the jerky; $ 13 a bag for 6 ozs. The buffalo is a tad tough, the santa maria (beef) is flavourful + chewy, and the hot (beef) has a smidge of heat and tender. All of their jerky is dry. If you like the slightly wet /​saucy jerky, Beef Palace in HB is the way to go.