It has been years since I’ve dined at Gyotaku Japanese Restaurant. Nothing against their food, I actually enjoy their food, it’s just that I don’t think the prices match what you get. Okay, not a great start to the post but the food is actually good. Let’s review…

Hamachi Carpaccio • $16.25

Delicious! Good flavor, I guess the price is about right for Hamachi?

Salad served with Teishoku Sets, yummy wafu dressing

Miso soup served with teishoku sets

Combination Bento (three choice) • $24.95

Chicken Karaage, Nishime, and Misoyaki Salmon. Not my entree but where can you go wrong? I do enjoy the karaage chicken from Gyotaku a lot so thumbs up from me.

Assorted Poke Don & Tenpura • $24.95

My dish! I love their poke don, do I think it’s worth $25? Umm..no. But they season their poke very well and I enjoy it a lot. It’s nice to enjoy this dish once in a while. Their tempura? Nicely battered and fried, always gotta add it on!

Okinawan Sweet Potato Pie • $5.50

One of my favorite desserts of all time! This thing is soooo good. Everything works, looks dense but it is so light…not too sweet. I shared this with my dining companion but I’m sure I could have scarfed it down myself.

They’ve done a great job with their renovations and the food is delicious. To me, it’s just a bit pricey especially for a family-type restaurant but I know I will get ono food when I do go.

Tsukada Nojo Hawaii is a fairly new Japanese restaurant in Hawaii. I love the atmosphere of this restaurant, the decorations, servers, food, etc! They have a little parking lot in front of their restaurant but it is very small and it is shared with a sushi restaurant! So unless you can make it there right when they open, parking is a bit risky. Another plus to this restaurant? You can make reservation on Open Table! I wish all restaurants were on Open Table.

Miyazaki Mango Mojito • $9.00
Miyazaki Mango, Rum, Club soda, Mint
Known for their year-round season, Miyazaki mangoes are flown in to create this unique mojito with freshly muddled mint, citrus and rum

Yum, I’ve been here twice and got this drink both times. It’s delicious and refreshing, I just wish the drink was bigger.

Nikumaki Rice Ball • $3.50
miyazaki region’s comfort food: a pork belly-wrapped rice ball in sweet soy ginger sauce, served on green leaf lettuce, served with teriyaki sauce

Okay, we got this dish both times we came here. The first time the rice balls tasted good, the second time, not so much. The meat wrapped around the rice was too tough and the sauce was too salty.

Grilled Skillet Egg • $6.00
plain omelet

Okay this sounds silly but I LOVE THIS DISH. Why is it called a skillet egg? It actually come out in a cast iron skillet and they flip it onto the plate at your table. The egg is soft…souffle-ish and is seasoned like a dashi tamago. The first time we went, we bought two. This time we could only eat one, would have ordered two if we could.

Bijin Nabe • $40.00
chicken-based collagen soup with zucchini, watermelon radish, tofu, romaine lettuce, chinese cabbage, enoki mushroom, abura-age, green onion, watercress, and tsukune meatball

Doesn’t that look…delicious? Haha, I didn’t know what to expect when this was set at our table. But when it boils down, it is a collagen-rich yet light broth.

The bijin pot comes with some chicken tsukune. We ordered kurobuta pork belly as an add-on for our pot. This was delicious! And like other nabes, you can get rice or noodles to finish off your broth. We went with ramen, it was delicious but we were much too full to eat it all. They have such wonderful dining utensils/plates, I think it’s the little details that count and they think of it! I hope you folks get to try this place out!

Ah yes. Slowly catching up on my posts but decided to stick a new one in! Tsukiji Shokudo Genchan Waikiki has been open for about a month and I wanted to give it a try. Oh, this place is hard to get to. Waikiki is already a pain but this place has absolutely no parking. One of the worst kept secrets is the Ross Store parking lot. If you know you’re going to buy something from Ross, you can park in their lot for 2 hours FREE. It’s great. We took full advantage, ate dinner, walked over to the International Market Place for dessert, shopped at Ross and got out just in the knick of time!

Tsukiji Shokudo Genchan Waikiki offers a pretty extensive menu: hotpot, sashimi, poke, Japanese pupus, and plenty of specials! If you check out their yelp page, I uploaded pictures of the menu from my visit.

Salmon and Avocado Salad – $10.80

Nice salad with a good dressing. Very generous with the salmon and ikura. The addition of limu is a bit of a headscratcher. I’m not a fan of limu so I’m glad it was just sprinkled on top so I could just remove it. Good salad.

Spicy Karaage – $7.50

Interesting preparation. My dining companion thought it reminded her of Korean chicken from Zippy’s, she’s probably right. It has big chunks of chicken thighs fried with a very light batter tossed in a savory soy sauce. Not spicy at all but I enjoyed it.

Spicy Trio Don Set – $19.98

According to the waitress, the trio of fish varies on the day. During our night, it was ahi, salmon and hamachi (and ikura!). It was good, nicely seasoned! Their sets come with the entree, rice, miso soup, and tsukemono. The tsukemono was interesting, the usual daikon dish and then a Korean seasoned bean sprout side dish.

Special Ahi Don Set – $18.86

Ah, my dish. I should have gotten the trio special above but I didn’t want us both to get the same dish. I was disappointed. Do you notice that it’s basically slices of ahi sashimi? I hardly would call this a special ahi don, I would have expected seasoning. Well, after I was able to dig in further, there was a mound of ahi chunks under the nori that was somewhat seasoned. Still disappointing, I wouldn’t get this dish again.

I think this restaurant was pretty good! I would definitely give them a try again knowing my new parking option. They weren’t too busy but I wonder if it’s because word hasn’t gotten out yet.

 

My friend suggested we try Yakitori Hachibei, I saw it on Yelp but people said it was always busy. Well the stars must have aligned for us on this day because we were able to grab a last minute reservation at the bar for dinner. Was it good? Yes. Was it worth the hype…well…I can’t say it’s the best yakitori place in town but it certainly had it’s high points. To the pics!

Cabbage Appetizer – complimentary.

Served raw with a very light dressing. I’m not the biggest fan of raw cabbage so it was okay.

Bacon and Egg Maki (Japanese breakfast stick)

Will you look at that? Just look at it! Sweet tamago encased with bacon, an American dream.

Tare Bara (pork belly dipped in lightly sweet soy sauce)

Pork? Yes, please. Belly? YES, please. Get in my belly. This was delicious. Probably one of our favorites of the night since we ordered it twice.

Goma Salmon (salmon in shoyu sesame sauce)

Good dish, nice chunks of salmon!

Hachibei Tempura Chicken Fingers (chicken fingers done the hachibei way)

This is their version of nanban chicken. My friend doesn’t like tartar sauce so we got it with a different preparation. All the reviews on Yelp say their tartar sauce is good, so give it a try!

Sukiyaki (sukiyaki on a stick…really on a stick)

Stop the presses. MUST TRY DISH IS RIGHT HERE. It really literally is sukiyaki on a stick. The unassuming meat roll is covering up all the fixings that come in sukiyaki. Yup, all the veggies and such are wrapped tightly on this stick with wonderful seasoning. That egg yolk right there? That raw egg yolk? You break that yolk up and dip your sukiyaki in. Heavenly. I loved it. Trust me.

Hachibei Chicken Ramen

We fell into the hype. We saw these bowls being carried out to other diners and had to get one for ourselves. Light chicken ramen served in their custom designed cups? Sure, why not. It was an okay dish. When they say light broth, they mean light broth. Nothing I would return for but it was nice to try once.

Have I come to Sushi Izakaya Shinn a few times? Yes. Do I feel like I enjoyed each time? Debatable. Maybe I felt like I had to give them a chance? The hostess is an unfriendly woman and to me that makes a huge difference in your experience. They are on open table so you can make reservations before going. One visit, we were checking their reservations and it was open and clear all night. We walk in and inquire for a seat, the restaurant is not full by the way and she informs us coldly that there were no open seats. If she apologetically informed us of this, I think I would not have left with such a sour taste in my mouth. The thing is, the staff once you get seated are great. I’ve had good experiences with the grill master and the wait staff, it’s just the host staff that ruins everything. I refuse to go unless I put a reservation in through Open Table. Also, the parking is horrendous. They share a small lot with Mini Garden and this other shop in the back…not sure what the back lot is…not a place I would go. It’s hard to get parking so good luck with street parking.

Okay I did a lot of smack talking, let me share the meal I had there last.

Fresh Oysters – delicious but pricey. We were in the mood for oysters so it was really nice. Do you folks know of any all you can eat oyster places? That would be heaven.

Fire Cracker Roll (Go to the Hell) – that’s the exact title. It didn’t wow me but it was okay.

Enoki Bacon (top) and Chicken Meatball – well the enoki looks pretty burnt. Gosh, I can’t even remember this meal…

Chicken Skin and Beef Tongue

Totally my own guilty pleasure. Grilled chicken skin? YES. It was good, sorry not sorry. Their beef tongue, my favorite here. I like that they slice the tongue so thick. Some places slices beef tongue so thin…this place makes it perfect. I really enjoyed the tongue.

Mochi Bacon and Chicken and Leek

I mainly wanted to try the bacon wrapped mochi. It was a nice bit of the soft mochi with the smoky bacon. I was glad to try it but probably wouldn’t order it again.

Grilled Lamb Chop 

It was good, but once again, not memorable.

Miso Ramen – lol, okay I think this wasn’t half bad. Definitely better than Ramen Nakamura. This restaurant really serves everything. Sushi, Robata, Noodles, and Oden! I didn’t get to try the oden but if you’re into oden, they serve it up!

Mizu Shingen Mochi with Green Tea Ice Cream

This is mizu shingen mochi right? I think it’s better at Tsukuneya…

I’ve heard about Ramen Nakamura for the longest time, they’re at the edge of Waikiki on Kalakaua. The reviews seem to be awesome and they always have a line out the door. We just had to try it once! When we got there, there was a line so we thought it was a good sign! We finally got into the restaurant and they certainly run a tight ship, customers hustle in and out of the restaurant as they complete their meals. Kamaaina get a discount so make sure you bring your ID for 15% off and it’s cash only! So what’s the verdict?

Hakata Tonkotsu Ramen Combo

Well…I’ve had much much better elsewhere. What is the big deal about this place? You know one way I judge a good ramen joint? How the eggs are made. Look at this egg. The gray ring around the yolk signals it’s been over-boiled…how disappointing! The ramen was not memorable and I just had no urgency to come back.

Gyoza – typical, average, nothing special

The ramen combo comes with the small fried rice and gyoza. The whole meal was just meh to me, nothing special. The broth was mediocre with no depth in flavor. I would not recommend this restaurant especially since we have so many great ramen restaurants elsewhere.