Oahu Eats

Hawaii not only has beautiful beaches and nature trails, it also have a lot of amazing food. During our time in Oahu, we had a lot of delicious eats. Here is the full review of the places we ate at.

We flew in from Vancouver that morning and we were starving when we arrived at the hotel (Embassy Suites by Hilton Waikiki Beach Walk). Our room was not yet available, so the nice Bell Service person recommended that we walk across the street to the Royal Hawaiian Center Food Court for some quick eats.

Royal Hawaiian Center Shopping Mall: 7/10

Here we had the poke, pineapple fried rice, Dole Whip. Overall nice solid staples of Hawaii. Nothing mind-blowing but still tasty. The Dole Whip tasted a lot more artificial than I had remembered it. Maybe it was all psychological since I had to read the ingredients list to check for allergies and yeah… let’s just say don’t read it if you don’t want to ruin the experience. My little one loved it though. Ignorance is bliss.

Giovanni Pastrami: 7.5/10

We had an exhausting travel day so after some pool time and enjoying the complimentary cocktail hour, we decided to go back to our room for some “room service”. Although they did not have actual room service, they did have some arrangement with 2 restaurants close by with discounts +/- delivery to our room. When we called, however, they said that delivery was going to take too long so we opted to order then go pick it up ourselves. Unfortunately, Aaron still had to wait downstairs for quite a while before the food was ready and by that time, our little one was in major over-tired territory. So my tip is, if you’re planning to order “room service” here, to do it much in advance. The food itself was actually quite tasty. Their onion ring was solid. Their wagyu sandwich was scrumptious. We also had their kalua pig supreme pizza which was very unique and tasty.

Buffet Breakfast at Embassy Suites by Hilton Waikiki Beach Walk 6.5/10

Very standard breakfast with hot food, cereal bar, bread/baked goods bar, and drinks bar. Note: they did not have a lot of non-dairy milk options for those with intolerance/allergies. Highlights being the cook to order omelette/egg station. The rest of the breakfast was unremarkable. I’m not a natto fan but was surprised to see this available next to the miso soup.

Aloha Food Truck 6.5/10

We spent morning at Kahanamoku Beach and saw a food truck there so we had to get some shaved ice to enjoy while we’re there. We ordered the pina colada flavoured shaved ice. The shaved ice itself was huge and quite challenging to eat. The syrup was tasty and they added condensed milk as well to make it creamy. Overall it was like a really nice snow-cone but not as nice some other shaved ice I’ve had in the past where the ice itself was flavoured.

Musubi Cafe Iyasume 7.5/10

We had a fun morning at the beach so on our way back to our hotel, we stopped by here to pick up a few musubi to bring back to our room to eat. We didn’t even realize that this was a very famous musubi place. We tried the original spam teriyaki one, egg spam one as well as the shrimp tempura and avocado one which is apparently their #1 best seller. They were all delicious. We ate this with the leftovers from last night. It was a nice relaxing lunch back in our room before our afternoon adventures.

Momosan Waikiki 8.5/10

We were craving ramen tonight so we took a walk along Waikiki beach and had an early dinner here. It was good we came early because as the night went on, there was long line up. We ordered the spicy dan dan, which was quite different than any other spicy dan dan noodle we’ve had. It reminded us of the Malaysian laksa and was more curry-like than ramen-like. We also had to order the tonkotsu as it’s usually our way of standardizing how good a ramen restaurant is. It did not disappoint and was creamy and rich. The real surprise of the night was the sticky ribs. It definitely stole the show. Our little one who just woke up from a nap immediately perked up after taking a bite of this and proceeded to gnaw at the bone since it was so delicious.

Steak Shack 8/10

It was another beach day for us, this time at Fort DeRussy Beach so we decided to just pick up some food at the popular Steak Shack here. We got the mixed beef and chicken plate and it was really good. We also picked up some drinks along the beach and it was a bit disappointing. The food itself made up for the disappointing drinks.

Tonkatsu Ginza Bairin 9/10

For dinner, we tried our luck at the famous tonkatsu place close to our hotel. Again, we opted for an early dinner and there was no line up. I ordered the tonkatsu sandwich which was pillowy on the outside and crunchy and delicious on inside. I also ordered a side tonjiru (pork soup) which is one of my favourite Japanese soups and it was perfection. Aaron had their specialty Kurobuta pork loin katsu which not quite as good as to the one he had in Tokyo but still better than anything else he’s had in North America. It came with unlimited soup, rice and cabbage, as usual. We enjoyed our dinner as our little one napped and packed some leftovers for her to enjoy back at the cocktail hour at the hotel.

Liliha Bakery 8/10

It was a rainy travel day for us. We opted to skip the hotel breakfast today to enjoy breakfast at Liliha Bakery. I haven’t had any loco moco yet this trip so I had to order it. It was lovely. The eggs were cooked to perfection, the patty was generous and the gravy was flavourful. Aaron really enjoyed their chicken waffles. And they gave us some buns with sauce before our meals arrived and those were amazing. The sauce reminds us of jelly donut filling.

Mina’s Fish House 10/10

On our way back from Maui, we stayed Aulani resort for a few nights. We ate most of our meals on the resort which we’ve already blogged about but I had to write about our experience at Mina’s Fish House at the Four Seasons next door which was probably our favourite meal of this whole trip. Everything was perfection. Their complimentary hummus and pita was a lovely way to start the meal. I ordered one of their cocktail which was like a South East Asian dessert in cocktail form: it contained a matcha-infused vodka, pandan, coconut, lime and basil leaves. My mind was blown. For dinner we started with their hamachi crudo which was amazing. Aaron was obsessed with the sauce. We also had the broiled Spanish octopus which was perfectly cooked and not chewy at all. Then we had their char-broiled lobster cooked with miso butter, garlic and yuzukosho. We only got the small portion and I wanted more by the end of it. Since it’s a fish house, we had to order a fish. We had one of their fish specials which was grilled then place on top of a kimchi pork belly stew. Our server recommended we paired it with rice to which we had to order the spam fried rice. And wow what an incredible way to round off our meal. Everything was mind-blowingly good. We were left truly speechless.