Takeout lunch from Downtown Honolulu, Hawaii…read more.. While I was walking through the Topa Financial Center (makai Ewa corner of Queen and Bishop Streets), I saw "Aloha Sushi". I have seen other locations of Aloha Sushi, scattered around the area. It's so convenient for the people working at the end of Fort Street Mall area. There are hot entrées under the warmer, cold drinks in the refrigerator, and ready to go bentos on the counter! Just grab, pay at the counter, and get to your next destination! This particular location has cute plushies like Hello Kitty and Totoro! On the refrigerator, there are photos of a cute white dog... must belong to one of the workers. The pleasant workers liked Cony, Brown, Stitch, Miffy, and Nikki Bunny! I showed them how Brown will eat the Salmon Bento and share his broccoli with Cony, etc. At home, we enjoyed the ume avocado maki sushi a lot! That was a good combination! We also liked the imitation crab avocado sushi, zucchini and imitation crab jun (with yummy dipping sauce), and the salmon bento! All flavors were on point and everything had nice presentation! The shop was clean, organized, and bright! I would go back again!

Out of all the sushi places in town, Aloha Sushi is my go to. Although 3 blocks away from me, I…read morewill make that walk to get my sushi fix. This location has never done me wrong, the staff is friendly and loves what they do, their shrimp tempura roll is always delicious and from time to time I'll get their shrimp tempura curry, so filling and at a generous portion. The charmingly small store is kept flawlessly clean and is inviting. They also have popular bentos to go so anyone to grab and go, but they tend to go quick so get there early.

We came across Ilea's Kitchen (at the KailuaTown Farmer's Market across Adventist Health Castle)…read moreenticed by their delicious looking display of Japanese hand rolls. Today's offerings were: torched salmon/spicy mayo/unagi sauce seared ahi/black sesame seed shoyu ahi poke salmon cream cheese spicy ahi torched big island kampachi There were also the Mommy and Daddy sushi combos. Our teenagers happily inhaled the torched salmon, shoyu ahi and spicy ahi in seconds - which equates to their seal of approval. Generous fillings and quality ingredients. Very friendly service. Support local businesses and give them a try!

Who doesn't love fresh, made to order hand rolls and sushi? Oh, that crispy nori!…read more Ilea's Kitchen is a true mom and pop food stall at the Kaka'ako and Kailua Farmer's Market offering that! I came to the Kaka'ako one. Each hand roll is $8, but cheaper with each additional one (2 for $15, 3 for $22, all the up to 8 for $57). There are regular and torched hand rolls with options from ahi to salmon to Hokkaido scallop to Big Island Kanpachi. For sushi rolls, they offer a Mommy's and Daddy's roll for $19. This time I got the Seared Ahi with Black Sesame Sauce Torched hand roll. Oh my goodness, that black sesame sauce was so tasty and flavorful! Really strong black sesame and soy and umami taste. I'd put that sauce on everything! Next was the Torched Salmon with spicy mayo and Unagi sauce. This one needed more sauce. While the salmon was good, and did get some Unagi sauce, it wasn't enough, so it was on the bland side. The spicy mayo didn't seem like it was in there. Didn't get any spice kick. Overall, I enjoyed it! Price was fine. Everything was fresh and solid quality. The owners were nice. Would visit to try other rolls! That black sesame sauce was awesome! Forgot to take photos as my hands were full! And hungry!

Holoholo Grill is a genuinely solid food offering located in the Paradise Palms food court…read more Holoholo Grill is sort of split up into roughly three sections, with a ramen bar, a musubi section, and the main cashier section where you can purchase their main entree bentos as well as cafe drinks. In the morning you will find their usual breakfast options (including musubi) in their main section, although I think around 10 or 10:30 is when they start to put out their lunch items and move their musubi to the musubi section. I am always impressed at the options they put out. There are certain staples like their breakfast items and musubis, as well as select lunch bento, such as the loco moco and garlic chicken, but then they switch up the menu every day; one time I got pork belly in a Chinese bun-style slider. I am always excited to try their hot food items. I also like to pick up dessert when it's seemingly rare and unusual, like their tiramisus. Over on the musubi section, if they are selling butter mochi, I find it very hard to resist. Also, if I need to stretch my budget, I have found the musubis to be both (relatively) cheap and filling. Holoholo is my go-to for lunch (I love the Garlic Chicken, Miso Garlic Chicken, Lechon Kawali, Pork Adobo, Meat Jun, etc.). I especially love the local vibes of the food; I have been able to try so much Filipino food here (so much so that I've had more Filipino food in 4 months than I've had in the prior decades of my life). One word of caution is that they have often been unpredictable with how much they salt their food. I have been (salt)burned a handful of times with how unpleasantly salty a dish was. This is infrequent, but it has happened at least twice for me.

I love this place! I hope they never close down. Such comfort food to me :)…read moreParking is in the front and is shared with other tenants. There's one aunty making the plates and she's sweet. No seating area!

Takeout lunch from Kalihi, Honolulu, Hawaii…read more.. I don't remember how I found out about Toshi's Delicatessen, but I knew that I would have to visit this old school okazuya because it's been around for a while. There are a few free stalls for parking right in the front. I was driving in the wrong direction, so I wasn't able to park there. Plus, there's no sign to indicate where the business is. It's truly a hidden treasure! Service is friendly and down to earth. Just answer: Chopstick or fork? Plain musubi or with nori? And remember that it's a cash only environment. Comfort food was delicious! I got the last piece of salmon! The Hamburger patty had a teriyaki flavor. The chow funn was surprisingly really tasty! The nori musubi was nostalgic. The corned beef hash patty brought back happy memories of small kid time! Overall, a wonderful foodie experience!

***4.5 STARS*** Last…read moreweekend I was tasked to pick up spareribs for employee meal. I've done this multiple times previously. No big deal. Wrong. After I secured free street parking on a Sunday morning, I went to my go to place for meats and was caught off guard when the staff told me they were sold out on what I asked for. They did have local spareribs but with our previous experience we found these spareribs to have excess bones and the meat quality not as good. I found myself going to other back up places only to find out the sparerib prices are 17% to 30% higher. I was tasked to pick up over 5 lbs so to keep my cost low, I found myself walking over to Oahu Market. I stumbled across Sing Hing Market (SHM), a meat stall at the corner of Kekaulike and N King Street. They had a large display of assorted pork cuts, along with Chinese roast pork and char siu meats. Immediately my eyes landed on the spareribs I was looking for and was delighted when the staff quoted me a price that was 16% cheaper than what I usually pay for at my go to place. I asked if they had 5 lbs plus as I had to feed a crew and the next thing I witnessed the male staff brought a whole bunch out and placed it on a scale that totaled over 5lbs. ***happy dance*** I advised the staff that I was making steamed spareribs. The next thing I witnessed, one of the male staff ran the sparerib slabs through the meat saw. It was then transported to the counter where the female staff chopped the spareribs into bite sized pieces for steaming. The staff had this process well set up where my waiting time was minimal. I also appreciated this stall's display as the layout of the meats were sorted in a way where it was convenient for the consumer to see what's available. Upon payment, I asked the staff for a receipt as I was getting reimbursed. I was impressed the female staff wrote "pork" along with the date and total amount paid. One of our employees marinated the pork and steamed it for lunch that day where it made a delicious meal. Several other staff also commented that the spareribs were delicious but the quality wasn't as good as where usually get them from. I personally felt the same way, too. Overall, SHM was a great find and came through when my go to place didn't have what I wanted. I'm willing to give them another chance as the sparerib price was considerably cheaper. Perhaps I didn't get the best quality but worthy for another try in my books.

Did someone say Crispy Pork Belly cut fresh for $8 a 1/2 pound? Super flavorful and a great portion…read more(1/2 lb) for $8. Enough to say, it was delicious. No place to eat it, but a short walk to the Maunakea Market to grab a drink and a table.

Freshly made Yukon dish with shrimp tempura, while I waited…read more Home.made is always better. Don't and soup wa very good with seaweed and green onion toppings. But, the shrimp was probably frozen, cruchy. Still, I enjoyed the food.

This place is not too expensive but honestly the ambiance and cleanliness is not up to par for an…read moreeat-in place. There are 2 dining tables inside a space that looks like a gas station store. We ordered some food and sat at a table, only to see that the sriracha that was sitting on the table was old and separated, with green splotches. When the food came out, the California rolls were cute, but everything else was very very unappetizing. We picked at the food and left. I don't recommend coming here. 2 stars because the ladies working there were very nice.

This place seems super underrated. Amazing musubi and omusubi. Lots of different flavor options…read moreavailable. It seems that everything is made fresh daily or even multiple times a day. Because it's ready to and wrapped to-go, the service is fast too. Prices are very reasonable and the portions are pretty big (maybe a lot of rice if you're on a diet, but better more than less lol) Also they have a lot of cute stickers and merch (I got a cute "I musubi" insulated lunch bag) 10/10 recommend.

As much as I like to eat here, I really wish the rice proportion wasn't overwhelming compared to…read morethe actual good stuff :/

I never review this early lol. Sometimes it takes me months tbh. My on time review is probably bias…read morelol as I am Samoan lol. We were driving around searching every market that pops up on yelp saying they sell hot Samoan food, my mom grew up in Hawaii and remembers a market on the corner in her old neighborhood somewhere that sells Samoan food. I search yelp & end up here first, this wasn't the market, we eventually found the one she was speaking of, but of all the ones we visited today, this one stood out to us the most, as we tried food from every market we visited. They definitely had the most options from the other markets we tried , even sold Vaifala in mason jars. The 4 stars really is for the price. What we got here we would usually pay $100 off top for in the mainland. So to us, the pricing was reasonable. It's only missing a star because the lack of flavor in what I wanted the most lol. The palusami being $7 was def, uhm, questionable. The second market we visited had theirs priced at $3. I feel so many things come into play when you price food. Like ....do it taste like $7? My pops is the cook in our family & early on he tried steaming his luau before baking it. This creates a more soft texture in the luau kalo creating an easier tear when you dip your kalo or fa'i in lol & a better chew. I realized how much that made a difference when I ate the palusami from here today. The luau was tough, hard to tear into with my kalo and when I went to take a bite it was rough. Idk how to explain but I wish it was softer. The faalifu inside also could've used more seasoning. However I'm here for more than that lol , because I HATE Turkey tail. I've always been able to do oxtail because I feel like there's more meat than fat there, But with Turkey tail I feel like it's all fat, little meat. However the Turkey tail from here, best I've had to be honest. I only tried because my mom said I'd like it. She was right. So tasty. I didn't even mind the fat because it was marinated and seasoned well. I also had the vegetables and mamoe lol I mean, we killed that in the car on the drive back to the hotel lol. I kept telling my mom wait I need to take a picture for my review lol but Lol we couldn't stop eating it after tasting it. That should say enough lol. Also, they sell canned spaghetti here lol. The kind they don't sell it in reg grocery stores on the mainland anymore. I have to order it on Amazon for my parents, so it was so cool to see they sell it here lol. So lucky lol. They had sweets too. Pankeke, half moon pie, banana bread. I had the banana bread and it was good, your typical Samoan banana bread. Other than that, this place is def. Worth the time & money. My parents would love to not have to cook Samoan food anymore because it's sold just down the street LOL. But until then our annual Hawaii trips will include Talofa Polynesian Market from now on.

I love this place. Every time you visit, if you don't want to cook but have a fat wallet, you know…read morewhere to go even early as 8am you get nice hot Poly food fresh and very delicious! Whoever the Chef is, you're doing a great job. So get ready to go and enjoy this Yummylicious hot Polynesian food! MAHALO