Opened in Aug 2025 in the former Izakaya Torae Torae Restaurant in McCully, by owner husband-and-wife team of Chef Yuichi Miura from Japan and local born Tina Kaku, whom he met in Honolulu. Chef Miura previously worked for Sun Noodle and Totto Ramen in New York.
The family-owned restaurant is named:
* "Udon," as its specialty is thick Japanese wheat noodles named as such.
* "Yonpachi," refers to a specific dipping-style udon dish, which the restaurant considers this menu item as its signature dish.
All noodles and sauces are made in-house. The flour for the noodles is flown in from Japan, and special machines are used by the restaurant to make its noodles. The noodles are thick, firm and chewy.
The restaurant's signature dish is its tsuke udon or dipping-style udon that originated from the Saitama prefecture, north of Tokyo. The noodles are served cold, separate from the broth, and are dipped into a flavorful hot broth with various ingredients added. This allows the noodles to say chewy during the entire meal instead of getting softer as it sits in a hot broth.
During lunch, the restaurant only serves 7 different udon sets with mini tossed salad (argula, corn cherry tomatoes, wafu dressing), kinpira gobo, rice with hijiki seaweed, and asazuke Japanese pickles. During dinner, it serves udon, izakaya-style small plates (pupus), and desserts.
During dinner, the menu format is different. While the lunch menu is limited, the dinner menu does not consist of sets, but the same udon dishes are ordered by themselves with an extensive choice of izakaya small plate-, e.g., fried squid, edamame, stingray fin, udon fries, takoyaki, tofu, inari sushi, etc. You can also add additional toppings to the udon, e.g., veggie or chikuwa tempura, soft boiled egg tempura, fried mochi, and more. Dessert includes pre-purchased sherbet of various flavors.
Kids sets are offered for a reasonable price of $8 that includes udon, fries, edamame, chicken tempura, apple juice, and soft crackers. Great deal!
Brings back memories of the former Jimbo's Restaurant in Honolulu that closed in 2020.
We visited the restaurant during lunch and ordered the following:
* Shrimp tempura udon set. This was hot udon in soup with 2 shrimp tempuras. The shrimp tempura was a good size, made to order, and was light, crispy and non-greasy. Perfectly made tempura! I requested the shrimp tempura served on the side, as they would get soggy sitting in the soup. The udon noodles were thick, chewy, and complemented the piping hot and flavorful bonito-flavored broth.
* Spicy niku kinoko jiru tsuke udon set. This was cold udon with pork and hot spicy dipping bonito broth with shimeji and shiitake mushrooms, kitsune, and age (fried tofu). The dipping broth was very flavorful, and the thin park slices were tender and tasty.
Hubby and I both agreed that the mini salad was very fresh, and loved the corn kernels and wafu dressing, a Japanese-style vinaigrette dressing. The gobo was perfectly cooked with the right crunchiness and went well with the hijiki rice, as well as the red pickled cucumbers that were salty, spicy, and tangy. The fluffy rice was fresh and sweet. Hope that hot tea can be offered soon!
Customer service is excellent! The serving staff of two, one of whom is the chef's personable wife Tina Kaku, are efficient dealing with a full house, knowledgeable, friendly, and attentive. Water glasses were kept full, and our orders were served within a reasonable amount of time. The entire staff, including the kitchen staff, yelled out an enthusiastic greeting when we walked in the door and yelled out to thank us when we were leaving, with Tina graciously opening the door for us! 3% kitchen fee assessed.
The restaurant interior has a bar counter seating facing the kitchen, tables that can be put together for groups. The interior is clean, bright, and has many Japanese artwork on its walls. Nice Japanese ambiance with Japanese music playing in the background.
Hours of operation are lunch from Thurs to Sat only from 11a to 2p, dinner from Mon to Sat from 5p to 10p, Sun closed. Dine-in only, no reservations. No take-out at this time. Note that a line forms when lunch starts, so when everyone is seated and have ordered, the kitchen is inundated with orders at the same time. Plus, parking may not be available. We arrived about 12:30p, as diners were leaving, thereby opening up parking spaces and available seating in the restaurant.
Udon Yonpachi is located at the corner of McCully and Young streets and is next to the Sushi Company. Free limited parking of 6 designated stall fronting the restaurant. Additional parking available in the same lot during after-hours (week nights and all-day Sat) of Territorial Savings Bank.
We thoroughly enjoyed our lunch experience and look forward to returning to try the dinner menu! Congratulations to Chef Miura and wife Tina on their new restaurant and wish them much success in their venture! Support local! read more