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| - Wow! This is a prime example of why you can't always trust 4 stars on Yelp. (Sad face) I have seen a Groupon for this place multiple times and have been curious about the quality since their reviews on here seem to be great. We went during early lunch hour time, was helped promptly at the order counter, was excited to see the full menu & our mouths started watering thinking about this special caloric treat we were about to indulge in. And..... then the let downs started. No soy sauce, just some kind of mix that seemed teriyaki-ish, but whatever, who needs that sodium bottle anyway. Food came out relatively quickly EXCEPT the side order of lau lau which is what we were most excited about, it was delivered to us after we were done with our other plates. We gave the benefit of the doubt because this is a slow cooked item & we thought they were putting love into it... NOT! It was sooooo disgusting, if you've ever had real lau lau, you would understand how horribly prepared this was. After we worked our way through the dried banana leaf portion, we made it to the treasure... NOPE! The leaf was extremely bitter, filled (using the term loosely) with 2 large pieces of fat globules, a few (meaning 3) strips of what seemed to be dried jerky like pork substance. Enough on that, I'm getting upset again just typing it. The Mac salad with no potato, huh? tasted like orange zest & was low on flavor. The Kalbi ribs were so chewy I had to spit some bites into my napkin because I was going to get lock jaw trying to process it. My better half got the chicken katsu & it was just alright.
Now I have eaten at Ono & thought that was passable but do not choose to eat there, but I would eat there any day in comparison to here.
End note, if you've been to Hawaii, then you know what authentic flavors are, if you are looking for the real deal, go to Aloha Kitchen. They know what they are doing, it's delicious and less expensive and so much better quality!
Was that too harsh? I really dislike wasting hard earned money.
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