GREAT EATS HAWAII: SHOKUDO JAPANESE RESTAURANT AND BAR

SHOKUDO JAPANESE

HONOLULU, HAWAII

SHOKUDO JAPANESE

1585 KAPIOLANI BLVD

HONOLULU, HI 96814

808-941-3701

HOURS: Monday thru Thursday 11:30 AM - 12:00 AM

Friday and Saturday 11:30 AM - 1:00 AM

www.shokudojapanese.com

I visited Shokudo Japanese shortly they opened the restaurant many years ago. Cannot remember much about the first visit, but for some reason I have never been back. Decided to give it another try after visiting a vitamin shop that is located just down the street. We walked over from the Nordstrom parking lot and were greeted by a smiling young hostess and another gentlemen. The place was about half full and we were seated at a booth in the main dining room. Shokudo has two separate dining areas with a sushi bar in the middle. The main dining area features comfortable small booths and larger tables for groups and families. The other section behind the bar is terraced with a totally different feel and atmosphere from the main dining room. Our waiter was pleasant and informed us that Shokudo had changed their menu since first opening on Kapiolani Boulevard. The new menu includes photographs of most every dish and there is a large selection of Sushi, Appetizers, Salads, Entrees and Rice Dishes. We decided to order one dish from each of the three pages of menu items. Started with the Miso Soup ($1.95). The soup included large pieces of Tofu but my daughter complained that there was no seaweed in the soup. The first page included Sushi so we went with the Red Eye Roll ($13.45). Spicy Tuna and Cucumber wrapped with fresh Ahi Tuna and topped with Green Onion. Loved this Sushi. It had just a little kick of heat and the tuna was fresh. Yummy! The next page of the menu had a photo of Gyoza that caught my daughters eye. The Gyoza ($6.95) were small and had very little taste. Even with the dipping sauce these did not deliver on flavor. We picked the Unagi Rice Bowl ($11.45) from the third page of the menu. The waiter brought the dish to our table in a sizzling hot and I mean hot bowl. The glazed Unagi sat atop the rice beautifully and I was ready to dig in when the waiter asked if we would like the dish "mixed" at the table. I said yes and he went to work mixing the Unagi into the rice. We were left with a bowl of rice mixed and patted down in the bowl. Flavor was delicious. This was a really good rice dish if you like Unagi (Eel). Overall I found the service here to be good and liked the atmosphere in main dining room. The food was just o.k.