Good friends Sharon and Rayna told us about Yakitori Glad, located left next to Pizza Hut on Kapahulu Avenue. EVERYTHING on the menu, including beer in small, medium, or large sizes is $3.90.
Ample parking was found in the small downsloping driveway lot behind on Palani Avenue with a small sign that said parking was free for Yakitori Glad if you let them know your parking stall number.
We were there early, before 6:00, and were asked if we had reservations (no), our parking stall # (3), and then seated against a counter that had no view, but it was okay since we were there to eat, and not for a view. Our server was a nice young man who brought us water and green tea.
Their large glossy 3 section menu card is quite extensive and overwhelming at first. Shio, Tare, Mene. whatever. We ordered, almost blindly.
Bacon wrapped mushroom sounded delicious – and it was! 2 mushrooms with bacon on a stick, and we got 2 juicy yummy sticks.
Aunty ordered kamameshi rice which had gobo (Aunty loves kamameshi rice) and was told that it would take 30 minutes to make. Hmmm. Gotta have it, and it actually came sooner, or it seemed like came sooner, in a neat little metal bowl on a stand with a wooden cover – so cute! We were already rather full so took most of it home (and it was just as delicious the next day after a zapping in the microwave oven).
We ordered a couple of orders of yakitori (chicken chunks on sticks) – one was Mune Glad-yaki, and another that was recommended by the server, but we were not impressed with either because the chicken was quite dry and rather tasteless, imo. It did not taste fresh and was probably pre-cooked. We were there very early, way before the crowd, so perhaps fresher sticks would have been served later, as the place got more packed and busy by the time we left.
The enoki mushrooms (we love mushrooms) came in a foil boat with ponzu sauce and was delicious though a little sparse.
We tried the tsukune okonomiyaki in shio flavor – that was tasty and more like a ground chicken patty with sauce, at the recommendation of the server when I commented that the chicken was a bit too dry for my taste. These were pretty good so next time we will order the chicken patties instead of the chicken yakitoris.
The Gyu-kushi wasabi yuzu beef sticks that we ordered sounded and looked delicious, and they were – but again, very dry. Aunty was hoping for something like gyutaku with ponzu sauce but this was not it. Maybe next time we’ll order pork instead.
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- mune glad-yaki, meh…
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- chicken skewer, forgot which one
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- enoki mushrooms, yum!
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- tsukune okonimiyaki
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- gyu-kushi (beef)
half eaten already, yum!
Aunty’s favorite was the ume ochazuke – nice deep bowl of rice with 3 soft big ume swimming in green tea. Yum! It was the best simple and most satisfying ochazuke, so it really made Aunty’s meal.
Lastly, we ordered their mochi ice cream, 2 green tea and 1 cherry blossom (tasted like cherry ice cream). Meh. It was okay but nothing to write home about.
Would Aunty go back to this place again? Yes, definitely – but with a better idea of what to order.
Here’s what Aunty would order the next time. Kamameshi rice (with the plan to take home most of it), ume ochazuke, bacon wrapped mushroom, shiitake nikuzume (mushroom with chicken patty), renkon nikuzume (lotus root stuffed with ground chicken). Maybe the buta-bara (pork), or chicken skin (kawa-shio), or a salad, or … Actually, going back is a must because there are a lot of things that we didn’t try that might be super delicious.
$3.90 sounds like a great price for entrees, but it can add up. It would help to try blindly first (like we did) and then figure out slowly what you really like. It was a small busy fun place with very nice servers, and good simple food that makes for a happy stomach.
If you do go, please let Aunty know what your favorite dish is, onegai shimasu (please)!
I wanted to make sure you saw my answer to you on my blog:
I used my Bose noise cancelling ear buds and they were absolutely AWESOME. The first time I turned on the noise cancelling switch, my eyebrows went right up to my hairline. Almost all the airplane roar disappeared and left me with my peaceful music. Sigh… It was wonderful. That noise cancelling technology is amazing. I can’t fly without it now. The wonderful thing is that it’s so small. I don’t need the ear muff thing. Yae!!!
Wow! An eyebrow raising experience! I shall keep my eyes and ears open for them and pounce on the next deal. Mahalo for the report!
Wow! This sounds like a great place. Thank you so much for the recommendation. We’ll have to try it once we get our lives more settled again. Too much happening over here. The kamameshi sounds great. Chazuke is such a comfort food. Uh oh… getting hungry again.
I am hungry too. I would love to just have the ochazuke and bacon mushrooms, yum yum.
Hope you are rested! Enjoy being home again.
I went there w/ mom after an event. Hoo da food and the great staff. We had this awesome server he said he was an Arab and he was gorgeous and dat buggah wen flirt with my mom and made her so happy. He was saving up to live in Japan. Their yakitori sticks were HUGE and generous. We also bought extra food to take home for next day’s dinner – total cost only $40 and we ordered a LOT. The only thing was there was only one hibachi and one chef cooking it so it took forever to get our food. My mom had a fab time and the server got a huge tip. They also got a 5-star on yelp from me and I’m rarely a 5-star giver. BTW I grew up in Kapahulu on Date St. near Kaimuki High. My bff lived on Kapahulu Ave as her parents owned an okazuya and they lived above. This was right across from Bill’s Bakery and Cal Yee all gone now. My other bestie lived in an apt right across from Glad’s parking lot. That was my stomping ground…..
Didn’t see a gorgeous Arab server so maybe he went to Japan already. Kapahulu is so different now – great for eats!
Palani Avenue is a street that hold some very special memories for me. My grandmother lived on Palani Avenue. There’s an apartment building on what was once her property. Spent a lot of time at Grandma’s. There was a 3 bedroom house up front, which a lot of the family lived in, including my mother. Then in back was a cottage where Grandma lived. Between the two houses was a huge hayden mango tree that us kids practically lived in during the summer…eating mangos until we were sick…fond memories. Interesting dishes on the restaurant’s menu…
Kapahulu is SO different now, Betty! It may have started when Safeway built their new store. It is always busy and lots of new little restaurants on the Ewa side of the street. The Kapahulu Bank of Hawaii branch next to Taco Bell is closing up – that will really change the block. Traffic and the streets are still congested so hopefully that will be addressed for the sake of tourists and bikers and the rest of us. It is truly the gateway to Waikiki but not user friendly enough, imo.
Our mango tree was at the tail end of harvest so I had our tree trimmer (a future post) cut all the branches back. This year was a really great season – so many mangoes that I almost got sick of it. Almost, but they are too delicious to get sick of and now I am missing the sweet juicy luscious fruit.
Am planning a trip home next July…actually going to Kaua’i for a family reunion…then hope to spend some days in Honolulu. One of things I’d like to do is drive around to the different places where my family use to live…St Louis Heights, Palolo Valley, Kailua, etc and drive through Kapahulu and by Grandma’s…it will be fun to be able to find everything that was so much a part of my growing up…
Betty, make sure you contact me when you are in town, maybe we can get together and I can drive you through the old neighborhoods, then have lunch and/or dinner! Maybe the other Hawaii bloggers too!
I will definitely plan on doing that…it would be fun…:)