Best Affordable Honolulu Restaurants

Adventurous diners will find much to discover and learn about local-style Honolulu cuisine on their Oahu vacation. The Hawaiian Islands’ cosmopolitan capital city presents a veritable buffet of cross-cultural cuisines and cooking styles. If you like the excitement of sampling exotic foods from around the Asia-Pacific Rim, you won’t be disappointed by Honolulu’s dining scene. What’s more, you can find the best Honolulu restaurants on a limited budget.

Backstory to Hawaii’s Varied Cuisine

Hawaii’s diverse cuisine reflects its melting-pot population. Many of the exotic flavors and dishes have their origins in the thousands of immigrant laborers who came to Hawaii from the 1850s onward. Along with native Hawaiians, these Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, Portuguese and later Southeast Asian immigrants, all lent their influences to the evolvement of Hawaii’s regional cuisine.

One staple, the ubiquitous Hawaiian plate lunch, is an institution. It consists of two scoops of rice, a scoop of macaroni salad, and a meat or fish entrée. The variations are almost endless but reflect Hawaii’s unique cross-cultural blending. Plate lunches are generally inexpensive, ranging from $5 to $7 and up, and are available at take-out lunch counters and restaurants around Honolulu.

Here is a Honolulu restaurant guide featuring favorite plate lunch and island-style eateries, where you can sample genuine Hawaiian cuisine that makes Honolulu a diner’s delight.

 

• A traditional Hawaiian plate lunch.

Courtesy of the OVB

Waikiki

Ono Hawaiian Foods

Ono Hawaiian Foods, a small hole-in-the-wall place, serves up authentic Hawaiian-style plates including kalua pig, lau lau, chicken long rice or combinations. “Ono” means delicious in Hawaiian. It’s well worth the wait for a table.

Ono Hawaiian Foods, 726 Kapahulu Ave., tel.808-737-2275. Hours: Mon. to Sat. 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. www.geocities.com

Kapahulu Poi Shop

This is a small unpretentious place—take-outs only. Choose from combination plates with kalua pig, lau lau, chicken luau, pipikaula, chicken long rice and more. Create your own plate and enjoy some real Hawaiian food.  

 

• Patrons of Ono Hawaiian Foods take a pause from their Hawaiian feast of lomi salmon, poi, beef stew, watercress pork and taro leaf-wrapped pork.

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Kapahulu Poi Shop, 3110 Winam Ave., tel. 808-737-8014. Hours: Mon. to Sat. 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Rainbow Drive In

Rainbow Drive In is an old-fashioned drive-in that has a lengthy menu of island favorites like beef teriyaki, boneless chicken, roast pork, shoyu chicken and more. There is limited table seating outside, or opt for take-out.

Rainbow Drive In, 3308 Kanaina Ave., tel. 808-737-0177. Hours: daily 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. www.rainbowdrivein.com

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