Nobu Waikiki ▪ Waikiki

2233 Helumoa Road
Honolulu, Hawaii
808.237.6999
website

Another evening in Waikiki, another restaurant at a hotel. We decided to have dinner at Nobu, which I have heard of from celebrities coming out of the LA and London locations. We picked Nobu for its happy hour special, the Nobu "Three-some": any three food items and dessert for $32. Unfortunately, we either came in on the wrong day or too late. If you want to take advantage of the deal, call ahead. We still decided to stay in the lounge area so we could order off of the tapas menu, which is not available in the main dining room.

Nobu.

The tapas menu is broken down into hot and cold sections. We ordered from a bit of both. We decided to share the Wagyu beef and foie gras gyoza ($10) from the hot section. It was a treat of a dumpling due to the richness of the filling and we all loved the squash purée underneath each gyoza.

Gyoza.

E decided on a threesome of her own. She ordered the yellowtail sashimi with jalapeno ($9), the sea bass tempura ($9), and the pork belly kushiyaki ($10).

Sashimi, sea bass tempura and pork belly skewers.

Cee ordered Bigeye tuna sashimi salad ($26) off of the main menu. It included generous slices of tuna.

Tuna sashimi salad.

I ordered the black cod with butter lettuce ($16) also from the main menu. I have been obsessed with black cod ever since I tried it at Imadake. This one also did not disappoint, even though the two pieces were pretty small. I liked that it was served in lettuce adding an element of freshness. The steamed clams with pancetta, kale in a miso dashi broth ($9) was nice and hot. The broth was extremely savoury. It was a light dish that warmed me up. Once I ate all of the clams, I slurped up all of the beautiful dashi broth.

Black cod and Steamed clams.

I'm sure the main menu at Nobu is just as good but I enjoyed my meal at Nobu mainly because of the tapas menu. Small plates always win in my book. It gives me a chance to try a variety of dishes without breaking the bank. The dessert selection was ho-hum so we skipped it. (We gained a habit of walking down Kalakaua, the main street in Waikiki full of stores and stopping by Honolulu Cookie Company. There are several and each store has samples of their shortbread cookies. I just needed one piece of the dark chocolate dipped one and I was happy for the night!)