Poke restaurant beats culinary luminaries
Owner-chef of Sushi Izakaya Gaku, Manabu Kikuchi with some of his specialties, left to right, omatsuri natto, teriyaki chicken with sansho pepper and sliced tako with basil and garlic dressing. Kikuchi's restaurant was ranked No. 11 in Yelp.com's Top 100 Places to Eat in the U.S.
A small Kailua-Kona restaurant specializing in poke is at the very top of the Yelp.com Top 100 Places to Eat in the U.S., a list that includes 10 Hawaii restaurants.
Da Poke Shack, along Kona’s Alii Drive, was ranked No. 1, beating out uber-high-end, multi-star, multi-diamond-bearing restaurants including Alinea, a Chicago-based temple of molecular gastronomy, which eked out a ranking of No. 7. The storied restaurant Gary Danko in San Francisco is at No. 9, barely making the top 10 above Joe’s Falafel in Los Angeles.
Two Honolulu restaurants were in the top 20, including Sushi Izakaya Gaku at No. 11 and 18th-ranked Ono Seafood at 747 Kapahulu Ave. (not to be confused with Ono Hawaiian Food at 726 Kapahulu).
Other Hawaii restaurants among the Top 100 are Opal Thai Food in Haleiwa at No. 39, No. 41 Marukame Udon in Honolulu, on Maui, the Geste Shrimp Truck in Kahului at No. 50 while Ono Tacos in Lahaina is ranked No. 73.
Dat Cajun Guy in Haleiwa at No. 77, in Kapaa, Kauai, Pono Market is at No. 82, and Honolulu’s Sushi Sasabune restaurant is ranked 95th in the U.S.
Yelp.com engineers used each restaurant’s star rating and number of reviews to determine and rank the popularity of each restaurant on the list.
