Family-owned Hamjipark has been a fixture in the Los Angeles area for nearly 30 years, with two locations in Koreatown and one in Orange County.

Living just an ocean’s skip from Hawaii, husband-and-wife owners Adam and Mimi Cho — whose mother opened the original Ham Ji Park on Pico Boulevard — were frequent visitors who spent their vacations on Oahu sampling food at Korean restaurants around town. Over time, they decided there could be room for their style of Korean barbecue in Honolulu.

The couple partnered with John Lee, a three-year California transplant who missed the taste of home that Hamjipark offers.

Adam Cho said he found local Korean fare heavy on salt and sugar.

“For me, it was very strong. “In every region people have their own flavor preferences, and to a certain extent there’s no fighting that, but Cho said what may work in Hamjipark’s favor is Honolulu’s aging demographic. “Maybe our food will be too light, but older people tend to think of their health and may search for food with less salt, and we don’t use MSG.”

AFTER FOUR years of planning, Hamjipark has opened in our own mini version of Koreatown, “Korea­moku,” bordered by Keeaumoku and King streets, Kapiolani Boulevard and Kala­kaua Avenue. The new restaurant is in the Keeaumoku International Village, in the space formerly home to Paradise Seafood, near Yakiniku Lulu Rara.

The small restaurant fills up early in the evening, with overflow spilling into the streetside patio. The sound of K-pop fills the air, though more for the benefit of an energized kitchen staff than customers.

Beyond flavor, what will be most striking for local Korean-food enthusiasts is the dominance of pork, as beef is so popular here. By local standards, the menu — identical to that in L.A. — is quite small. Cho said they started with many more dishes, but trimmed back over the years to focus on executing a few specialties well.

That means the offerings are meat- and stew-centric, without the extras we tend to expect, from seafood to mandoo and pajeon (scallion pancakes). It’s a time-tested, greatest-hits collection of recipes. Some date to the restaurant’s opening in 1989, when Mimi Cho’s, when Hwashin Kim, now retired, opened the first Ham Ji Park, partly because, as a Christian, she loved feeding people from all walks of life. To this day, there’s a family spirit to dining here, and the large portions are meant to be shared by many.

The two main specialties are pork spareribs ($26.99) and pork neck stew with potato ($26.99). Those ribs arrive sizzling over a bed of sliced onions, and are succulent, plump and juicy. I thought such juiciness only happens following a long marinating process with Asian pear or other fruit, generally the Korean secret to tenderizing meat with fruit enzymes. But no, Adam Cho said Hamjipark arrived at a flash process about 25 years ago when, because of a sudden rush of customers, they didn’t have time for marinating. A quick rub of a house red-pepper paste before grilling was found to create better results, because salt marinades tend to dry out meat and rob it of fresh color.

The resulting ribs are addictive, with a balance of sweetness, touch of salt and heat, to the point that Cho — who is hands-on in everything from cooking to washing dishes — says he’s surprised when people don’t order the ribs.

The pot of pork neck stew (gamjatang) is an eyeful, arriving brimming with meaty broth, pork and a whole boiled potato. It’s a comfort dish reminiscent of oxtail stew, as one picks at the meat around the pork bones.

I know there are those out there who don’t enjoy any kind of laboring over their meals. For them, it may be best to pursue the one beef dish on the menu, marinated sirloin ($33.99). Instead of steak alone, as usually presented at local Korean yakiniku houses, the sliced meat is tossed with green and white onion slices for tableside grilling. Heavy on a garlicky marinade, this dish comes closest to matching the local palate.

A favorite dish to go with all the meat you’ll be eating is saucy, stir-fried squid ($28.99) or octopus ($29.99) with noodles, meant to be stirred together before eating.

This is not the place to bring your veggie-loving friends. The only things green on the menu are a complimentary lettuce salad and banchan that varies daily. About six little side dishes are offered and may include cucumber, daikon and cabbage kim chee, fish cake, dried seaweed, potato salad or potato slaw.

The salad comes in handy if you’re the type who likes using meat as a wrap when grilling pork bacon ($24.99) or Jeju pork belly ($26.99) tableside. You’ll have to take the lead when grilling because the young staff isn’t versed in helping out. We didn’t notice that our server hadn’t returned to turn and cut the pork belly, so it became dried out.

Every table has a button to summon a server, and this has become something of a crutch. Staffers are inattentive until you push the button to summon them.

Cho promises that will change with more training. To maintain the service level of the L.A. operation, one of his managers has moved here, and one of his L.A. chefs will remain here indefinitely.

BECAUSE I couldn’t read the menu descriptions in Hangul, I thought that dishes of cod roe with vegetables ($24.99) and milt with vegetables ($24.99) were salads. I ordered the combination of milt and roe, the sperm and egg sacs delivered in a stew, which is probably a preferable way to eat that combination.

One of the dishes popular with the older set is Hamjipark’s specialty of fermented soybeans with tofu and pork ($15.99), a stew geared toward those with a taste for natto and Chinese stinky tofu. Once you get beyond the smell, you may enjoy the textures of the beans and savory character of the dish.

Lunch is more affordable, with $16.99 meat-and-stew combination specials that give a taste of the pork spareribs, or stripped-down sea-salt spareribs (these will seem flavorless if eaten after the original ribs), paired with your choice of spicy kim chee stew, vegetables with soybean paste and pork meat, or the aforementioned fermented soybean stew.

Nadine Kam’s restaurant reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Advertiser. Reach her at nkam@staradvertiser.com.