This is one of the toughest restaurant to get into in Honolulu. Reservations are taken between 5 and 7 PM, The rest of the time, its a free-for-all: submit your name and wait for the bad news on how many minutes or hours you have to wait. Long benches are situated to the side of the entrance, for those who want to wait. Parking also sucks. Four or five precious stalls are devoted to the restaurant and the Lexus and BMW crowd have a nightly jihad over them. Be prepared to walk at least a block and pay for parking if you don’t want to go to war for parking.

Is it worth all this effort? You’re darn tootin’ it is. Imanas serves three different types of Japanese fare: a good assortment of sushi, a tapas menu for those inclined to imbibe and relax after work, and a "nabe" menu for serious eaters. It’s known mostly for the latter, and that’s what the ram goes there for. "Nabe" is the Japanese word for pot and a nabe dish is usually a soup or stew-type dish that is cooked in one pot. Imanas offers two nabe dishes: shabu-shabu and a chanko nabe. The ram goes for the chanko. Chanko nabe is the protein-rich stew the sumo wrestlers eat to bulk up. After having chanko nabe, one does feel a little "chanko-ed." The belt has to be loosened a few notches.

A portable gas stove is set up on your table and fired up. A large coppery pot is placed over it. A dashi or soup base is added and brought to a boil. One of the not-too-talkative waitresses brings an overflowing platter of veggies, meat and you-name it and prepares to stick everything into the pot. in a very orderly way. First the pork balls go in (yummy). I forget the exact order, but stuff are slid into the pot depending on how fast it cooks. The longer cooking ingredients go in first. The ingredient list includes: Chinese cabbage, watercress, green onions, gobo, mushrooms, long rice, tofu, aburage, mochi, thinly sliced beef, chicken, king crab legs, clams, scallops, shrimp, and hunks of salmon. The sea food goes on this pile of goodies last and slowly submerges as the veggies get cooked. After a few minutes, it’s time to eat.

It doesn’t take more than another fifteen minutes for all the good stuff to go down the gullet, Viking-style. The quiet waitress returns, adds a little more soup base, scrambles a few eggs and adds it in, along with some rice or noodles and turns it into zosui - a rice or noodle porridge flavored with all the goodies cooked in the chanko broth. She serves it up in new bowls, sprinkles in some slashed-up sea weed and the chanko-nabe experience rolls to a stomach-warming conclusion. This whole dish will drain $36 from your VISA account and is supposed to feed two. It actually feeds four normal sized humans.

You roll out of the warmth of Imanas Tei and the world has taken on a rosey hue. Even the backside of Pucks Alley resembles the Taj Mahal, at least for a few seconds. Go here for a truly satisfying meal.

Michinoku

Michinoku’s is another little known gem of a restaurant on upper Kalakaua Avenue, next to Waikiki Realty. You have to drive through a hole in the building to park in the graveled area in the rear. The hunter-green Jaguars and white Lexus tell you sometime about the local folk that have discovered this restaurant. Three big tables, two small tables and a small sushi bar is what you have in this well lit restaurants that pumps Japanese music into its patron’s ears. Sometimes the music is folksy, reminding you of country scenes in a samurai movie, and sometimes its dirge-like.

You are welcomed by a very pleasant Japanese woman dressed in a working kimono. She does not speak English. The sushi bar is run by a head-banded fellow that never enters the main dining area. There are invisible territorial lines here. You get the feeling that they’re a couple, but the ram has never had the guts nor the language skills to ask.

Michinoku specializes in chirashi and udon dishes. The ram goes here for their chirashi. I’m sure the following description does not pass muster for dyed in the wool Japanese foodies, but what the hell. Chirashi is like deconstructed sushi. Sushi rice is placed in a bowl and an assortment of sashimi is placed on top of it in a visually pleasing way. You eat some sashimi and you eat some sushi rice, some sashimi, some rice, etc. You judge the quality of the dish by how good the sashimi is. Some lesser restaurants will include a slice of pink and white kamaboko in their chirashi. A siren should go off in your head when you see this. Rescue flares should explode, firemen should be sliding down their poles and mounting their trucks, tsunami alerts should be going off and flash flood warnings should be scrolling across the television set in your head. Kamaboko in chirashi is a "revolting development." Some will say it’s simply a decorative piece that’s edible. The ram says they’re slipping you the shaft. Kamaboko is not sashimi and has no place in a bowl of chirashi.

At Michinoku there are two levels of chirashi rice: Assortment A and Assortment B. They have fancy names for these, but I forgot what they are. Assortment A will run you $16 and Assortment B will jump up to $21. What’s the diff you ask? B, obviously has better stuff, tho I have never laid out the contests of an A against the contents of a B and made a comparison. Both are good. Just choose the one you can afford at that moment. The contents change depending on what’s available. Maguro is always present, along with clams, shrimp, a white fish, scallops, etc. Also always present is the sweet delicious tamago which the ram saves for last. Needless to say the stuff is fresh and delicious.

With the chirashi bowl comes an assortment of usual Japanese goodies on a tray. A small salad, miso soup, pickles, chawan mushi and usually a cooked vegetable side dish like kimpira gobo.

The ram's eating partner has a different version of chirashi.  Maguro is scrapped into a soft mass and natto is added and mixed in.  This concoction is placed on top of the sushi rice, embellished with flying fish eggs and other stuff and served.

Everybody walks out of Michinoku happy and a little lighter in the wallet, but what the hell, life is short. 

You always check the window display before going into Nuuanu Okazuya on busy Nuuanu Avenue. The food, at an okazuya is stored in a case in the window to show off the available variety. Inside the store the case has sliding screen doors through which the food is selected. You wanna see what’s left. Depending on the time of day you are doing this, the answer for "what’s left?" can range anywhere between "nothing" to "hey, they got everything." The earlier you make your visit the better your chances of getting what you want. In other words: go early. Early is usually six in the morning when working folks buy their lunches on their way to work.

Then you proceed through the doorway, and mess up your carefully coifed hair on the split curtains in the doorway. Normally it isn’t this easy. You usually have to wait on the sidewalk for the three or four people in front of you to order and pay.

Okazu, for you newbies, is a Japanese-Hawaiian word that really roughly translates to "stuff -that-goes-with-rice." Normally, this is mostly Japanese-style food, served cold. And here’s how the ordering process goes. You go into the okazuya - stuff-that-goes-with-rice store - stand in front of the food display and tell the order taker what you want.  Its placed on a paper plate as you order. When you are finished you are charged, ala carte, for each thing you ordered. Most folks start their order with their starch; usually a musubi or cone sushi, or two. Next the gals like to order their veggies like namasu, gobo, nishime, fried pumpkin and konbu maki. The guys usually like to start loading the protein: a teriyaki-ed slice of spam, a hot dog, a hamburger patty, fried saba, fried chicken, corned beef patty or a piece of shrimp tempura. The gals add one or two pieces of protein - usually the healthiest ones - and may add an order of chow fun noodles or fried noodles. The guys, after they have completely covered their paper plate with meaty stuff may add a noodle selection, just in case there might be room in their stomach after the protein, and perhaps a scoop of mac salad for taste. Nuuanu specializes in  homemade fishcake items - kamaboko with a piece of hot dog in it or a half of a boiled egg, etc. - that the gals go for also. They also make okara everyday, which is a rarity.

While you are ordering, a line is forming behind you.  You need to be quick and decisive.  The line can get surly.  Some even double park and leave their car engine running.  The quickest way to get lynched in a okazuya line is to order six separate plates with unique choices in each.  If you hem and haw and stutter a lot they may drag you across the street to Hosoi and order a different kind of box for you. 

While okazu is normally thought of as being Japanese, Okazuyas today sell almost anything. Hot dishes like sweet-sour ribs, squash and pork, peas and pork are common. I’ve even seen spaghetti sold in an okazuya.

The completed order is foiled and then wrapped in butcher paper held tight with a rubber band. A disposable chopstick wrapped in a napkin is slipped under the rubber band. Then, its time to add up the damage which is normally done in the head of the order taker.

How much does a normal plate cost. Depends on what you order. But on average it should not run you more than four bucks, unless you’re a glutton. Of all the okazuyas around, the ram goes to Nuuanu because they have the tastiest food at reasonable prices. And the hard working folks that run the place are always  pleasant and courteous, even if you hem and haw.