Japanese Grandma's Cafe

So good we’re coming back tomorrow (seriously!!).

🍹Drinks: FANTASTIC

🍣 Food: EXCELLENT - highly recommended the karaga chicken, poke wonton tacos, golden dragon roll, and tiger roll.

🎶 Atmosphere: PHENOMENAL - Adorable and very Covid-safe outdoor seating in their backyard garden. Check their schedule for live music in the garden - Papa’a Bay Music was performing the Sunday evening we ate here and Russel was so incredibly talented!

Oh, and for any gluten-free (GF) people out there, this place has you covered!! So many great options, including some of the rolls with tempura shrimp 🍤🍱

In summary, GO HERE!! 😍

This place has one of the best salmon dishes I’ve ever had. I’d fly 6,000 miles back to here just to have that salmon again.
Not really. That’d be crazy.
But the quality of food here’s kind of crazy. So… do with this information what you will.

Lovely location in a small town. Their lunch menu is to die for - I don’t remember the last time where everything on offer looked good. Simple, high quality and fresh ingredients, with good portions. Staff are super friendly and helpful. However, note that some of their market price items like their sashimi and nigri - which to be fair is really fresh, can be really pricey ($40+ USD typa deal), and some of their dinner portions (e.g. soft shell crab salad) are a bit too small.

I got the spicy tuna poke and husband got the chicken karaage bento with the house teriyaki sauce. Both were excellent. I also got the dragonfruit lemonade which was delicious! The only thing that confused me was that the tuna was kind of ground up, not cubed like typical poke? But the flavor was great!

The food was pretty good, but the reason for 3 stars was due to customer service. First, in the hour and 15 minutes we were there, nobody came to clean up the dishes. When someone finally did, the reason behind hind it was trying to get us to leave. The person clearing the dishes, who I assume was a manager made it a point to tell me that the next customers had already checked in for our table. That’s not my problem. You menu says specifically that you have up to 90 minutes. I thought it was rude to try to rush us along. I would not recommend driving an hour to come here like we had to.

Yummy yummy food - healthy bento rice bowls with freshly made tempura. Highly recommended home made food!

Amazing food! Sushi was amazing & so was the Poke burrito. If I could give 10 stars I would!

Two weeks later the meal we had at Japanese Grandma's is one of the highlights of our time on Kauai. The service was great, the live music was good, but the food was phenomenal. The poke wonton tacos and crispy rice appetizers were a great start, but I've been thinking about the Red Dragon roll and Otoro special since we ate them. Highly recommend!

This place is amazing! We drove an hour to get here and it is worth every minute of the drive. The sushi is wonderful and the macha cheesecake is out of this world. The vibe is great. There are some musquitoes but if you move a little they won’t bother you. The food is so good you probably won’t even notice they are there.
Must visit!

Solid Japanese sushi spot on the quaint town of Hanapepe. They have a very nice outdoor seating area with great ambience, liquor license with a good selection of beer, wine and sake plus solid Japanese food. Highly recommend the restaurant and don't forget to visit the swinging bridge right behind the restaurant for a cool walk over the river.