Restaurateurs are an optimistic bunch. Even in the midst of a pandemic, with restaurants closing or struggling to stay afloat, new eateries continue to open.
Key to their optimism is the idea that no matter what happens, people still need to eat. While sheltering in place, I think many of us found that with few places to go, there was little need for nonessential spending.
Like many restaurateurs who opened their doors last month after getting the green light from the governor, Ernesto Guieb and his wife, Maria, had been on the cusp of fulfilling a longtime dream of opening a restaurant when the business shutdowns began.
He’d already had decades of experience working in a variety of kitchens, from visitor luau to pancake houses to Alan Wong’s Pineapple Room. In 2006 he started Guieb’s Catering in Waipahu, and has finally been able to expand, armed with the help of his children and plenty of firsthand knowledge about what people want.
His menu encompasses the best of everything he’s learned. It’s everyday brunch-focused, but eclectic, with breakfast and lunch offered the whole time the restaurant is open, and buffet favorites of prime rib and crab legs.
The restaurant is open for dine-in and takeout meals, but with social distancing there are only four tables, so reservations are needed to guarantee a dining-in spot.
When it comes to breakfast, I’m an omelet person, but the curiosity factor may do you in here. Outside-the-box offerings include a purple sweet potato waffle ($6.95) accompanied by a purple “ooze” sauce; and Fruity Pebbles French toast ($6.95), thick cuts of Portuguese sweet bread embedded with the popular Post cereal. Something about the combination highlights the artificiality of the cereal, but it will fill kids, or kids-at-heart, with awe.
My choice in this realm would be the honey French toast acai, an acai bowl transferred to bread, with all the essential ingredients: granola, banana and strawberry slices and blueberries.
Traditional Benedicts come in combinations of ham and turkey ($7.95), caprese with tomatoes, mozzarella and basil ($8.95), and crab cake with avocado ($11.95), but there’s reinvention too, with a bao bun Benedict ($10.95). It’s basically a char siu pork belly bao that you eat with a fork and knife instead of your bare hands, as you would at a Chinese restaurant, because of the gooey additions of egg and hoisin hollandaise.
You can also choose a more traditional garden omelet ($9.95) or Da Local ($10.95), filled with Portuguese sausage, Spam, bacon, tomato, onions and cheddar cheese. Those who love Philly cheese steak sandwiches may like to see it in omelet form ($11.95) with mushrooms, bell peppers, onions and mozzarella.
Or if you’re on the go, a Denver omelet wrap ($7.95) or Cali wrap ($7.95) with bacon, scrambled eggs, avocado, spinach, tomatoes and cheddar are delicious options.
Pancakes and waffles tend to be dense and chewy here, but one of the dishes I’d come back for is the fried chicken and waffles. Even with just two pieces of chicken, it’s a lot of food for $8.95. The waffle is meh, but the chicken is a golden combination of crispy, light and flavorful, seemingly with more skin than meat, and we all know the crispy chicken skin is the main reason for eating fried chicken. I have a pretty strong self-preservation instinct when it comes to ingesting too much of the kinds of food that doctors tell you will shorten your life, but I could not resist the chicken skin drizzled with a bit of honey.
Augment those breakfast items with dishes off the compact lunch menu, again, all those things that set mouths watering, like a North Shore- inspired butter and garlic shrimp plate ($12), the fried chicken ($8.95), this time served like all of Guieb’s lunch plates, with rice and a choice of sauteed vegetables or a generous scoop of imitation crab salad. Other options include a 4-ounce lobster tail ($15) or two satisfying clusters of snow crab legs ($15).
A prime rib loco moco ($15) served with two eggs and two scoops of rice is another lunch favorite.
Whatever you choose, the price is right, which is key to getting people to leave their homes these days.
GUIEB CAFE
1311 N. King St. (next to Kalihi post office)
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Food: ***
Service:*** 1/2
Ambiance: ** 1/2
Value: ****
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Call: 913-2131
Hours: 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily
Prices: $25 to $30 for two
COVID-19 precautions: Hand sanitizer at the door, QR code menu
Ratings compare similar restaurants:
**** – excellent
*** – very good
** – average
* – below average
Nadine Kam’s restaurant reviews are conducted anonymously and paid for by the Star-Advertiser. Reach her at nkam@staradvertiser.com.
