Pasta-lovers can rejoice because Assaggio Ristorante Italiano is open for pickup and takeout.Here are the good eats available at Koko Marina Center for your dining pleasure. “We just hope everyone stays safe and practices the recommendations of the CDC,” says director of marketing Krysti Peacock. Luckily, Koko Marina Center has you covered, thanks to its many eateries that remain open for takeout and delivery service. The essence: Counter-service millenial magnet with varied poke selections made with fresh fish.Hawaii is still in the midst of its stay-at-home/work-from-home mandate on this Easter Sunday, but that doesn’t mean you and your family can’t enjoy great meals during the religious holiday. Paina Cafe, 6870 Spring Mountain Road in KoreaTown plaza 70 Las Vegas Review-Journal restaurant reviews are done anonymously at Review-Journal expense. Getting a poke bowl at Paina Cafe is a great way to take part, and a lot easier (not to mention faster and cheaper) than going to the islands. With its wooden tables and wainscoting, copious charging spots, Hawaiian-themed signage and island/reggae music, the place has all the markings of a millennial magnet.īut if you’re not a millennial, don’t let that stop you. Paina means “gathering,” the website says, and a crowd was indeed gathering during the early dinner hour. Not enough cabbage, not enough crunch.Īnd what would a Hawaiian restaurant be without Hawaiian pastries? There are lots to choose from, with two cases filled with the likes of haupia (coconut-milk) bars and ube (purple yam) puffs.Īloha tart pack at Paina Cafe. It had decent enough dressing and almonds but far less cabbage than romaine, resulting in something more akin to a spicy tuna Asian salad sans spicy tuna. The Asian slaw ($6.95) was the weakest link. Kimura ahi katsu bento plate at Paina Cafe. On the side: a cup of “potato salad” that actually was a potato-pasta hybrid Hawaiians love a good macaroni salad. The white rice and with tender strips of soy-marinated meat came topped with sliced scallions and crispy garlic chips, both providing crunch and jolts of flavor playing off the mellower beef. While purist poke involves only raw fish, Paina Cafe also offers Kalua pig and cooked beef, the latter in its Hawaiian beef bowl ($9.25). Shredded nori brought more of a hint of the sea than the neutrally flavored tuna, and a surfeit of tempura flakes provided crunch in every bite, offsetting the fish’s tender lushness. The brown rice came topped with well-trimmed fish with a middlin’ amount of fire that was tamed but not obliterated by the teriyaki glaze. Spicy tuna paired well with the smaller Poke Crunch Bowl ($9.95/$11.25), which was the size of a soup bowl. There are lots of design-your-own options, with six to eight seafood and tofu choices and 15 toppings, but even some of the prescribed combos allow you to select whatever fish you like (and all can be ordered with white or brown rice). And contrasting textures and flavors elevate poke well beyond fish trimmings.

Of course, most poke today gets the same attention as the best sushi with many flavors in common, as in the wasabi masago ahi poke or the shoyu ginger salmon poke at Paina Cafe. Just as France’s vaunted sauces were created initially to compensate for inferior meats, poke began as a way for fishermen to use their trimmings. Poke, in the Hawaiian context, is a raw-fish assemblage resembling a salad over a bed of rice to make it a meal. More recently, a flurry of poke restaurants, with island import Paina Cafe (three locations near Honolulu, where it claims it invented the poke bowl) chief among them. It started with the arrival of “Hawaiian barbecues,” which are great if you like Spam musubi and plate lunches with copious carbs. Benjamin Hager Las Vegas Review-Journal influx of Hawaiian immigrants that’s given the valley ninth-island status is perhaps most apparent in the restaurant industry. Aloha soy sauce at Paina Cafe on Tuesday, May 9, 2017, in Las Vegas.

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