The Best Chinese Restaurants in Honolulu

I grew up on my mom’s yummy home-cooked Chinese meals.  At one point, when I was in middle school, my mom’s pasta salad was so popular among all my friends that I had her make extra batches for me to bring to school for lunch.  In college, she made a huge portion of fried rice, froze it, and then shipped it over to me in Maine.

There’s nothing like my mom’s cooking, but Hawaii is fortunate enough to have some very decent Chinese restaurants that don’t have “haole-fied” (Americanized) Chinese dishes like crab rangoon, beef and brocolli, orange or kung pao chicken.

If you’re looking for some decent Chinese food in Honolulu, give these places a try:

• Mini Garden: This place has a really yummy cake noodle dish.  The Hotel Street locale is perfect for hungry First Friday patrons, while its Beretania Street sister restaurant is more family friendly. (50 North Hotel Street [map], #808.538.1273; 2065 South Beretania Street [map], #808.946.3828)
• Little Village Noodle House: I really like their chive pockets and their noodle dishes. (1113 Smith Street [map], #808.545.3008)

These are two of my favorite dim sum spots — perfect for weekend brunch.

• Legends: This is one of the more authentic Chinese dim sum spots.  It has a smaller vegetarian restaurant across the way. (100 North Beretania Street [map], #808.532.1868)
• Happy Day: An enormous menu during the week and an always packed restaurant for weekend dim sum. (3553 Waialae Avenue [map], #808.738.8666)

When I’m craving home-cooked Chinese food, these spots are the next best thing.

Photo courtesy of stu_spivack (Flickr)