Kapuna Cafe, located in a snug, sunshine-filled spot in North Las Vegas' Red Feather Plaza, stands tall among the Vegas Valley's many Hawaiian-style restaurants. It features Aloha State mainstays like plate lunches piled high with kalbi short ribs and loco moco hamburger patties with prodigious mounds of white rice and macaroni salad on the side, but it also offers a more wide-ranging culinary tour for diners, too.
The saimin bowl ($11) is one of the prettiest of its kind in the Valley, an abundant serving of ramen noodles (imported from Oahu) topped with candy cane-colored fish cake, Spam, tempura shrimp, pork hash (a large wonton of sorts), a hard-boiled egg, nori and scallions in steaming broth.
Musubi—the Hawaiian version of sushi, featuring Spam—is on the menu, of course, including a selection deep-fried, katsu-style, and sliced into four very filling pieces ($4). Other savory selections include furikake chicken, garlic shrimp, kalua pork sliders with guava barbecue sauce, beef stew, Filipino chicken adobo and fries slathered with piquant curry cheese sauce. Wash everything down with delicious homemade strawberry lemonade ($4) infused with li hing mui (dried Chinese plums); it's both tart and pleasantly salty.
On the sweet side, Kapuna Cafe specializes in mochi pancakes ($4), a take on the Japanese pounded rice confection. Other dessert highlights include coconut and ube (purple yam) puff pastries, mini blueberry cheesecakes, chantilly brownies, Long Johns and guava turnovers ($1.50-$5).
KAPUNA CAFE 3231 N. Decatur Blvd. #122, 702-395-1400. Daily, 8 a.m.- 4 p.m.
