Casual fine dining with a local flair
Friday - September 05, 2008
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The last time I stopped by Lily Koi Restaurant and chatted with chef Keith Ogata, he explained his idea of bringing fine dining with a local flair to the Pearlridge area.
“We want to bring French-influenced, local-style food in a casual atmosphere,” he told me of the ambitious menu. Certainly all the food I tasted was excellent - from a grilled veggie sub sandwich on house-made bread to a fresh catch of the day simply sautéed, and tender chicken Parmesan over linguine.
On that first meeting, I was incredibly impressed with Ogata’s food and felt sure that given enough time, local people would realize they’d something special amid the fast food restaurants and box stores of Aiea.
Today, a year or so later, Lily Koi is coming into its own and is working on two levels - a casual restaurant serving excellent food, and a bustling night club scene with karaoke contests and live entertainment. It’s a mix that not too many people could pull off, but owner Dennis Kinoshita thinks he knows what his customers want.
“We listened a lot to what people want from our place,” he says, “and we’ve tried to accommodate that.”
One of the initial problems that had to be overcome at Lily Koi was an impression that the fine dining-styled menu might be pricy.
“We had folks open the door and say, ‘oh, it looks too fancy,’” says Keith. “But they soon realized that it’s not too pricy and that we’re pretty relaxed.”
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What foodies will soon realize, too, from a look at the menu that features twin marinated grilled pork chops ($20.95), clams and linguini ($17.95) and marinated rib eye ($12.95) is that the food offers some of the best value around.
Keith Ogata returned to Hawaii (he’s a Castle High School and KCC grad) last year, having spent a decade or so working with star chefs like Joachim Splichal, honing his skills in Vegas. He left famous restaurant Pinot Brasserie at The Venetian to come back and open Lily Koi, lured back in part by his desire to create local food with a classic twist and in part at the urging of Kinoshita, who is his cousin.
“I started going to Vegas two or three times a year to visit Keith,” says Kinoshita, “and I started to really enjoy the diversity of the food over there. Not just the fine dining, but all of the food. Keith and I began to talk about him coming back and bringing that kind of food to this side of the island.”
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Today, have lunch or dinner at Lily Koi and you’ll see that they’re doing what they set out to.
“People seem to love the dishes,” says Ogata of a menu that includes fall-off-the-bone short ribs ($18.95), salt and pepper pork ($17.95), tonkatsu ($10.95), braised pork belly ($16.95), and kalua pig and cabbage ($12.95), alongside elegant entrees like oven-roasted herb chicken ($16.95), pan-seared scallops ($20.95) and grilled rack of lamb ($17.95).
Ogata explains the menu by saying that it’s local food with some French cooking techniques. “Everything I do begins with classically French techniques,” he says. “Then there are flavors and styles borrowed from California, local flavors and Asian influences.” It’s all adding up to an incredibly well-executed menu.
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I all but devoured a rack of lamb (being served as a special and not yet on the regular menu) cooked perfectly medium rare with pan-roasted potatoes, mushrooms and shallots on a bed of rich Bordelaise sauce. Simply seasoned with salt and pepper, seared and then finished in the oven, the New Zealand rack ($17.95) is an outstanding dish, and one that I’d be happy to make the long trek to Pearlridge any day for. And the dish is a great example of why Ogata’s food is both surprising and comforting - surprising because if you’re new to Lily Koi and its restaurant/lounge/nightclub theme, you’re certainly not expecting this standard of food, and comforting because if a difficult dish like rack of lamb is this good, you can only imagine how good the pork belly or a hamburger might be.
If you’re going for the first time and can’t decide, try the signature short ribs. There’s immediate evidence of Ogata’s classic French technique in the rich, deep lilikoi sauce that smothers them. “They’re simply done,” he says.
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In trying to define Lily Koi’s style (and that’s tough, because of the happy hour, late-night cabaret, karaoke and live entertainment that are as much a part of the place as the restaurant), I’m going to say it’s part French brasserie and part plate lunch, which makes for an interesting visit no matter which side of the gourmet food debate you’re on. At lunch (Friday, Saturday and Sunday only) there’s an excellent eggplant Parmesan sub ($5.95) and a traditionally classic French dip ($9.95) of sumptuous shaved prime rib with a hot au jus, alongside a barbecue pulled pork sandwich ($6.95) and duck breast salad ($10.95) - regional dishes that are almost all a combination of classic cooking and comfort food.
“It’s relaxed here, it’s not too fancy, and the prices are reasonable,” says Dennis, “but we feel that the food is really something different.”
Lily Koi Restaurant and Lounge 98-150 Kaonohi St.
Aiea Open: 3:30 p.m.-2 a.m. Lunch: 10:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Friday-Sunday
Dinner: 4:30-10 p.m. nightly Happy Hour : 3-7 p.m. 486-8488
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