Ajijiman

Rating: Very good
Meal: Dinner for 2
Price:  8834 yen
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Lots of little dishes, a bottle of awamori
English Menu: No, but good pictures
Smoking: Yes

After the second day of the tournament my wife and I got to leave a bit early and had some time to explore the main drag near our Airbnb for a good place to eat.  We ended up at a brightly colored izakaya specializing in Okinawan food as we were really craving some.  I wanted some awamori (local rice drink) and thought I was ordering a small serving but ended up accidentally ordering a bottle, thus inflating the price above quite a bit.  I didn't get a breakdown of the charges or I would have subtracted it.  I'm guessing it was between 3 - 4,000 yen (waaay more than just buying it at the grocery store, oh well).  It was delicious though and we managed to polish it off by the end of the evening.

Delicious awamori

We ordered a bunch of little dishes so I'll just put the pictures below and try to remember what they were.  The food was really quite good and we enjoyed ourselves a lot, so I'm giving this place a Very Good.

Ham wrapped avocado

Fried rice

Goya champuru

Fu champuru

soki

French fries

Not sure...delicious pork

Akai Helmet

Rating: OK
Meal: Dinner for 2
Price: 3640 yen
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Okonomiyaki, kimichi fried rice, garlic/pork/beansprouts, shochu
English Menu: No
Smoking: Yes

After the first day of the roller derby tournament in Okinawa, my wife and I were dead tired, but really hungry.  We started walking towards the main drag from our Airbnb and I saw a restaurant on Google maps called "red helmet", so we took a chance and veered off towards that.  It turned out to be a really nice, swanky izakaya with a great vibe.  We didn't mind the smoking because it masked the awful smells coming from our unwashed bodies.

Moyashi stir fry

It looks like they specialize in teppanyaki type dishes, including okonomiyaki, one of my wife's favorite dishes.  They also had several potato based shochus and I tried one out, much to my liking.  My meal was kimchi fried rice and garlic/pork/beansprouts which were ok.  The flavors were rather muted overall so despite the great ambience I'm rating this place an Ok.

Kimchi fried rice

okonomiyaki

Origin of the name

King Tacos

Rating: OK
Meal: Dinner for 2
Price: 1700 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes:  Two tacos, one taco rice with lettuce and cheese, bara bara chicken (fried chicken)
English Menu: Yes
Smoking: No

King Tacos is a chain in Okinawa that specializes in Taco Rice, a sort of Okinawan dish that is basically taco meat on Japanese rice with lettuce, tomato and maybe some cheese or salsa-ish sauce.  It's a very common "comfort food" in Japan that was probably a result of using American rations in a novel way (to Okinawans).  To me it's always reminded me of something I would have made in my poor college student days, along with some hideous ramen packet abominations.  It's not that it's bad...it just doesn't have a lot of flavor usually.

Anyway, here we were in Okinawa, making our way to our destination by bus.  It was getting dark, and we had just missed our connection and had to kill about 50 minutes.  Lo and behold, the sign for King Tacos loomed above us!  An excellent opportunity to try the chain I'd seen from a distance several times before.

It was quite sparse inside, mainly a call in and pickup kind of joint.  But there were some standing tables and we were told we could eat there.  We ordered some tacos, a taco rice with all the fixings and bara bara chicken because...we didn't know what it was.  It was all quite cheap and like I said, we had time to kill.  Which is good because it took about 20 minutes for the chicken to be made and it was like...an entire chickens worth of meat!  By the time we finally got our food several other groups of people had come and gone and we were getting antsy.  We were shocked by the large portions and managed to eat our tacos and half the taco rice before we packed everything up and went to the bus stop.  Later, after we got to our Airbnb, we pulled out the chicken and finished it up, then saved the last of the taco rice to combine with some fried eggs for breakfast.  Our 1700 yen meal served us quite well.

All that said, I wasn't amazed by any of it, but it's really cheap, and the tacos were pretty good.  I think it would be a guilty pleasure if we lived in Okinawa and didn't have so many other places to try out.

Hamakaze

Rating: Very good
Meal: Lunch for 3
Price: 2950 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes: Fried rice, goya champuru, buttered fish, katsudon
English Menu: Yes
Smoking: No

Finally!  We got some goya while in Okinawa!  Apparently goya is a summer vegetable, so many places weren't serving it.  Hamakaze is a smallish roadside restaurant right on the way to and from Okuma Beach Resort.  The food is better and cheaper than available on the resort, it's worth a stop.  When we went it was really busy but we found out this was due to a funeral happening just down the road that was letting out for lunch.  I imagine it's not usually so full.  We had to return in 30 minutes for a table.

Fried rice

My wife got a buttered fish teishoku that was super delicious.  My son was happy with is fried rice and I got a katsudon (I know, very unimaginative).  I also got a goya champuru dish so we could have that all important goya dish.  It was quite tasty.

Buttered fish

Katsudon

Goya champuru

Waayaa

Rating: Very good
Meal: Lunch for 2
Price: 1300 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes: Inobuta (hybrid wild/domestic pork) don, chicken dish
English Menu: No (not sure, but don't think so)
Smoking: No

Yuiyuikunigami is a big road stop with lots of local items to purchase.  There are also a couple of restaurants, one of which is Waayaa, a very small place specializing in "inobuta" (hybrid wild/domestic pork) dishes.  I had a pork bowl and my wife had a chicken dish.  Both of us really liked our dishes (didn't get a picture of my wife's for some reason), and definitely recommend stopping by if you are in the area.

Surfside Restaurant

Rating: Not great
Meal: Dinner for 3
Price: $36.40
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes:Fried rice, mongolian chicken, pizza
English Menu:Yes
Smoking: No

I was hopeful that the restaurant at the Okuma Beach Resort, which is run by Kadena Air Force Base in Okinawa, would be better than the usual base restaurant fare I've had everywhere else...that is...not great.  Unfortunately, it met all my expectations, and we avoided the place after that except for breakfast a couple of times.

Campbell's soup (probably)

My son had fried rice which he thought was ok, I had a "mongolian" chicken of some kind that was bleh, and then there was the pizza, which looked like it might be good but once again we were treated to virtually nil flavor on crust that tasted like cardboard.  Astonishing really.

Pizza ala cardboard

Fried Rice

 

Mongolian chicken

Hotto Motto

Rating: OK
Meal:  Breakfast for 2
Price: 1180 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes: Spam champuru, oyakodon, tonjiru
English Menu: Yes
Smoking: No

Hotto Motto is not unique to Okinawa, but we don't have a lot of them in Yokosuka, so it was kind of fun to see them everywhere when we were on vacation there.  Also, they are open 24 hours (generally) which means breakfast is available!  Not that it's any different than what they server all the time, but I'm not really a breakfast food person anyway, so that suits me fine.

I was sent over one morning from our hotel to get some breakfast and I came back with an oyakodon (chicken and egg dish my son likes) and spam champuru (spam with stir fried vegetables on rice).  I also got some tonjiro (pork broth soup). It hit the spot for what it was.

Wahaha

Rating: OK
Meal:  Dinner for 2
Price: 3390 yen (includes awamori)
Payment: Credit cards accepted
Dishes: Fu champuru, okinawan pancake (hirayachi), tofu-yo
English Menu: Yes
Smoking:Yes (lots)

After another late night of roller derby in Okinawa, my wife and I decided to walk down to this Okinawan izakaya called Wahaha that was really close to our hotel.  My son was satisfied with some conbini food, and we knew it would probably be smoky (yowzers, was it ever, my coat stank the next day).

Awamori with water and ice bucket

We were hoping to do our truly "okinawan" meal here (which means goya must be on the menu) but we were told they were all out.  I also wanted my wife to try "fu" champuru which is made with gluten that has the consistency of eggs.  This they had, along with an okinawan savory pancake (hirayachi) and tofu-yo (tofu fermented in awamori).  We also tried out some awamori, which wasn't as good as my favorite brand (Zuisen Couth FTW!) that I can get in Yokosuka.  (I did get to visit the Zuisen Distillery, so cool!)

Tofu-yo

Anyway, the food was all right here, but not amazing, and the smoke is a real turn off.

Fu-champuru

Okinawan pancake (hirayachi)