Hapa Grill

Hapa Grill is a Hawaiian plate lunch food establishment in Beaverton, Oregon.

While I do try to seek out great, new, exciting foods Oregon has to offer, I also, from time to time, like to return to my roots and see if places in Oregon can pull off stunning authentic Hawaiian plate lunches. I got their kalua pork brown rice bowl with steamed vegetables, plus a side of their macaroni salad ($8 total).

Kalua pork bowl w/brown rice and steamed vegetables underneath

Hapa Grill's macaroni salad

The kalua pork was nice and smoky, not too salty. A respectable attempt, but it was a bit too dry here to be called authentic Hawaiian kalua pig. It really was more like an attempt on smoked pulled pork with more salt added on. The vegetables were cooked quite nicely, with the crunch still present. I liked that Hapa Grill offers the brown rice option, as not all Hawaiian plate lunch joints will do that. The brown rice was cooked well here.

Hapa Grill gets decent marks for their macaroni salad, which was served cold in its own container. I liked the shredded carrots in the mac salad. I do appreciate that there's not a ton of mayonnaise in the mac salad, but I'm sure there will be people who prefer it creamier with more mayo. It still had a little creaminess, which was nice. However, it needed a touch more salt and a bunch of black pepper to really make me go "wow."

Hapa Grill's decor features a bunch of Hawaiian-themed items and artwork. Perhaps to others, it may be pretty cool to see, but for me, I really wasn't buying it.

Hapa Grill is basically average here in all respects. Not horrible, but nothing to make me remember this place in a real positive light. 5.25/10