City Café

First time here today for lunch. Ordered the chicken salad sandwich on wheat and it was delicious. They did not over do it on the mayo like some places do. Lettuce and tomatoes were fresh. I also ordered a slush blended Thai tea without the boba and it was refreshing. Great place. Nice ladies who work there. Will probably be back tomorrow. Haha!!!

This is one of my favorite place for shave ice desert, bubble drink, and for a lunch-​able sandwich combo. There were all kinds of choices to select from, green sprouts, lettuces, cheese, ham, or chicken… etc For shave ice, you get to choose all different types of beans, green beans, red beans, kidney beans, taro pieces, mochi ball, custard, condensed milk, syrup, assorted flavor of jelly, and tapiocas, the store is located near Ala Moana shopping center on Makaloa next parallel to Kapiolani further from the makai and perpendicular to Keeamoku. It is a good place to go for an afternoon treat to add some delightedness to a long horrendous boring day.

Large black milk tea with boba for only $ 4 including tax!
I’ve tried numerous milk tea joints and I’d say the flavor is most comparable to Shaka Shaka, which in my book makes awesome milk teas.
They also make blended versions of their drinks for an additional $.50!

Delicious sandwiches for 5.25 $
Large hazelnut iced coffee for 3 $
If they had pumpkin or broccoli soup, I would it here all day long:)

my sister is like a magnet to city café. them sandwiches were light yet filling. sometimes the pastrami one is on special. haven’t yet tried the taiwanese shave ice. some people call it halo halo. but as u can tell in the picture, the dessert is very messy. perfect place to go to lunch if u work in the area. city! go make me a sandwich!

You’re feeling great because you’re done with the gym and sometimes you want to eat something fatty and filling because you think you deserve it. Then there are other days when you just don’t want to pack the extra fat and waste your hard burned cardio in one sitting. Let me say this, I chose to be good and go for a nice sandwich from City Café.
Sandwiches are very affordable and the menu is quite simple. The selection ranges from the simple Ham & Cheese, to specialties like The City’s Club/​Ham Pesto to dessert and shave ice. There are special sandwiches as well. The Chicken Pesto (one of my favorites) made with baked chicken breast, provolone, cheese, carrots, sprouts, tomato, lettuce and homemade pesto sauce on multigrain ciabatta bread. The portions are generous and are filling. You won’t have to worry about feeling guilty after the last bite. Should you have a light appetite, the sandwiches can be ordered in half as a lunch special for $ 7. This deal is a half sandwich of your choice with a salad, chips or soda. This will fill you up as well.
City Café has become one of my go to places for lunch and the cashiers are super nice. Seats/​tables are ample enough and have a fast turn around even during their lunch rush. Call in orders are welcome and deliver to your car upon pick up. Parking is limited since they do share with Kickin Cajun, Iyazume and the nail place. Plan accordingly to carpool, call ins or burn some extra calories and walk!

Love this cute little café, the sandwiches are so fresh and the drinks are wonderful.

I love Taiwanese style shaved ice! I tried their brown sugar syrup with Vanilla ice cream and taro pieces. They have different flavors and toppings too. They also have coffee, smoothies and sandwiches here too. Parking gets kinda crazy on the weekends here. Street parking is free on Sundays.

Kinda disappointed… I came in anticipating an awesome Taiwanese shave ice that I could top with custard, mochi balls, and coconut tapioca. But they had none of those toppings! :(Hence, my three star rating.
I made do with the haupia, condensed milk, ice cream, and strawberry popping jelly to top off my shave ice.
I like Taiwanese shave ice; I just wish they had the toppings I initially came here for. ‚(
Despite not having the toppings I wanted, it still hit the spot on a hot day!

My boyfriend and I just moved into the neighborhood. We wanted to try out the local shaved ice place. It was a bit confusing on how to order and what each topping was. I think this place is just going to have to be trial and error for us in figuring out what our favorite mixture is. The smoothie that we got was more of a slushie with boba. I was kind of disappointed with that.
PS It was a one man person running the show so it kinda takes a while to get your stuff.

I was desperately craving a fresh handmade sandwich while I was in the area. I Unilocaled it and tada! I found city café:)
There were 2 ladies behind the counter and they were both very nice. I ordered the turkey sandwich with a tai tea. After being too hungry to wait, I ate it in the car while the bf drove… about 30 minutes later we returned because I decided I wanted one of those fresh sandwiches for dinner also. This time I ordered the veggie sandwich, no drink. They ran out of cheese but I didn’t care. The prices of the sandwiches are below $ 6 and include a small bag of chips. I was a happy camper:)

Went here for the taiwanese shaved ice. For less than $ 5 got the shaved ice with brown sugar syrup, azuki bean, taro, custard pudding and condensed milk! It hit the spot! Can’t comment on the rest of the food or drinks but everything is reasonably priced… probably good for a quick lunch. Only problem with this place is the parking but it looks like if you call in your order ahead of time and they will bring it out to your car.

City Café is located nearby my office, so we decided to check it out — I’ve made some party orders with the owner prior to going here and she is just a doll… and let me tell you they have one of best sandwiches in town. I’ve ordered the chicken salad sandwich, and my friend got the roast beef. They also have yummy boba tea (also known as bubble tea or milk tea, a Taiwanese tea based drink, and you have the choice to add pearls — the tapioca) I like mine extra sweet so you can request that as well. The meal comes with chips too, so all in all, a sandwich, a drink, and chips came out to $ 8 — not bad at all right? If you’re near by Ala Moana, check City Café out, it’s a real hole in the wall, parking is really tight so I suggest parking at Walmart/​SAMs and just walking across. but you wont regret it, say hello to Serena! Good luck!

Finally got to come back again for their red beans, taro and condense milk (#4) shave ice. I remember the first time I had it I really liked it, but haven’t been able to come by since. Seems like each time I try to stop by, it’s either a Sunday or after 6 PM. But today, I made it a must stop at 5:15 PM so I can get it just to be sure it was as good as I remembered.
Sure enough, it was just as good as the first time I had it. The taro tastes fresh and they actually use palm sugar as a sweetener instead of regular sugar, which is why it smells so much nicer. I have a pretty refined palate so I can tell the slightest difference in most food taste and texture. I’m especially sensitive to flavors I don’t like. The ice is very finely shaven so you can taste all the different flavors, not bland at all.
My son got the #1 and he seemed to enjoy it as well.
Glad I came back because I was not disappointed!

I was not impressed. My sister and I came here after getting our hair cut next door at V’s Hairstyling, and we would’ve been better off going to Makai Food Court.
The shave ice was so chunky. It was like chewing the chewable ice from Costco. The syrup was also WAY too sweet and due to the chunky ice, went straight to the bottom of the bowl in a mess of sugar and too strong flavors.
The sandwiches were also forgettable. I might as well should’ve gone home and made myself a sandwich. The bag of chips that came with the meal was also stale.
Maybe I’ll try a bubble tea in the future. Maybe. I would have to be in a really good mood.

I LOVE CITY CAFE!
My first time coming his was years ago when they first opened! (For their shaved ice, it was a-​mazing! & still is)
Recently I’ve been coming a lot for their almond milk tea, and as a new mother it is very hard to get a drink in a shop (having to take baby out of car seat so much work) plus their parking sucks! So I LOVE LOVE LOVE how they have curb side pick up! They’re really fast and come out right away with my drink! I give them a few dollars for tip (treat people how you would want to be treated) and I’m on my way! No getting out of car and hassling to remove car seat, no parking in those small stalls (especially in my mom SUV)
I’m a huge fan! Thank you for making my mom life that much easier to fulfill my almond milk tea cravings! *thumbs up*

Let’s face it, everyone knows taiwanese shave ice got popular because of the comp’d dessert at sweet home café. Sometimes when I’ve got a craving for their shave ice but don’t feel like venturing over there for hot pot, we’ll come to city café. It’s definitely not the same but it still has the same feeeeeel to it.
The syrup is a brown sugar syrup but it’s not as sweet as those artificial flavors. You can choose the toppings you want and they have a wide variety: azuki bean, mochi, haupia, tapioca, custard, coffee jelly, condensed milk, icecream, etc. 5 – 7 choices is what we usually get since my bf and I like to share one and it’s around $ 5.50. It’s a good amount of shave ice and I actually like that I can choose the toppings I want. I’ve tried their milk tea before also and found that it’s actually a bit on the sweeter side. I’ve yet to try their food but it seems popular since everytime I come here someone is ordering food/​eating their sandwiches. AND THEY HAVE CIABATTA BREAD. I looooove ciabatta… I digress.
Go try their shave ice!

Came here because my cousin wanted to try it out and unfortunately I was not impressed. I thought it was kind of overpriced for the quality of the ingredients.
First off, this place barely has any parking and their private lot is shared with other businesses. I drove passed it the first time because there was not parking and luckily the second time around there was someone leaving. If you park on the street, there is a chance that your car may get towed.
After the parking ordeal, we were welcomed by these two ladies that were somewhat helpful. They have a ton of toppings for your shaved ice and I just went with the special of orange, passion fruit and mango (asked to not have condensed milk and extra ice cream).
The ice cream was bland and she didn’t give me an extra scoop when asked.
My cousin tried the flan and it looked super cute, it wasn’t too bad for not being one of their specialties. The mochi balls were pretty standard.
Overall I would skip this place the next time I visit.

Location: This place is hard to find on Makaloa Street. The sign is faded which makes it even harder to find.
Parking: There are not many parking stalls in front of this shop. You will have to find street parking which you have to pay the meter.
Service: The two ladies there were really friendly. We didn’t notice that they had specials when we ordered certain things and they told us about it. We were able to get free toppings and upgraded one of our drinks for free.
Drinks: They have so many different variations of tea and a lot of other drinks.
Food: We had one of their sandwiches which was pretty good but for the price we paid we could’ve gotten a full mean elsewhere. The shave ice came to us in a pretty looking bowl it was different and good.
Verdict: I don’t think I’ll be coming back to this place because of the parking issue and I wasn’t really impressed with the food all that much.

Recently I’ve been replacing meals with icy treats. Not something I recommend, but it is delicious. A lot of my friends urged me to go to City Café, so I took the plunge. I ordered the 3 – 4 toppings Taiwanese shaved ice. For the toppings I picked mochi balls, flan, rainbow jellies and haupia.
The portion was generous and the flan was smooth and tasty, but that’s where the complements stop. I found the ice to be a bit too coarse and rocky. Mochi balls were too stiff and not as soft as I’m accustomed to. Unless I was in the area and desperately craving shaved ice, I’d give City Café another go– but until then, I’ll stick with Ice Forest.

Half expecting a fancy array of gelatinous bobas, fruity jellies (like that of the other Taiwanese dessert from Sweet Home Café); basically something that could outdo my expectations and redefine Taiwanese shave ice as I knew it, thanks to my lovely Instagram friends. But I did not find it here (I’m still persuaded it’s at the previously mentioned place *hint hint*)
«Meh. I’ve experienced better.» is probably the best way I can sum up my experience. Granted, we came here a half hour before closing, they had run out of some of the toppings (understandably so). We ordered a medium 4 topping shave ice. Because I was a noob on how to order, I was stumped when trying to look for a place that had the flavors for the shave ice. I couldn’t have been more off. The flavor of shave ice is set (duh), as it is a brown sugar syrup and the toppings give you the freedom to choose (mung beans, azuki beans, coffee jellies, haupia, condensed milk, custard, bobas, along with others that were out). I can’t help to go back to mung beans, what the heck is that? I only know of it in reference to Jackie Chan Adventures the Grandpa’s favorite was mung beans («ONE MORE THINNNNGGG.»)
We got the haupia, coffee jellies, condensed milk, and custard. The coffee jellies were spot on, tasting like coffee and gelatinous, just the way I like it, as the name implies. And the condensed milk? Spot on; tasting like condensed milk, extra nice. But when it came to the haupia, and custard, they were a bit weak. Haupia lacked the oomph that legit haupia has. And the custard seemed to lack taste.
All in all, meh, I’ve experienced better. I would give City Café the benefit of the doubt and give them another try, though. But first impressions are usually pretty spot on. Or are they?