King Sha

This is a super friendly mum and pop shop with close to authentic Taiwanese food. The restaurant and kitchen was clean, the owners are very nice and passionate about their food, and all their dishes are made from the heart. I came with a friend who is a regular at this restaurant. The owners were so nice that they kept bringing us free stuff to try. I ordered the minced pork Taiwanese mixed noodles with steamed vegetables. It has that home style cooking flavours with no msg. I also ordered 2 «Fan Tuan» (which is sticky rice with dried shredded pork, pickled vegetables and you tiao inside) to go. It was perfect for breakfast the next day.
I also heard that they make their soy milk from scratch. That evening I was very lucky to taste their Brown Sugar Man Tou, a flavour I haven’t had for a long time. The bao was hand kneaded with brown sugar they brought back from Taiwan. 2 hours of work and each bao was only $ 1 ($ 10 for 11 buns). It was fluffy yet chewy, with a very subtle yet fragrant brown sugar sweetness. Needless to say I’ll be back to try their other foods.

Beef noodle is not as good as I thought, sticky rice with pork hash was good, will go back to try other Taiwanese dishes.

Limited choice of soup base but that’s the best herb soup base that I had so far. The price is reasonable and you will have to make your own dip sauces the boss will recommend you his own dip sauce and you can make your own sauce, those dip sauce very fresh and the fried chicken is the authentic Taiwanese food which is delicious. We just order the set of shabu shabu and come with one bowl of rice which was just right for us. The boss really friendly and nice. Would come back again to try other food.

Shabu shabu or beef noodle??? You can have both. That’s the Taiwanese way. I went for lunch to tried the beef noodle soup, it was good. They put salted veggie in it and add lots of spices, totally give you the Taiwanese flavor. The broth was a bit too salty and the meat was a bit too chewy for me. If they can improve on it, it will definitely be a good place to go.

Woot Woot! Taiwanese cuisine! Lunch people lunch! Thats what im here to tell you about. King Sha’s lunch is a good sit down place next to Otto Cakes! At lunch there is a good shabu shabu special as long as several lunch combos. So far i’ve had a taste of the smoked chicken, some fried pork dish, and the other pork dish.
the smoked chicken is a tasty smoked chicken combo that was quite good. It has a smoky flavor and has a large portion especially with the combo.
The fried pork is like a tonkatsu. Unfortunately the time that i tried it was cooked in bad oil :(But it was moist and tasty.
The other pork dish was like braised pork belly. Very similar to the okinawan style char siu. This dish was to die for. I would go back twice over or more just to eat it. Freakin love it and you should try it too!
The owners are quite friendly which is very welcome change when in chinatown =D

Loved the Shabu Shabu & very friendly hospitality! Recommend for tasty value!

Ok i’m finally putting this review up. After several times dining there I have being sold on this lesser know shabu shabu place. 1^st of all i want you to understand this restaurant is more or less an mom & pop eatery, 2^nd don’t expect a person next to you the whole time waiting on you, 3^rd but not last be open and talk to the owners, they are very charming and will open up to you if you just take the time to talk to them (if you speak mandarin or Taiwanese is a plus =)).
On to the food, from the 1^st time that I dined there to just tonight, it has always being the shabu shabu that stood out from the rest of the menu. I was a big fan of Sweet Home due to their original soup base and the amount of friendliness that the owner was giving to all their tables, however after few recent outings there their service and soup has become a norm, nothing special (gone with the bold traditional taste), so becomes a regular shabu shabu place, i feel the passion is gone. KING SHA however is fresh new and has brought back the traditional Taiwan herbal shabu shabu that once sweet home had.
The regular menu is cater to the local consumers who knows what they want and is used to the typical Asian restaurants katsu, tempura, curry, and the works. However if you dare to step away from your comfort zone and try out some of their specialties like the «grilled chicken» and all the different type of soup base for the shabu shabu. The owner will often come by the table to check on the dipping sauce that you made, and suggest their version and some times even mix the sauces for you to try out, one thing i truly think that King Sha separates themselves apart from other shabu shabu place is that they really put «sake» rice wine in to their soup bases, and the refills for the soup base is not just water or chicken stocking, its the same soup base that you ordered.
So in conclusion I suggest you to try King Sha out, don’t let the 3 star or 2 star rating and reviews fool you, this is one of the best Taiwanese shabu shabu place you could ever eat at on this island.

King Sha opened in the same spot as Yusura. It appears that they are serving almost the exact same Japanese menu as Yusura. I can’t remember what I had (really I can’t, it was a super quick dinner just to get dinner), but I recall it was just like Yusura. The menu items are almost all exactly like the old menu. There was a special listed on the wall — cold ginger chicken. And what looked like hot pots were on a few tables (these folks do not seem to think that busing tables is all that important), but I’m not sure because they didn’t tell us about that aspect of their menu. I think you need to ask. They were busy talking to another table (the only other table occupied on a weekend night, 7:30 or 8). All in all, it was an odd mixed bag. I think these guys need to figure out what they cook well and just do that.

Went to try their dinner since they just open. It’s another Taiwanese restaurant that’s newly open at china town. Was pretty exciting about this new open, since there aren’t too much Taiwanese food in Hawaii. But when i saw the menu I was a little disappointed. It has a menu of Japanese kind of food. Like tenshoku style, which comes with salad, soup, and a little side dish. The main dishes they have are like chicken Katsu, tempura, tonkatsu, curry rice, gyoza, and etc. But they still have few Taiwanese food, beef noodle, rice mochi, spicy chicken. And i have heard that soon they will serve shabu shabu hotpot for dinner. Maybe when they do I will return again! :)
By the way there is no parking. But you can park at chinese cultural plaza or some other pay parking in china town.
And they also do some special orders on some Taiwanese food. Check it with them!