Mimasuya Italiano

To Our Customers.
Thank you to all of our loyal customers, it was a pleasure serving you this last year. Unfortunately, we will be closing our doors permanently and immediately. I wanted to use Unilocal to say thank you to all of our customers since I won’t have the opportunity in person. Also, I will be moving back to Il Lupino in Waikiki so please stop by and say hello.
Thank You & Arigatou Gozaimashita
— Rob

Mimasuya Italiano of Kyoto is a slightly upscale Japanese Italian restraunt on Kapiolani close to Ala Moana Shopping Center. There is free self parking in the basement of the building. There is an elevator from the parking directly into the restaurant.
I’ve been there twice for lunch with my mom. Both times we had the five course lunch special set menu for $ 26 per person. It started out with a pretty good three choices appetizer followed by a salad, soup, then a pasta, and finally and entrée either steak or salmon. Service was very attentive. They kept my water glass full brought more bread a couple of times.
The food was definitely good but not fantastic. Overall it’s a great dining experience. If you’re having the five course meal as you did, just plan on about an hour and a half lunch. Definitely recommended.
see my many pictures.

This will be my first time to eat at this restaurant. I hope this restaurant is awesome. I have a hot deals hawaii voucher that I can spend 50 bucks of food and I do want to make sure that I really do. If you like this restaurant, you can go to open table and reserve a spot so that you can experience going to this Japanese infused style of food, then this place is for you. I hope I will enjoy it

Let me start off this review with a disclaimer, I used to live in Italy and continue to travel there as much as my wife and I can so I am very picky and out spoken to Italian dinning.
With that said, we had high hopes for this Italian restaurant with Japanese flair or what ever you want to call Kyoto styled Italian food, I am always looking for good food no matter what type it is and I have had Japanese styled Italian food before and it was very good. The food for us Friday night was just OK, nothing memorable. Prices a little high, Wine by the glass OK, deserts were good. The chef is really trying to think outside the box with some of his dishes and they may get better with time but for me they are missing the mark.
There where 3 of us, we had the appetizer sampler which is 1 or 2 bites of 10 different apps, although the presentation is great and the food dishes looked great. once we started eating it nothing stood out as a Wow this is really good. Next came the soup of the day, pumpkin soup for my wife and her comment was, tastes good but is grainy for some reason and she could not get past that so only ate a little more than half of it. Main courses were, Pescatore, Seafood Risotto and Chicken Cacciatore, all three of us had mixed feelings on them. The comment on the chicken was that the sauce did not taste good. The Pescatore, we asked for no mussels and a small portion of Pasta, No mussels came and the serving size of pasta was very large, only the seafood was eaten and about 3 bites of pasta. For the Risotto– it was good But… although cooked just right, nice and creamy with a little firmness left in the rice, good flavor in the seafood sauce, here is the But… all the seafood was just a little overcooked, squid was rubbery, along with the shrimp. clams were limited and the chef added Mussels although it was not listed on the menu as coming with them. if I knew it came with mussels I would have asked for no mussels. next was desert, Tiramisu and Flan, each came with a wonderful small scoop of vanilla bean Gelato, the Tiramisu was OK, but different, the sponge cake instead of vanilla was chocolate and very thin, the espresso flavor was very light. the Flan was good according to my wife and our other dinning companion. Espresso and Cappuccino’s — ok.
Waitstaff service was great and we never needed anything.
So total cost (without tip) was $ 160.00 and for that you get– one appetizer sampler, one soup of the day, two glasses of $ 10ea wine, one ice tea, 3 entrees, 2 deserts one espresso and one cappuccino. I like spending my money for great food so if this place wowed us that cost would not have been a problem. but for Meh feeling at the end of the night i think it is overpriced.
Sorry Mimasuya, I have experienced better, we were a little disappointed. :(

I came here for my birthday lunch. I guess they missed the memo on open table. Ah well it’s ok. It was surprisingly slower here from the last time I came here. There was only two other tables occupied during the entire duration of our lunch.
I opted for the primo course which consisted of an appetizer, light/​fresh salad, potato soup, crab pasta, and the chicken confit which was today’s «beef» that was suggested by our server. Everything served was ok, but the chicken was really salty! I could barely eat it so we took it out instead. I should have gotten the fish instead.
I thought I could use the hot deals voucher today but didn’t see the fine print, so we’ll be back again some other time.

This review would be a testament to how service can make or break your dining experience. I had heard about this place through Unilocal and a few people that had come here for lunch, so after looking at the menu, decided to give this place a try for dinner.
In all honesty, I think I would give the food only 2 to 3 stars. It wasn’t bad and we enjoyed our meal, but it wasn’t anything that would make me want to come back to this place again. Unfortunately. They serve complimentary foccacia bread. The bread but give you all of two pieces each — the size of a matchbook. I get that this is a Japanese inspired Italian restaurant and I know that the Japanese style is «small portions» but come on… and no one ever came back to offer us more bread. Well, not a huge deal, but hey… worth mentioning. Drinks: We ordered wine and a Basil Blueberry drink. The blueberry drink was interesting. Was is fantastic? Not enough to order a second time. And the wine, well, I was a little annoyed because it wasn’t even a full pour. I really don’t like when restaurants do that. Appetizers: we ordered calamari and bruschetta. Both were mediocre. The calamari was mixed with fried vegetables so in all honesty, I think you only get a handful of calamari pieces. We ordered the Arrabiata and the Pescatore. Both were ok… although, I was a little disappointed in the lack of seafood in the Pescatore. I mean really. Dessert: Tiramisu and Panna cotta. Both good, but again not great.
So why 4 stars? Our waiter was fantastic! I wish I remembered his name. Honestly, if it wasn’t for his service, my rating would probably be a lot lower. He was so good — very helpful, attentive, gave good recommendations without being pushy, came around to check on us yet allowed us to enjoy our meal… great server! If anyone from management is reading this, our reservation was Sat. night at 8:30pm — we were pretty much the only table in there and the last ones there and he never made us feel like we had to rush. He was outstanding!
The conclusion — the food was eh… but the service made up for it!

My friend and I came here for the first time. We started off with the assorted appetizer ($ 28) which lets you try 10 different chef-​selected appetizers. We are big fans of being able to try a little bit of everything so of course we would order this.
My friend had the Pescatore pasta. She liked it although was a little disappointed with the amount of seafood she was given. I had the uni pasta, which was a special that for the month. It was ok. I love eating uni for sushi, but cooked uni was definitely different. I’m so used to the soft, mushy texture of uni that the cooked uni was a huge turnoff. It was a little to rubbery for my liking. I thought they would at least top it off with a little raw uni, but they didn’t.
If you are coming here for the first time, they do offer pre fixe menus at a great price.

Absolutely ridiculous, I’ve eaten at several different italian restaurants, and this honestly came as a huge shock to me. I ordered the lobster linguini, instead I got a bowl full of lobster shells, not even an ounce of lobster, over a bed of a couple pieces of linguini ‘soup’. I asked one of the servers to take a look at my plate, she gave me attitude and walked away. I didn’t even take a bite from my pasta, yet they still charged me. I wish I never came here, and I wish I could give this restaurant 0 stars.
Do not come here, save your time and money. If you want good italian food, this is not the place for you.

A few coworkers and I decided to have lunch here recently, and I can honestly say I left with a favorable impression. I don’t think anyone can argue that they don’t get enough value for their dollar at Mimasuya Italiano, because the pasta lunch options are quite filling and yet surprisingly affordable. It comes with a plate of three chef choice appetizers, a small salad, and the pasta of your choice. The appetizers were okay… nothing special or spectacular, but there was a nice variety of flavors that complimented each other well. I think they would’ve benefited from utilizing different textures, however, since everything more or less had the same feel to it.
If my meal were to have ended here, I’d have no reservations for grading the place 3 stars at best. Fortunately, the main course was still to come, and for that I knew exactly what I wanted from the first moment I laid my eyes on the menu: uni pasta. Now I’ve been to various establishments that serve uni pasta, and I’ve experienced the highest of highs and the lowest of lows in regards to the execution of the dish. So the big question is how does Mimasuya Italiano’s uni pasta stack up against the competition? Well, it might not have been the best I’ve ever had, but it was still very enjoyable. And what Mimasuya Italiano has going for them is that they offer the most generous amounts of uni I’ve ever had in a pasta.
In addition to my meal, I ordered a basil soda, which although might sound strange, was actually very refreshing and helped to cut through the richness of lunch. Don’t be scared by the unknown and order one for yourself.
I can see myself coming back sometime. Although it might not be the restaurant that instantly springs to mind when looking for somewhere to eat, it’s great to know that there’s another option for when that uni pasta craving attacks.

Not bad, something different and best of all, prices are reasonable for what you get (small and dried up clams, tough squid, a few shrimps and ONE tiny scallop); however, based on the number of people there on Saturday for lunch, this place may not last. One point to note. Why limited $ 4.00 coffee refill to once? Not many people drink more than a couple cups after a meal. Therefore, it would have been prudent not doing that because it just turned away your truly to revisit this place in the future.

Great service, great food, and filling!
Pretty reasonable for lunch, they have a primo course for $ 26…antipasto (chef selection trio), salad, soup of the day, pasta entrée (extra charge for upgrade), and chef special beef OR catch of the day. The entrée comes with the antipasto and salad if you don’t want the soup and chef entrée. Homemade focaccia bread is warm out of the oven.
Desserts are made fresh — if you have an iDCard, you get a free dessert with purchase of an entrée up to two, what a deal!

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, so here’s mine on our recent visit to Mimasuya. To be honest, I came with expectations in the mid range. I read the Unilocal reviews, and I saw the ratings. What made me want to come here, however, were the pictures. They are after all, worth a thousand words. Most of the reviews on Unilocal don’t even hit the count of two or three hundred. So I went with what the pictures told me instead of the reviews.
I cook Italian food at home. In fact, I’d say about 80% of what I cook is Italian. I can honestly say that I can tell what most Italian food would taste like simply by looking at it. For some reason though, I was baffled by the pictures from Mimasuya. I didn’t know what flavors might be contained with those dishes and I had to find out.
We took a trip to Mimasuya a little late on a Thursday night. When we arrived there were only three other parties in the restaurant. As we looked around, we agreed that it was a nice little place. But let’s face it, we were here for the food.
Our server Jeffrey (I’ll tell you more about him later) gave us our menus and let us look things over. We decided on the 10 item appetizer sampler (a must have!), penne arrabiata, and the carbonara.
The penne arrabiata was awesome. It was al dente and spicy and the dish came with eggplant and pancetta. She doesn’t eat meat, so I asked Jeffrey to serve the pancetta on the side so I could toss it in my carbonara.
Speaking of the carbonara, this dish is amazing. The cream sauce is to die for. When you look at the dish, it appears to be heavy, but not so. I would return for this dish alone.
With that being said though, the real star of the evening was the appetizer sampler. It changes on a daily basis at the chef’s discretion. We were served a wide array of dishes and I was completely satisfied with the chef’s choices.
I hope you all give this place a try. If you can, ask to be seated in Jeffrey’s section. He’s a delight. He was attentive, polite, pleasant, and most importantly: he laughed at all my jokes. He’s also able to hold a conversation very well is sort of rare these days when it comes to servers.

Great to see an upscale Italian restaurant return to this building. Take the ramp downstairs for lots of parking, which can be a challenge for an otherwise very busy Kapiolani street. Walk upstairs to a very nicely furnished restaurant. The host met us at the door and was very warm and friendly. There tables, chairs, and dinnerware reflected an fining dining type of experience. I highly recommend their calamari with zucchini, which was lightly breaded and was accompanied by a great marinara dipping sauce. The waiter recommended a mango-​infused Italian soda, which wasn’t on the menu. This can be ordered with or without alcohol, and I would recommend the drink with alcohol. Excellent drink!
For the main entrée, I ordered the dungeness crab pasta dish, for $ 27.99. Strong seafood flavor, and hearty chunks of fresh crab meat. This was an excellent dish, but a little salty.
We also ordered the uni-​pasta, which was a featured dinner special. This was an upscale Japanese gourmet dish, very rich, seafood, which tasted much sweeter due to the extremely fresh and flavorful uni.
FYI, they have a great lunch special, with dishes starting at $ 12.99!

I like to use the Japanese word, «Maamaa» in English conversation. It basically means «so-​so.»
“How’s that drink?“
Maa-​maa.
Ok, better try another one.
«How’s your entrée?»
Maa-​maa.
Yeesh, Imma try another one.
«How were the sales at store XYZ?»
Maa-​maa.
Do I risk it? Am I feeling lucky?
I think it’s the perfect word to describe Mimasuya, one of the newer Japanese-​Italian fusion kids on the block. MAA-​MAA! This location in Uraku tower seems to be pretty bad because the restaurants keep turning over here. But anyways, we tried this place for dinner because my grandma went here for lunch & liked it. I think we were a little disappointed with our dinner. Based on the other reviews, it seems like lunch is better than dinner.
One plus is their wine menu is very reasonable & we were all pleased with our selections.
At first glance, the pre-​fixe menu is a good deal. Soup or salad, appetizer, main course, & dessert for $ 24!
Unfortunately, the best part was the soup. It was cauliflower purée and it was delicious. But then again anything with cream in it is probably going to be good.
The appetizers were bite sized offerings of various «Italian» appetizers. We had a fried shrimp, some kind of cooked fish, proscitto wrapped cantaloupe, & bruscetta on crostini. They just weren’t very memorable. MAA-​MAA
My main course, the seafood pasta was not very good. The seafood was not fresh. It seemed like they used those frozen mixed seafood packs. All I had were those small scallops that were tough and grainy, and I was expecting at least a shrimp or two. Plus it was $ 4 extra!!! My other family members had the clam pasta which was better. The eggplant one was also better. I think I just chose the wrong one :(MAA-​MAA!
The dessert was a pumpkin flan that was, of course, MAA-​MAA. Fine but nothing extraordinary.
I will say one thing, our server was REALLY good. He was cheery, upbeat, polite, and attentive. He also had to cover a lot of ground as it seemed like they only had 2 – 3 guys working.
I think that if I had selected a different pasta, I would’ve been much more satisfied with my meal. However, Mimasuya has potential, but for now it is just maa-​maa aka A-​OK 3 stars. Hopefully this location isn’t a death sentence.

More like 3.5 stars.
The food is good and the service is good, but I found a bug in my salad after I ate 90% of it. Ugh. You’d think they would comp the salad, but they offered free dessert instead… which really wasn’t all that cool because by the end of the meal, I was too full to enjoy dessert.
I’ve tried lunch and dinner, but I think the food is better at dinner. Of course you’re going to pay big $$$ here either way.

A pleasant lunch experience was presented at Mimasuya Italiano, located in the Uraku Tower on Kapiolani between Piikoi and Sheridan Street.
The menu was somewhat confusing because they were numbered and the numbering system was duplicated for their daily specials. Confusing menu aside, we had the chef’s lunch special which came with an appetizer platter (its like an amuse bouche with 3 selections= a bite of each). It was followed by the choice of pasta and that was followed by their house salad (topped with their own honey mustard vinegar dressing which was very nice by the way, clean, not heavy). Them chasing both was the entrée. We had the steak entrée and the fish entrée. The fish was a salmon, broiled to perfection. The steak was marinated in their special sauce grilled, sliced and plated. Both entrees were served with their house vegetable (we had okra)
We also ordered the desert plate– fresh fruit and a slice of their own tiramisu. The tiramisu was one of the better I’ve had in a while.
The taste? It had a very subtle peppery taste! Nice!
The service? Great! Attentive and pleasant
The bill? Pricey side for lunch but worth every dollar (the Chef’s meal; 4 courses= $ 25)
The parking? Free parking in their underground parking lot.
For those who dined at Uraku– you may remember the elevator from the parking garage directly into the restaurant. Well, its no longer operable. You need to walk up and down the flight of stairs. A good way I guess to build an appetite and then, burn off the calories…
Bosses! Good place to take your AA’s for Secretary’s Day. Husbands, wives, boyfriend, girlfriend? Great place for a nice quiet romantic meal.

Went for a friend’s birthday dinner, a big group of us of about 20 people on a Saturday night. Apparently, it was all of our first times there (including the birthday girl), who stumbled upon this restaurant and thought she’d give it a try. No worries, I’m always open to new restaurants and as long as we have good company, I’m pretty sure we will have a good time.
My first impression was that it is a nice, cozy restaurant. The service was OK. I know we are a big group, but I don’t find it nice that our server had to talk to us as though we are on a tour. I understand you don’t want to repeat yourself, but really? It kind of loss the cozy/​romantic feel for this place.
The food wasn’t bad, but a little on the expensive side:
— Soup of the day: Potato Potage soup: was pretty good! I love potage.
— Crispy Calamari with Zucchini: We thought this was pretty good, it wasn’t like traditional calamari. We liked that it was lightly breaded and was paired well with the zucchini
— Seafood Risotto: This was my dish, I requested all shrimp. It was good, a nice flavor and good size.
— Penne Arrabiata: Bf had this, was OK. I had a bite and thought the same.
I really wanted to try the Lobster Linguine, but I’m allergic to wheat right now so can’t eat pasta ;(My friends who had it said it was good though. I also would have loved the Vongole Rose, I loooove vongole but same thing, damn allergies to clams. Perhaps my experience would have been better if I just cheated and had stuff I’m allergic to, lol.
Only disappointment was the wait for everything was extremely long… Even with only half of our group there early, and only 3 of us ordered drinks and that took half an hour! I can understand we are a big group, and maybe they wanted all the food to come out at the same time. But damn, a 3 hour meal with just appetizers and entrees? We dare not even think of ordering dessert lol.
Overall, it was just OK.

Went to lunch here with a girlfriend a few weeks ago. Parking is free in the underground parking lot.
We got seated right away and the server was very helpful in assisting us with the menu. The server could speak Japanese and since my friend’s first language is Japanese (I can speak as well) so we just communicated the whole time to the server in Japanese. I did notice all the patrons were speaking Japanese though! Not many locals on the day that I went. We ended up ordering the lunch set which I thought was a great deal…
For about $ 13 you get a salad, appetizer, and main dish.
The salad was a generous portion with a great homemade dressing. The appetizer was a variety of chilled meat, tsukemono and vegetables. I ended up getting the spaghetti bolognese for my entrée and fist was flavorful and very decent.
I got the tiramisu for dessert — yum.
I highly recommend this place for lunch (and get the lunch set!). You’ll leave very full and your wallet very happy.

Lunch is where it’s at. Hands down!
Plain and Simple:
Go for lunch. Lots of parking in their parking lot; driveway is located to the left side of the restaurant (you’ll see a sign on the wall) The #2 pasta combo is what I would recommend. Especially if you’re like me, and want to be able to taste a little bit of everything. The sauces are on the thinner side. I would pass on the dessert and coffee/​tea.
Breakdown:
Lunch is from 11:30am — 2pm (I thought it was 11am, but the site says 11:30am, better to be safe than sorry) We were greeted and seated immediately. Seem pretty slow.
Rob M and I got #2 Pasta Course for $ 13. It comes with a small appetizer (I believe it changes based on what’s available), a salad, and your choice of pasta (a list of 3 is offered) The rectangular box below offers two other options for addiontal 3 $.
They start you off with a basket of focaccia bread & the usual oil and balsamic. The granules of salt on the top of the bread is what makes it. The appetizers (tuna, potato salad, and bruschetta) I’m sure it had fancier names, and more detailed ingredients cook and prepared a certain way… but frankly I forget, and when you break it down. That’s what it was. Tuna. Potato Salad. Bruschetta. It was good nonetheless. Salad followed; which I loved. Mmm the dressing. Keep in mind all (including the focaccia bread) are done is small potions, which I personally find nice.** The ability to try a little bit of everything without over indulging before the main dish.
I got the Parma Ham & Gorgonzola Cream (part of the rectangular box) and Rob M got the tuna and mushroom cream. Both sauces came out thinner than we expected. Especially the tuna and mushroom; perhaps we are just use to thicker creamier like stuff when it comes to pasta. They were both pretty good, but we decided that the Parma Ham was the better of the two dishes.
After we were done, we were offered for an additional $ 5, tiramisu & coffee. Sure why not. Seems reasonable. Forgetting the whole «smaller portion» concept. When the dessert arrived my tiramisu was about the size of a golf ball with a small assortment of fruits. Rob M found the coffee cup a bit challenging because he could barely get his one finger into the handle. He had to pinch the handle rather than grab the handle. I’m not sure if $ 5 was really worth coffee, a golf ball worth of cake and fruit. It was good don’t get me wrong… but was it really worth $ 5 is the question. Seriously.
**At the time I was cool with small portions, but $ 5 for coffee and tiramisu. Not nice.

So after hearing some of the mixed reviews about this place through my food blogging/​reviewer contacts, I wasn’t sure about coming here for lunch since I know I could get something I’m already familiar with in the nearby area like La Cucina, Ichiriki, Ala Moana Shopping Center, etc. But my colleague wanted to try it so I went ahead and agreed with the request since we needed to work on a few business related items and it was a short walk from my office.
We were able to park in the building as they have several stalls reserved for Mimasuya. If you recall the location of the former L’Uraku, that’s where Mimasuya is.
We went in with a reservation and it was a good thing we did because it was quite crowded. So that was a good sign since you would assume a place with horrible food wouldn’t be. I’m an advertising guy so I noticed that the crowd was quite diverse. Many Japanese nationals, some local folks in business attire and a handful of locals who looked like they were there leisurely. The crowd present was predominantly women.
The lunch menu is small but that’s fine. I don’t think you want too many choices since most folks have an hour lunch break. You want to get in, identify what you want, eat and go.
Lunch for both my colleague and I came with a small house salad. I’m not sure what kind of homemade vinaigrette the dressing was but it was good.
My friend went with the Veal cutlet and shrimp pilaf. The portions were on the smaller side, the cutlet itself was very flat so it looked like it had been pounded into submission prior to being deep fried. The taste however wasn’t too bad.
The appetizers for the pasta special. Small but tasty. I don’t eat Tako so I gave it to my colleague and she enjoyed it very much. I thought the egg was pretty darn good.
I had the Shrimp & Asparagus Aglio Olio. At first glance it looks good but as I got deeper into the dish I realize a couple things. First off this wasn’t a «wow» dish, it’s a dish I honestly can probably make at home. I only say this because normally you want to go somewhere and pay a little more for something you can’t easily make at home. Not the case here. The noodles were on the mushier side, some people prefer that but I like mine al dente. The shrimp was a tad undercooked and the dish itself was way too oily. I literally poured out some of the oil onto my bread dish as it was that oily. Don’t get me wrong i love olive oil but too much just kills the flavor of the dish… you end up just tasting… well oil.
The service was great and the wait staff was very attentive and nice, however If I come back here I’d probably order something different. I think this place does have potential so I hope things come together for them soon.