Reef Bar & Restaurant

omg the coconut pancakes!!! such a cool place we will for sure be making this a regular when we visit Santa Cruz

Great place to feel the local vibe of Santa Cruz. The beers are cheap $ 5 a draft and they have freak poke. Super fresh.

Big Ern, takes 10 bottles to make, don’t ask just do it! — deliciously deceiving drink, think Long Island ice tea Hawaiian style. After a few sips in I was already feeling warm ;-)
Ordered the moco loco to soak up the big Ern, man it was awesome. Two scoops of rice, two parties, two eggs and some Mac salad fills you up

Where to go for the best poke bowls? Here! I crave one at least once a day haha. The quality of the food here is fantastic. Great drinks as well! The outdoor seating is fun to do as well. They also have live music.

Love this place. It’s my spot. Great drinks, awesome food. The staff is dope! Always welcoming and happy to help. Jakes my bartender he knows what he’s doing! I’d give it a 10 outta 10!

A very nice place. I especially like the happy hour Monday’s with music.
I like the teriyaki bowls

Headed in Saturday evening because of the full bar and the ability to get food and bring the kids.
Starting at the cashier can be a little rushed if you have never been. The menu takes a bit to go through but the pressure of taking to long for the sake of everyone who is in line, kinda sucks. It takes a good 30 minutes to get to the food cashier, where you order and get a number for your table.
If you want drinks, get in line at the bar. Where I was able to actually witness the change in drinks and timeliness with the change of bartenders. There was a Hawaiian looking guy when I first came in around 5, ordered a happy hour Mai-​tai– it was strong and awesome, when my friends arrived a petite woman with curly hair was now bartending, but taking a looonnnggg time to order, make and ring up one drink, they were not the same caliber drinks as the Mai-​tai, (we ordered the house margarita and another Mai-tai)…So should have been pretty similar.
Food:
Kahlua pork sliders-​greasy and not much to them but the pork was pretty tasty, but would eat fast, cold greasy pork… gross
Hawaiian Spring Rolls–
Had a Great fresh flavor nice little bite and a flavorful dipping sauce. A+
Hawaiian Tacos:
Basically Kahlua pork with a few shreds of cabbage and onion. Really really really greasy, at the end of the second one, my daughter couldn’t keep eating because it wasn’t warm and the greasy feel was not appealing.
Coconut shrimp combination plate with ribs–
Liked the shrimp and the fish, would say they were well made and fried right. Ka-​lai? Ribs– yum, they had a wonderful flavor. Two scoops of rice and macaroni salad: Mac salad was pretty tasty, really basic Hawaiian style, not overly seasoned one way or another.
Later ordered an Ern? -(lots of alcohol and I don’t think you could make it weak if you wanted!) And a coconut margarita (which tasted like a basic margarita that had coconut shavings in it)
For the food, wait and accessibility to the bar… 3 stars.
It’s definitely a great place to chill out with friends, we say on the back patio near one of the heat lamps for a few hours and never felt over crowded or rushed. Our waitress did visit and bring by a few items, so we were not abandoned…
Would be nice to place a drink order with a runner though. otherwise someone in your party is forever going to be waiting at the bar

This is an interesting addition to downtown Santa Cruz, not sure how long this place has been open since it is tucked off a side street off the main drag downtown near the Pacific Garden Mall. Here for lunch today with my Boss. First off, overall, I was pleased with my lunch, I am only going 4-​stars however due to a few reasons:
–The menu is confusing. Even the gal working the counter was confused by the menu and could not explain what came with what meals.
–Drinks in fridge near the counter were limited in choices to only very sugary fruit drinks, so very limited choices and the gal working the counter directed us to the fridge and indicated those were are only choices.
–We had to ask for utensils, despite the same gal bringing us food that we had ordered that clearly was designed to be eaten with a fork.
–ordering took a really long time and the cashier had to keep asking questions to other employees
–The place is a little dingy inside and could use a top to bottom cleaning. For instance if you are going to have your kitchen viewable to the public while ordering, as an owner you might want said kitchen to be immaculate. Who knows maybe this is how it was just designed but bad call, as we lingered there trying to get an order entered, with 15 people standing in line behind us, one can’t help but inspect the workings of the kitchen and it is NOT perfect. So as a suggestion, maybe hire some waiters and just hand out menus and have people sit down and order like a regular restaurant so each customer is not hovering over your kitchen and watching all the missteps of your chefs like not washing hands between touching meat, or rubbing sweat off forehead, etc.
Again overall I will give them another chance for 5-​stars but the organization and running of the place is a bit chaotic. Or so they say «Santa Cruz Normal». 4-​stars for now and possible 5-​stars in the future due to excellent food.

Laid back and relaxed.
Pono shares the floor space with this bar. Cold brew and loco moco… perfect. Take your drink out back to the tropical patio on a nice day and your transported to Hawaii… almost.
Nice happy hour and a long list of specialty drinks.
Last words… local brews on tap!

Going to the Reef (also called/​sharing a space with Pono) for happy hour on Fridays has lead to many a fun evening for my husband and I. The live Hawaiian music makes any evening seem like a special occasion. If you are hungry it’s easy to decide to stay for some authentic Hawaiian food. I highly recommend it.

Was missing Hawaii so ran over here for a bite of poke — Service is definitely not with a Hawaiian attitude –rushed and rude. Still tried to enjoy our meal of poke and a hawaiian burger… they couldn’t put the poke into a taco… why not? The price apparently… cant i just pay the higher price? Nope. Okay so just got a poke bowl. Had no rice. ‘Server’ dropped it on table and advised us of the silverware location. There were 2 people at another table and a couple guys at the bar –the place was dead. I get that it has counter service — just never seen it so bad.

Pretty awesome for Santa Cruz!!! Poke was good, teriyaki was good, patio allows dogs and beers are good :) what more could you ask for?

Portion size not worth the money if there is no flavor in the food. Total tourist trap! Pork was dry and stiff you needed a steak knife to cut through it. Poke really didn’t have any flavor and neither did the hamburger steak. We asked for medium and got well done.

Amazing food for a reasonable price. Atmosphere is fun and entertaining with live music and a mixed crowd. We had a pork dish which was tasty and juicy and the seafood combo. Plates were licked clean :)

Super good food options, friendly atmosphere, and whimsical bar options. Save money on a flight to the islands– worth a visit for a few tasty morsels.

Straight up comfort food. I ordered the seasonal fish plate. Which involved some lightly crispy fresh fish, rice and home made Mac salad I also got a side of wakame which was great .
Imagine a place better than L&L with a lounge style seating and a full bar. Also live music on most days… Oh yea and happy hour even on the weekends ?! My kind of spot definitely. Absolutely chill atmosphere, dub music being played in the background. Art pieces surround the walls, make sure to check out their outside patio as well.
Cheers,

This is the ONLY place I eat at when I go to Santa Cruz! This is the BEST place to get the freshest poke! The atmosphere here is just so relax and chill. They have outside setting inside as well. And a full bar! And they have live bands play here or super cool hula dancing! Amazing! Can’t say enough how delicious this place is! Oh and I’m guessing if your from Hawaii you’ll find this place like home. ;) or in the hunt for a awesome lunch when your in Santa Cruz… Make this your stop!

Live music… comfy bar atmosphere and traditional Hawaiian food!
Came here for birthday dinner. I was on the beach and my husband and I got hungry. I was craving poke so I typed a search on my Unilocal app and I wasn’t disappointed.
I ordered the poke platter shoyu poke (sweet soy sauce poke) with two scoops of rice, edemame, and kim chee. Came with lemon, wasabe and pickled ginger.
Husband had the kalua pork and he loved it. Great place, parking can be tricky if its packed.

They share the place with Pono. Though, I’m not quite sure how the ownership is setup, but we picked up a virgin lava flow for $ 3! We partially transported back to Hawaii.
They’ve got a full bar.
Will update review when (not if) we go back for funny-​time drinks!

This is a great spot to come and hear some live music and have some cocktails. I was there on a Sunday afternoon and they had live music!, on a Sunday! Thats pretty awesome. You can enjoy some great food from Pono Hawaiian Grill located inside the establishment as well.
They have a great draft beer selection as well as wine and just about any liquor you could want. The bartender was cool and gave very quick service. He even gave me a $ 5 bill change from a ten for a $ 5 beer, that made me happy to dig out a buck from my wallet for a tip…
The place is pretty big and they have lots of tables and even some couches to chill on. In the summer time (or even most of California’s winter time) you can enjoy the outside patio seating out back.
Ill definitely be back!