"Hero had the unfortunate luck of opening a few months before the pandemic, so this tiny izakaya on Westwood Blvd. started as a bit of an unknown commodity in the neighborhood. That's no longer the case, as the line of regulars waiting for a table might tell you. From pork tonkotsu shabu shabu and daily sashimi platters to perfectly moist teba gyo (jidori chicken wing gyozas), everything on Hakata’s tremendous menu is shareable and designed to be eaten with a big glass of beer or sake to wash it all down. This is the kind of place you might roll into at 6pm with a few friends and accidentally stay for three hours—with concrete plans to come back next month." - nikko duren, brant cox
Jakob Layman
