5300 Rainier Ave S

I really enjoyed this Hawaiian place in Columbia City! We got poke and guava chicken to split between two people. The quack chicken was our favorite! I love the sauce on the chicken. The poke was okay but really good value. There's plenty of seating inside and service was quick!

Giving a 2 star for the fact they had onsite parking as well as a nice Hawaii theme design. Not sure if I'd go back unless I'm in the area. Food wise Meat jun wasn't cooked thoroughly Never seen meat jun served that I could see the flour coating. Spicy ahi poke was fine. Can't go wrong anything there. Crispy garlic poke was not at all what I was expecting to get. Whatever sauce they have possibly it's just oyster sauce is way too sweet in the crispy garlic ahi. Almost like eating candied tuna compared to what I was thinking of more garlic soy sauce flavored.

Tbh came here because mikes shave ice was here for the afternoon, but was pleasantly surprised by the expansive menu of Hawaiian eats. You order on an iPad, and then grab a seat. There's a small eating area inside, and some outdoor seating. Food came out pretty quickly which was nice I ordered the poke salad with the mo betta salmon. The salad was pretty big, had a nice variety of veggies too. The fish itself was yummy, mo betta sauce is def mo betta haha. Overall, very solid. The poke wasn't "wow" worthy though. If mikes shave ice comes back, perhaps I'll try all the other yummy things on their menu.

We saw this spot in the Seattle airport and decided to give it a try. We got the shrimp teriyaki bowl and loco moco. The shrimp bowl was pretty good. It was super flavorful. The mac salad was also pretty light which paired well with the overpowering shrimp tempura. Overall, this was a decent airport meal.

My apologies, Sam Choy. I was not familiar with your game, or the fact that you are the "godfather of poke". I got a clam chowder, and my boyfriend got the garlic chicken. The chicken was satisfyingly sweet, savory, and crispy. The rice was a tad mushy, and the mac salad was valid. The clam chowder came loaded with clams and bacon, it was really yummy and had a seafood-esque flavor to the chowder. I was craving clam chowder this entire Seattle trip, and I was so excited that this was my final pit stop and that it did not disappoint. Next time I'll have to try this place and see if they really do poke to the max!

I've heard a lot about this place and wanted to check it out for a couple of years now. Only now, I was able to make my way down to Columbia City to try it out! The location that we went to is located across of Hill City Tap House & Bottle Shop and Emma's BBQ on Rainier Ave S in Columbia City. There's a small parking lot for customers to park at. The interior of the restaurant seemed more like a café rather than a restaurant with its aesthetics of succulents around the area. It was more of a self-serve shop where it is contactless ordering and self-pickup on your order. There's an automatic $0.08 charge for a bag even if you're dining in. My friend and I shared family style on two plates: one poke bowl with Spicy Ahi and one plate lunch of Chef Choy's Bento Box. For the spicy ahi, we both could tell the fish was frozen (not necessarily a bad thing but for those who only like fresh, not here) and had really good flavor. Great to try! It came with two scoops of rice and 1/3 of the plate was salad that also had pickled veggies and seaweed salad. The salad definitely balanced out all the carbs we had. For the Chef Choy's bento box, the plate overall was delicious (except for the mac salad). The katsu chicken was very crispy with a nice crunch but a tad over fried. The kalua pork was was good; just missing that nice smokiness and cabbages that I love in kalua pork. The shrimp tempura also good with a nice crispiness. All the proteins were amazing. I only had a bad impression on the mac salad as it very undercooked. The macaroni was almost inedible, so we didn't even touch it. I noticed there were egg bits (and maybe potato?) so I scavenged around for those since they were good LOL. I'm glad I finally gave this place a try after seeing it around for good poke bowls. It wasn't as impressive as I hope, but I would come back for more of their plates and possibly there desserts in the future!

Reviewing for the food truck, but the portions were surprisingly huge, so the value was good in my opinion! I was able to eat my garlic chicken bowl across 3 lunches. (For others maybe 2 meals) All the food was delicious. Chicken was well flavored and crispy! Definitely will return.

Finally found a place that sells meat jun in Seattle! They have lots of island style foods that hit the spot. I have had better but I have yet to find another place that sells meat jun. Love the island reggae music they play and the spacious interior. For some reason it's usually empty when I come so the food comes out pretty fast

i got a poke rice bowl with shoyu ahi tuna. overall pretty good, fish was fresh. however, the cucumber salad was way too sweet for me and could've been more vinegar heavy. the tuna also could've had more shoyu and was lacking sauce. price wise, a bit more expensive than competitors, but also more authentic.

The poke was alright, definitely not the best that I ever had. We got the rainbow and the spicy salmon. I thought the rainbow was better than the spicy salmon, but overall nothing to write home about. It was entirely self serve as well, with the lady bringing the food out to us, but the place was tidy and clean.

I've been here a few times and I think there are better places to get poke. It has solid fish here but I'd say it's a bit pricy for what you get. I'd probably spend the extra trek and head to CD. You order at a kiosk (or ahead) and it's very casual. Decent seating inside but no high chair. Service is great, the woman that was helping us was super nice. The other usual we get is the garlic chicken and that's solid but I don't think I'd come back for much else.

I've had Sam Choy's poke in the past and very much enjoyed it. However, when I went recently on a Friday afternoon I had some of the worst poke I've ever tried. I ordered a shoyu ahi poke bowl which was a whopping $16. I received extremely dry tuna, dry rice, and mediocre salad sides (seaweed salad and some cucumber mix). In the past I have really enjoyed Sam Choy's shoyu ahi and I remember the shoyu sauce coating the tuna giving the fish a jeweled tint--succulent and delicious. This time I was extremely disappointed. There was barely anyone there, which makes sense to me if this is the quality of food they're serving these days.

Unfortunately the quality of the fish here seems to have drastically gone down. We purchased tuna and salmon poke by the pound. The texture of the tuna was pretty off and the salmon seems to have been doused in mayo.

I was excited to finally be able to try this place out.. unfortunately everything tasted so MID. I expected more flavor and unique flavor profiles.. but everything was bland. We tried out the crispy garlic poke bowl. Good portion, but fish was barely seasoned or tossed in sauce. There definitely was no garlic flavor to eat.. so disappointing! Especially for how expensive it was. We also ordered the spam musubi, and the spam wasn't even fried or grilled! Literally looked like it was quickly warmed up and rushily made. Barely any sauce on that as well. Just feels like they're holding back on the ingredients.. and this is a common complaint I have been reading from previous reviews. We also waited forever for our order.. like 30 minutes. We had a good amount of food but we didn't realize we had to wait that long. Workers behind the counter wasn't friendly or welcoming. Place was empty on a Saturday lunch hours. That might say something and hope they make some changes. I can't recommend this place, I would rather go somewhere else for some tasty Hawaiian food.

I finally visited Sam Choy's Seattle location to check out their Island Kine Brunch! We got the Meat Jun, Loco-3 Ways, Coconut Mac Nut Pancakes, and Guava Chicken & Waffle Bubbles. Loved all the dishes! The staff here are so attentive and welcoming. The food and service are timely as well. The restaurant has good seating and open space - great spot when it's sunny outside.

Not sure what happened to the portion sizes. Ordered the Maui bundle that supposedly feeds 4-6 people, and it was enough for 2, maybe 3 at most. Had to order additional food elsewhere to compensate. We've ordered the Maui bundle multiple times before so we knew what the portions looked like. It's about 40% less food compared to the other times. Disappointed.

One of our favorite places to come for garlic chicken, Mac salad, and all the other cool things they offer. We used to frequent at the Tacoma location before they closed. I'm a fan of the portions almost always being identical to the last order. Garlic chicken is always saucy and tasty, and rice is usually steamed and done well. Sometimes the Mac salad has an older / stale taste to in the Seattle location that I didn't notice at the Tacoma one. Employees were very nice. Parking is tight but that's not their fault, that's just Seattle. Usually get to go so I'm not sure on the interior experience but it does look well kept!

Gave Sam Choy's another shot, and glad I did! The last time was definitely a fluke because everything we got was flavorful and delicious this time around. We popped in during happy hour; I got the chicken sandwich with garlic sauce and my brother got the smash burger with an egg. The chicken sandwich was FIRE! It was definitely messy with the mac salad on it, but SO GOOD. I will absolutely return for the fried chicken alone, and I'm not a huge mac salad fan, but it was really good and very different to have on a sandwich. My brother said his burger was delicious as well... the egg was perfect with a nice runny yolk. Since it was HH, we snagged a couple of the discounted hard seltzers, and some strawberry haupia. Everything was perfect, and we will both return in the very near future. Thank you, Sam for the refund on my last order so we could give you another shot. Your customer service and kindness are unmatched. Mahalo!

No thanks anymore. Getting too old for kiosk ordering. Says I need 85 characters to post so here is filler.

I'm sorry guys, I know I reviewed a year ago and I was so hoping things would get better. Your stuff used to be awesome but ordered take out today, and while everything is usually decent quality - the chips were clearly made the day before, gummy not crispy and the onions in the poke were already soggy - like perhaps that was made the day before as well, sauce was seriously on the light side. I've experienced this with the rice where it's clearly dried out and with their mac salad where the pasta seems soggy; but always loved their side menu items enough to roll the dice. I know it's super hard to run a business - and expensive as can be but cutting staff down so much that nothing seems 'fresh' anymore really knocked this location down a lot. Atmosphere is very clean, staff very friendly, but paying nearly $40 for one (admittedly XL poke bowl add egg) where anything is less than perfect. I'm just out at this point. Oh also not sure if you guys know but on take out orders your plastic lids melt a lot on all your hot food by the time it arrives. Hope I'm not just consuming plastic particles in mass.

I was excited to try Sam Choy's, especially since they were running a $10 on any dish the day I came! Unfortunately, my experience wasn't the best. The time it took to get my food was insane, around 30 minutes from when I ordered on the kiosk. They also didn't have butter mochi so I was already pretty disappointed. When my food came out, I was... alright with it. There was a decent amount of tuna, the nachos seemed okay, but it just wasn't my favorite mode of eating fish. I think I should've gotten a bowl, the texture of the nachos and the poke didn't go well together. I also am pretty sure I got slight food poisoning the day after and I'm not sure if it was from the fish. It tasted fine when I had it, but... Anyways, I had an okay experience. I'm not sure if I'd come back here, with all the other poke places in Seattle.

Food was awesome! Staff was great, Very helpful, Felt like I was in Hawaii again! Restaurant super clean and They played great Music. Overall great place!!

This is a solid poke spot in Seattle to check out, they're located in Columbia City, which is an area that has a good amount of foodie spots to visit. They have their own private parking lot and there is plenty of seating available. Ordering and customizing your poke bowl is easy on their kiosks, they prepare your bowl quickly and will call you to pick it up at the front. There is a good variety of poke flavors to choose from, all with different sauces. I usually go for the Sam's Spicy because I love spicy aioli with my poke. If you're looking for something not raw fish, they have plenty of cooked Hawaiian options to choose from. I tried the Reconstructed Musubi and it was a delicious take on spam musubi.

They got my door dash order totally wrong I ordered Mo betta and I think it was just plan and then as I was eating proceeded to find a hair in my poke bowl. Won't be coming back. This is probably the worst poke restaurant I have eaten at out of my 20+ different restaurants. Save yourself the money.

Ordered three large platters for a group, with the results varying between good and very good. Meats (garlic chicken and kalua pork) were highlights. The sides...various salads...were a step behind. The order was very large, but was ready on time. The service responded positively to every request.

Do not order from her yes airport prices are expensive but they show you this big meal on pictures and serve you half i ordered the side of shrimp and tell me why it showed 3 prices of shrimp on the side on there AIRPORT website for mobile order when I got it there were only 2 2 small shrimps for 8 dollars!!!! I told her nicely why are there only two shrimps she says thats what a side is which make no sense bc the entree with rice and macaroni salad comes with 6 shrimps for 20 do the math I asked her if I could get my other shrimp bc thats false advertising and scamming she had a nasty attitude and said oh well thats what my system says other locations have differnt priced I told her this is not the website for another location this is your location she looked embarrassed then you can tell she is not a person that liked to be challenged or wrong and started saying well I can't change it thats what it is akin a sarcastic rude tone I told her if I could have a hire up number so I could get the accurate answer not to complain at first and she said oh idk why dont you look it up on the website you just saw the three shrimps on so rude !!!! In the meanest way the whole time i was nice I said why can't you just give it to me its just false advertising she said oh well I dont knownit do t eat her and ask for the quatity before hand !!!!!!!! Super expensive small small portions and i work for the airport i eat here all the time shes a new hire has side bands and a pony tail short and islander

If you get a chance, PLEASE look in to the monthly brunch. They do it at every location, and I went for my birthday. IT IS SO GOOD. Not only is the menu unique, varied, and interesting, but the staff is super helpful and the ordering at the kiosk makes everything so seamless. I love the space at the Rainier location. It's very light and bright, and the tables are plentiful without feeling smashed together. I'm not a poke fan, but I'm so happy I took the chance on this brunch!

Yeah, I'm sorry. I feel like this place has gone a little bit downhill. I enjoy their Poke, but I have not been happy with what responses I've been gerting from them everytime I ask. I don't want to sound picky, but it's interesting how I've been asking for mac salad as a side to Poke for an extremely long time and only recently have they taken out that option. I usually do Pick-Up, so I'm never sure what's in it. I specifically say in the notes PLEASE CHARGE FOR EXTRAS. It has never happened ever since a few months ago. I was VERY willing to pay extra. I went to go pick it up and they told me if I wanted to Mac Salad -- I need to buy the WHOLE side which is extremely large for one person. I really believe they have stopped being accommodating to their customers. I miss the old look of the place and the service they gave long time ago. I believe being accommodating is a very important part of service and they have continued to show me that's not the case for them.

Hate to give a bad review to a local business but my most recent visit was unbelievable bad. I had the Chef Choy's Bento Box which was a nice variety dish that allowed me to try a bit of everything. Unfortunately, I enjoyed very little of it. The dish comes with teriyaki beef, shrimp tempura, spam, katsu nuggets, mac salad and two scoops of rice. Probably the only thing I enjoyed was the beef. Spam was bland and mac salad had very little flavor/creaminess. The worst part had to be the katsu nuggets. They were overcooked to be way too dry and had too much batter. Eating the nuggets was painful... as if I were eating rocks. If I wasn't so hungry these would've went straight to the trash on first bite. I've been here before for their Poke and that was actually solid, so I'm a little surprised by this meal. I would still recommend them for their Poke if you're in the area, but whatever you do, please do not order those katsu nuggets.

Came to visit tacoma for a conference, and while there wasn't many locations nearby that were of Hawaiian, i checked this place out and it was a good bite! Parking is street side, restaurant has lots of tables, workers are usually 1-2, but food still comes out quick!

Based on the reviews that I read, I thought poke to the max would be a lot better, my meal didn't quite hit the spot. I ordered a half pound of the rainbow poke (albacore and salmon with sweet shoyu) with rice, and also ordered a side of the mac salad. My first impression was that the mac salad was super underwhelming. Mac salad is usually one of my favorite Hawaiian sides, but the mac salad I got was bland tasting, and the texture all just soft and a bit grainy. No crunchy bits of vegetables or chewy noodles in contrast to the sauce, everything just felt the same. The rice was also underwhelming, being dry and not very tasty. The poke itself was reasonably good, but I was unpleasantly surprised by the presence of a fish bone in my poke. Overall, considering the high price tag that it takes to fetch a meal here, I would much rather drive a bit further to go somewhere else for poke.

The poke nachos were great! So hard to find good poke nachos, especially with fish so fresh. We got the shoyu ahi and it was really flavorful. The poke salad was okay at best though mostly because the sweet and spicy sriracha ahi tuna didn't have any flavor and the lettuce on my salad was brown..I would order the salad again pending the lettuce is fresh and with a different flavor of poke.

I have ordered lunch from this place twice, and both times my order came out short of what I ordered. My last order was missing items which I paid for and didn't receive. The lunch bag was received in good condition. I have no problem with the food. I refuse to spend money on food and drinks and not receive everything I ordered.

I went to the counter to order a Local Moco and asked him a simple question whether or not the hamburger patty was homemade or if it was mass produced and previously frozen. The guy in the front kept on waving me off telling me to order at the kiosk and went back to expediting orders. I told him I had a question and he ignored me for almost 15 minutes.. Finally, I raised my voice and I said hey listen. I would like to order here at the cash register and I have a question. He continued to wave me off and say that I need to go order at the kiosk finally again! I SAID NO! I have a question and I want a place to order here then all of a sudden a light came on and he said ok you can order here at the cash register and said the hamburger patties were not made in house. I had to remind him that me paying you for food, involves some level of customer customer. What a crappy experience tarnishing Sam Choi's name.

This is probably one of my favorite food trucks in SLU. I always get Korean Fried Chicken + gravy (suggest getting the gravy since the rice is a bit dry). The Mac salad side provides a great pairing with the KFC. They also have other wraps and salad bowls. They have just one brick and mortar location in Seattle apart from their regular food truck service around the Seattle downtown area. I've visited the food truck enough times for the lady taking the order to eventually recognize me over time.

OH MY GOD.... I love this place. It truly stole my heart. It's a small place in Columbia City, but super cute, clean, and trendy inside. They aren't doing dine-in quite yet, so we ordered our food and ate it in the car because we could not wait. When you get in, there's a big menu, all the juices, and even slices of pie to take home. You order everything off an iPad and then they'll pack it up for you. We ordered lumpia, garlic chicken, aloha chicken, and spam fries. The food did not disappoint!! It was amazing. Everything from the lumpia to the plates - delicious. I mean, we weren't sure about the spam fries at first, but they are so crispy and yummy. I would definitely recommend, especially because they come in the spam container, which is a cute touch. The garlic chicken is a must try. It's not overwhelmingly garlicky, it's literally perfect. The rice and Mac salad were perfect. All of it was so good. I wish we had more room for more lumpia, but we were stuffed. Portion sizes are huge, one plate is definitely shareable.

Years ago I used to go to the old Sam Choy's food truck in SLU regularly and really enjoyed it. This poke bowl was incredibly disappointing - fish was bland (and kinda hard), there was just a pile of lettuce underneath the seaweed salad (???), and the pickles were a strange addition. I ended up not finishing it and I usually LOVE poke. Not worth the trip or the price.

Gross. Over-cooked flour nuggets. More flour nuggets than chicken. The chicken was then saturated in a plain ol' teriyaki sauce that made the chicken not that edible. The tuna tasted unfresh in our poke bowl, This is the second time I've eaten here and I'm thoroughly unimpressed. My partner sent me a text stating this as a place for dinner. I should have gone with my gut. Last time I ate here, the first order had onions which weren't listed anywhere on the menu. They remade my order. The remade order didn't have onions but it had hair instead. They refunded me my money. I wanted to like this place but I just can't recomend it.

Excellent poke and poke tacos from the Godfather of Poke, Sam Choy. This location in Columbia City is unique and you may see their food truck, parked here. The service is great and ambience is quiet. Definitely a bargain and convenient to South Seattle!

I wouldn't come back here. There are much better poke options in Seattle so it's definitely not worth the drive south. I didn't think that the fish tasted fresh and the salad was even more stale. It's difficult to justify the price; I ordered a poke salad with 2 scoops of fish (shoyu salmon + shoyu ahi) with a soda, and the total came out to $30! The outdoor seating is gorgeous, especially if it's nice and sunny, but that's about it.

Okay so I'm originally from Hawaii meaning born and raised in Hawaii and recently transferred to Seattle because of the beautiful girlfriend's job. I was very excited to learn that Sam Choy had established a restaurant only about a mile away from where we live so it was great to be able to walk there when the weather is Pleasant. I was very excited to try his bento box which included Terry beef, spam, shrimp tempura and chicken tonkatsu. As normal it came with two scoops of rice and potato macaroni salad. The rice had two choices, either just plain white rice or what they call Hapa rice which is a mix of brown and white rice. Since I've never had a loco Moco, I opted for the $1.99 option more to include two eggs, gravy, and fried onions over the rice. Due to covid-19 precautions, there only two seating areas inside and an outside huge tent set up in the parking lot with about for tables set pretty far apart. The weather was nice so we sat outside. The plate lunch with huge and could definitely have fed two people but I was hungry. I could slowly eat my way from the top to bottom. About drinks, there was a pretty big selection everything from sake to fruit juices to Seltzer's and sodas. I opted for a barefoot strawberry Seltzer which was pretty tasty. Are you able to charge everything and be prompted for a tip. It was take out so I left 15%. After placing your order they do not bring your food to you where you are waiting outside, you must report back in approximately 8 minutes to pick up your food. All in all, and okay to good dining experience okay because there is parking, the menu is available online, there are pictures of everything, and you get exactly what you are promised. On the not-so-great side, a whole bunch of food was crammed in to a relatively small plate and because of that your beef teriyaki will taste like gravy which will also taste like spam and your chicken katsu of course will also be covered in gravy and spam. The shrimp tempura, being close to the top was covered in gravy and had hints of Teri beef. I'm not sure if it's an option but if so, try to ask for your rice, gravy, onions and eggs in a separate container. That would have made it a much better dining experience for me. Definitely worth a try if you are missing true local Hawaiian food!

Dude, this place is soo great. I wish I knew about this sooner. I have been driving all the way to Kona kitchen but this place is just as awesome. The items they have are really top notch and the spam roll you see all over their marketing is really worth getting. Kinda want to try making it at home. Also, just found out they have a spot at the SeaTac airport so I'm definitely going there next time I can. Love the food and the prices were okay. Felt worth it.

Service is bad. Food is not consistent. Doesn't seem to care about customer feedback or comments. Then there's live music scheduled, that goes on the whole day and it's so loud for hours. What about the community and your neighbors? I ordered from you a lot before too. You can't place orders while the VM is full and nobody hardly ever answers. What happened to you guys?

Pros: good food, generous portions Cons: no water to drink for free, limited parking, no indoor dining, wait time can be longer than what you'd expect due to many take out orders you don't see.

I haven't eaten here in awhile and stop by for my usual loco moco. It taste so different in a bad way. The hamburger taste like frozen Patties from Costco. Rice was hard and gravy was different and they barely put any gravy on the patty and rice. Not sure if new management or what but I don't think I'll be back after this experience.

Dropped in since it was lunch time and I was in the area. At first I wasn't sure if it was open since I didn't see anyone inside, no employees or customers. As I was getting out of my car some customers entered and there were kiosks to order from. One of the cooks told me I could use the kiosk on the side since the other two were taken. Since it was my first time, I wasn't sure what to get and it took a while to order and there wasn't anyone I could ask questions to so I went with what sounded easy and tasty. I ended up getting half a pound of the shoyu salmon with rice and seaweed salad and avocado and a spam misubi. Now the spam misubi while decent was so messy to eat since it's cut in half, it also has soo much rice that it overpowered the spam and any other flavor it had. The poke was pretty underwhelming, I was a bit disappointed that the salmon didn't have much flavor especially since I paid so much for it. I don't know that I'll be back since it's out of the way for me, but if I were to, I'd order something else and probably a smaller portion.

Disappointing based on such great reviews from others. Korean fried chicken was better off without the "siraracha" style sauce. Mac salad was hard pasta. Spicy ahi was bland. Not very ono. I'll take my chances at L&L Hawaiian.

Food was meh nothing to good or bad. A bit over processed in my opinion. The people were pretty nice until we mention something then gave me a side eye look. Dead inside not that much but it was ok and chill. Found mold in the cake kinda unsafe and disgusting be careful

Ordered Poke salad and was disappointed Based on the reviews, I had high expectations. Fish did not taste fresh, I had to cover it in salad dressing to help with the taste. Salad was even more sad. It was just wilted and not so fresh items from a mixed bag of low quality veggies The ube mochi dessert somewhat made up for it. I did like the fact you just self order on a machine. But overall, wouldn't want to come back. Trendy but not tasty