Whew! It has been a crazy couple of weeks since my last post. Busy days during the work week and weekends packed with cruising around the islands for some delicious grinds.

Today’s casual grindz highlight is a spot that has become very, very popular over the past year. It is constantly on Yelp’s “hot list” for Honolulu and never fails to have a line of customers waiting at the door as soon as it opens.

Sweet Home Cafe is a hot pot specialty restaurant featuring a variety of delicious broths. Patrons order plates of paper thin meats to cook in the broth. The inside of the restaurant has four refrigerators packed with other ingredients you can cook including vegetables, mushrooms, seafood, and more!

Service is excellent in the restaurant, especially for first-time customers. Our server explained the menu and the ordering system along with describing each of their broths. At Sweet Home Cafe you can choose between sharing one pot and one broth, or ordering two broths which are poured into a split pot. On our visit we opted to try just one broth, the signature House Special. This broth was packed with a lot of flavor. Within the warm liquid you could clearly see Chinese parsley, garlic, ginger, and many other flavorful ingredients which culminate in a delightful savory broth. They will even let you take your leftover broth home with you!

What makes the whole meal complete is the free dessert at the end. The dessert served at Sweet Home Cafe is a mountain of shave ice topped with various puddings and tapiocas, smothered in condensed milk. Delicious!

Here is a quick picture gallery of our visit:

We arrived @ 4:45 and there were already people waiting!

The “Veggie” refrigerator with various goodies for you to choose.

A ton of dipping sauces to choose from! I especially liked the garlic ginger sauce!

We ordered beef, beef tongue (awesome!), and chicken for our hot pot.

Our Hot Pot steaming away!

A fully stacked dessert of shave ice, puddings, and tapiocas. For FREE!

Since the restaurant’s menu is pretty much ala carte, your spend is completely dependent on how much you feel like eating. For my wife and I we spent a little over $40. I’m a big eater and she’s a light eater so I’d say that two “medium” appetites can probably expect to spend around the same amount.

This spot has become so popular that customers will start showing up 15-20 minutes before opening at 5:00pm. Sweet Home Cafe takes no reservations and has a 90 minute time limit for diners. I have never driven by this restaurant after 6:00pm without seeing a line of customers waiting for their turn. My recommendation: Show up BEFORE it opens!

Sweet Home Cafe
2334 S King St. Honolulu, HI 96826
Phone: (808) 947-3707