Mini Garden Orient & Vegetarian Cuisine

For a couple of weeks I've been driving by this place hoping to stop in for a quick bite.  A chance meeting with a friend a couple of blocks away brought me here for a late lunch just a few days ago.

According to the sign, Mini Garden has been open for about a month now and inside it really shows.  Although most of the detail work is completed, there is still a lot more to be done -- covering the plywood at the front counter, putting the facing on the banquettes along the walls and painting the trim around portions of the ceiling.

There is another Mini Garden located in Chinatown and for the most part, their noodle dishes are quite good.  So, in the interest of seeing what the rest of the menu is like, I decided to order different things today.

To start off, I decided on the pan fried onion pancake (US$3.25).

Way back when, this used to be one of my favorite dishes to order at both Korean restaurants, and at Chinese ones too.  Here the pancake was light and crisp and just a little too oily.  There were lots of green onions in this, but for some reason this pancake was quite flavorless. 

The next dish was the pan fried spinach with garlic (US$5.25).

This dish was OK as it was done in the standard fashion.  What I liked about this was that the garlic didn't overpower the dish.  The subtle garlic flavor enhanced the flavor of the spinach nicely.

For the mains, we decided on two dishes.  The first to arrive was the honey and garlic chicken (US$7.95).

Pieces of boneless chicken thighs were stir fried with onions in a fairly sweet honey garlic sauce.  The sauce was a little too sweet for me, but there was a fair amount of garlic in this creating a bit of balance.  I would have liked this more if it were made a bit spicy with the addition of a few dried chillies.

And last, the black pepper beef (US$8.95).

A few slices of beef were stir fried with chopped bell peppers and onions in a thick black pepper sauce.  This was really peppery and this could have been my favorite dish because I really enjoyed the sauce.  The beef, however, was sliced into large pieces -- six pieces to be exact.  This made the beef quite difficult to eat, especially since there was no knife at the table.  That coupled with the fact that the beef was tough and dry, made this a disappointment.

I also asked for a hot Hong Kong milk tea, and was told that they only had it cold, so I said OK.  It was never delivered to the table.

Although the name of the restaurant suggests vegetarian cuisine, there were only a handful of vegetarian dishes on the menu.  The dishes that I tried were average at best and because of the lack of friendliness on the waitstaff's part, I probably won't come back here again.  By the way, for those of you that were curious about what happened here on the day that I visited, I decided not to post that story. 

For those of you who dine regularly at Little Village Noodle House, one of the waitresses that used to work there now works here.

Mini Garden Orient & Vegetarian Cuisine
2065 South Beretania Street
Telephone:  808.946.3828

Comments

[MrsT]

Bummer.. ! that the food was just average..! how come you decided not to post the story.. Reid..??

[Reid]

Hi MrsT,

Well what happened wasn't very nice, and although the restaurant staff could have done something about it (and they didn't), it was about another customer there so I don't feel that I should blame the restaurant.

The food was just so-so, but the won ton noodle is very good as are most of the other noodle dishes. I will visit the other shop to review those.

[Kirk]

Reid - Sorry about your bad experience. The scallion bread is pretty common home cooking - we make it at home sometimes and the spinach really looked like no big deal. Don;t you hate it when you only have chopsticks and give some huge hunk of meat with no knife???

[Reid]

Hi Kirk,

It really sucks when you have to use chopsticks and the meat is tough. If the pieces were smaller, I would have enjoyed this a lot more.

[kitkat]

Try Kukui Cafe at N. River & Kukui. They serve the best Hong Kong style milk tea. If you prefer cold drink, try their new Iced Ribena with lemon. I go there everytime I visit Oahu.

[Reid]

Hi Kitkat,

Thank you for visiting my blog and for leaving me with a comment.

I'll definitely pay a visit to Kukui Cafe to try the Hong Kong milk tea. Thanks for the recommendation.

BTW...where are you at?

[Kitkat]

I grew up in Hong Kong and presently reside in West Coast Canada. I visit Hawaii once or twice a year and I am planning on retiring in this beautiful island of Oahu.

[Reid]

Hi Kitkat,

Thank you for that bit of information. So what are your favorite Cantonese restaurants in Hawaii?

[Kitkat]

Hi Reid,
My favorite Chinese restauants in Hawaii? I like going to Fook Yuen Seafood Restaurant (Kapiolani & McCully) for dinner. They have lobster on special everyday and all the other dishes are very Hong Kongish. Perhaps you will find the size of the dishes a little small, but they are all tasty and full of "wok hay".
As for morning dim sum, I prefer Lucky Chinese Restaurant in Chinatown (not sure about exact address). Try their congee, they serve it not in a bowl, but in a pot. Crispy sesame cake is a must have.
Cheers, Kitkat

[Reid]

Hi Kitkat,

Thanks for the recommendations. I haven't been to Fook Yuen in a while, but I agree that the food is pretty good. The last time I was there, I had the lobster and it was quite delicious.

As far as the dim sum place, are you thinking of the old Forum Restaurant which is now Good Luck Chinese Restaurant? It's at the Chinese Cultural Plaza on the ground floor. If so, I've had the dim sum there and it was pretty good.

[John]

Sorry to bring up old news but I just ate at mini garden today (1/26/07) and I have to say the Tamarind shrimp dish is very good & spicy. The service or lack thereof needs improvement.