Udon Yama

Nice underground food court with good selections of food. This one has very reasonable price. The fresh made udon is lit! Highly recommend to have cold udon soup in hot summer.

This is a solid choice if you are seeking/craving marugame but dont want to stand in line for a long time. Inside Stix Asia (food court) in the Waikiki Business Plaza, Udon Yama was established (after marugame) has a similar concept (like in the school cafeteria) of grabbing your food first, at the end of the line paying for the order, and then finding a table to eat your food. Although the atmosphere may blend alittle into the rest of the food court, depending on where you sit, can be more secluded from the gazing eyes of people passing by. The music appears to be from the food court speaker, not so loud that you cannot here your neighboring table talk. Its very clean and the bench sitting is pretty comfortable. The service was brief, but friendly and patient. They constantly refill the free water, tempura sauces and any condiments or utensils that run low. They even have a sign pointing to the bathroom code paper that you can take if you need access into the bathrooms. My go-to for the past couple of years is the niku or niku tama udon, regular, and either cold or hot, depending on the day. For my sides, I usually get the mix vegetable tempura, and soft boiled egg one. This time I got the sweet chicken one with the mixed vegetables. They were cooked well, tender, crispy, and well seasoned. But I think over the years, the vegetable tempura got smaller. The udon was between a soft and firm noodle, I prefer firmer. (My preference) The soup base this time was cold, I enjoyed it on this very hot day. Deep umani flavor, darker base was very enjoyable. Regardless I'd go back, not often because its waikiki, but every now and again ill hit them up.

Quick, inexpensive and super tasty. Udon noodles had the perfect amount of chew. The broth is seasoned aggressively so it may not be everyone's favorite but it was right up my alley. The tempura add ons were hit or miss, but udon more than makes up for it. We tried other noodle dishes at this food court and this was unanimously our favorite for our group.