Pancakes & Waffles

The day I went to Kamehameha Bakery is the same day I stepped foot into Pancakes & Waffles for the first time. Why did I have to see the word «pancake»? I ended up craving for pancakes early Saturday morning.
After my purchase of pastries at the nearby bakery shop I walked back towards Pancakes & Waffles. I noticed that this food establishment passed the Department of Health inspection and that there was a «Now Hiring» notice on the window.
As I was waiting patiently outside of the restaurant with other customers I noticed one of the male employees making a hand gesture of «Come Inside». Even though Pancakes & Waffles opens at 6:30am…the customers in waiting were very appreciative of the employee in letting us walk in early.
Upon entering the breakfast restaurant I noticed four seater tables and chairs set up on the left hand side of the door. There were more four seater tables and chairs against the window along the right hand side of the door. I also seen several two seater tables set up towards the far right along the wall.
Looking over the menu above the counter I had opted to order a full stack of banana pancakes with a side of bacon. I also grabbed a bottle of apple juice to drink. I paid for my order and was given a plastic sign with the #23 on it. I took the number and placed it on the table where I would wait for my meal.
Waiting patiently for my food I noticed a female employee delivering the foods to paid customers. At one point she walked passed me with a tray of pancakes and delivered it to a couple who then said «we didn’t order this».
I looked at the employee and said «Is that the banana pancakes?»
«Yes…I thought this order was for two people,» says the employee.
I said «It’s for me and I’m hungry.»
Now that I got my banana pancakes in front of me I can start coating it with butter and syrup. Nice and fluffy pancakes with lots of syrup. Bacon was crispy and I could taste the salt on the bacon… I should have asked for Canadian bacon instead. To my amaze I managed to eat majority of the delicious banana pancakes. All I needed was three more bites then I would have eaten the entire full stack of pancakes.
Mahalo to the male employee for letting the hungry individuals in early and warning the kitchen workers that you’ll be taking orders right away. As for the female employee… make sure to deliver the correct meals to the right person.
Overall I would come back on a early morning if I ever do get off at 4am from working another overnight shift.
³⁰⁄₂₀₀

Always have good food and great crab cake Benedict. The waffles are ok however I have yet to order chicken and waffles.
Sometimes it fills up quickly so try to get here around the normal breakfast brunch rush or when church let’s out.

Awesome service! Staff very efficient!
Pancakes were ono! Big portions. Price is right!
Good menu selections

Another good place for breakfast in the Kalihi area. The parking lot in the City Square Shopping Center is usually packed at lunch, but empty during breakfast.
You order at the counter, and the food is served at your table. Nice, extensive menu with lunch and breakfast items. Had the Honey Butter Chicken & Waffles. The chicken was a little oily, but had a nice crunch. The plastic utensils were useless, but I do like my chicken crunchy. I thought the waffle was really good. A pretty rich dish…

Pancakes and Waffles, located near the Dillingham DMV. Pretty good location. In town and looks locally run.
As the name says, they’re known for their pancakes and waffles (say what?!). But they have other breakfast items that are pretty darn good. Like loco mocos, omelets, crepes, French toasts, etc.
You can order pancakes as a side order to your entrée but other starch items as well.
The pancakes are really nice and fluffy. The waffles are really good, like nice crisp and good fluff inside. But there are varieties to the pancakes and waffles. You could add bacon, blueberries, strawberries and whipped cream, macadamia nuts, cheese (yeah!). There’s churro waffles too.
The price for the items are really affordable so great place for anybody!

if you are placing an order for any of their catering pans no matter what size, they now strictly enforce the 24 hour notification rule.

I liked this little breakfast spot. They had a breakfast plate with two eggs prepared your way, rice, toast or home fries plus bacon or Portuguese sausage for 5.99. The coffee was good plus they refill it. The waitress was courteous and brought my plate to the table. What’s not to like? The place is clean, quiet and there’s adequate parking. It’s located down towards the end by the Koolau farmers store. Check it out if you’re down in Kalihi by Honolulu community college. Yummy!

After my horrible experience at Office Depot, I have to go relax myself And be treated to a high cholesterol breakfast. OMG SOOO GOOD
This is like my newest favorite place to grab a bite to eat.

My boyfriend and I went here for breakfast this past Sunday. I went there because I was dying for a waffle which I did not get, so I will be updating this once I return.
MY boyfriend ordered their country breakfast with sausage, biscuits and gravy, and eggs, along with a short stack of pancakes. I ordered their sweet bread french toast with an egg over easy.
The french toast was good, but not the best sweet bread french toast I’ve had on the island. My egg though was cooked perfect though which is a rare find.
I didn’t try much of my borfriend’s order, but the suasage was pretty delicious. The gravy was slightly bland, but not bad, just needed a little salt and pepper. The buscuits were deccent.

This place is real casual, it was as small as a Mcdonalds. I ordered Chicken & Waffles w/​Gravey, and a side of one Fried Twinkie. The Chicken & Waffles was good at first, but after a couple of bites it tasted unhealthy and tiring. If you know what I mean… Twinkie was good, but that started to get tirin as well. If you want to pig out then this is a nice breakfast place to go to. I actually like IHOP better, I’ll go here again, but next I probably will split my Chicken & Waffle with someone – so it won’t be overwhelming.

Having frequented the restaurant over the past few years, it seems like the food here just isn’t as good as it used to be. The fried chicken is still, ironically, the star of Pancakes & Waffles coming served piping hot with a little container of honey butter sauce. I usually just order the fried rice loco moco or waffle eggs benedict. The loco moco is pretty good, nothing outstanding. I recall the eggs benedict being better before. For some reason, it was bland today. I have had one dish that totally failed here though – the chicken fried steak. It seems that they coat their meat in chili powder or something then batter it before frying it. This creates an off putting layer of red slime between the meat and batter which just doesn’t match the flavor profile of the rest of the dish.

Sometimes I get a craving for fried rice for breakfast. Or lunch. Or dinner. Or snack. Whatever. I love fried rice. (Kapiolani Coffee Shop is one of my favs, as a reference for my flavor preference.)
My boyfriend loves chicken and waffles. We’d tried to check out their Aiea location awhile back, but it was too crowded.
One recent Sunday we decided to grab brunch from this place and take it back home to eat. I called in our order (fried rice for me and chicken & waffles for him, of course) on the drive down and it was ready when I arrived a few minutes later. I parked on the street along the back side of the restaurant to avoid that parking lot, which can get insane on the weekends (also you don’t have to pay the meter on Sundays). Popped in, paid for the food (the staff was «okay», not really friendly or rude), then headed home.
To start off with the good, the chicken was delicious. Tasty and juicy. I didn’t care for the waffle, but I’m never that big on waffles anyway. I thought it was a little too big and dry and wouldn’t have eaten it if it was mine. BF thought it was okay though. The portion size was really big (he couldn’t finish it) and the price was reasonable.
Unfortunately, my fried rice was NOT good. It was extremely bland. And they added SO many green onions, which are fine if they’re cooked down a bit, but these were pretty much raw and tossed all through the rice, so that’s the only flavor I could taste. It took forever to pick majority out. Then, even after dumping on a bunch of shoyu, it was still really mediocre. I didn’t even bother saving the leftovers, which never happens (I’ll always eat the second half of my meal later).
If someone else wanted to come here, I’d give it another try and order something different, but I probably wouldn’t initiate it.

I stopped here because I was rapidly running out of breakfast options on the way to the office.
Whenever I stop here, I usually order the same thing; Waffle Benedict. This time, I opted for the Loaded Potato Omelette with Pancakes.
I got to my office and as I prepared to serve out two portions, I opened up the omelette and found the Egg was like a pancake. Big a&& potatoes and chopped bacon were thrown on top of it and a huge glob of sour cream dumped right in the center on top of that then the egg was folded in half and slid into a takeout container. So not what I expected. Would have been better all separate in the container. The omelette was tastless as were the pancakes. They are rather large, but tasteless and rubbery. Blech. In this case, size does not make a difference.
I will probably continue to order my usual as I have not been disappointed yet.

First time customer. Waffles Eggs Benedict… eh. It sounded yummy and unique, but the flavors threw me off. So, I ended up eating only half of my plate and then ordered another serving of Mini Waffles (4) for redemption. Spent more on my meal altogether, but happy to report that the waffles are made just the way I like them: Light & fluffy! I’d say ordering waffles is a must. Wish there was a nice selection of juices available, but it’s just your standard soda fountain and coffee. There’s a side fridge with teas, milks, Starbucks in a can as well.
My son LOVED the chicken and waffles!

I had heard of Pancakes and Waffles (P&W) from a friend – who raved about the French toast – but I had never been to the Dillingham eatery. I finally had the weekend to check it out with my best friend during a brief trip to Hawaii for an early Saturday lunch.
From the outside, P&W doesn’t look like much, and the inside isn’t the most fabulous, in terms of décor or cleanliness. It’s okay, but it doesn’t look like anything special. But I will note that various awards and articles about that famous fried chicken cover the windows so you can’t help but notice when you’re entering/​exiting the eatery. Upon arrival, I was glad to see that the eatery wasn’t busy at all and there were numerous open tables.
I had looked at photos on Unilocal beforehand and the chicken and waffles did look appealing … but I also wanted to try the «Monte Cristo,» since that’s probably one of my favorite breakfast sandwiches and you often don’t find it at many restaurants. However, when I asked the girl at the counter which one she would choose, she told me that many customers don’t order the «Monte Cristo” – leading me to believe that it’s just average – but she would highly recommend the «Honey Butter» option for the chicken and waffles, since that’s what the eatery’s famous for. I do like a good mix of sweet and savory, so I decided to go with the two-​piece meal. My friend chose one of the eggs benedicts. We ordered separately but said we were on the same table, so the girl at the register gave us the same number so they could bring our food out to us for the kitchen.
We had just barely sat down and gotten two cups for water when my chicken and waffles entrée came out already and the lady whisked away our table number. That created some confusion because it took my friend’s entrée a longer time to come out – and then once it did, the lady was confused because our table didn’t have a number – but thankfully, since there weren’t many customers in the store, we got that all sorted out (and my friend was the only benedicts order there was at the time). I questioned at first whether my chicken and waffles entrée was fresh, because it came out MIGHTY quick (I even wondered if it was mine, because I had ordered two pieces but my entrée came with three hefty pieces of chicken) … but hey, I’m not complaining. And once I bit into that delectable chicken-​and-​waffle combo, all of my doubts and fears were immediately relieved.
Verdict: the hype is real and the «Honey Butter» chicken and waffles entrée is legit. This was actually the first chicken and waffles entrée I ever had, but it set the standard pretty high. I would definitely return to P&W just to get this amazing entrée again.
Here’s my take on what we got:
«Honey Butter Chicken & Waffles»: This is just one of the featured flavors for this entrée (you could also choose Brown Gravy/​Country Gravy) but since this hybrid featured a sweet-​and-​savory medley, I decided to go for it. It entailed crispy fried chicken thighs on a waffle, and you could choose between two or three pieces. I would have been fine with the two-​piece entrée; get the three-​piece entrée if you intend to share. I guess I didn’t have high expectations when I ordered this entrée, but everything changed once I took my first bite. That chicken is AMAZING. Both, chicken and waffle are coated with a drizzle of honey; the waffle isn’t drenched, but it’s soaked thoroughly enough so that you can taste that honey butter flavor. The chicken interior is piping hot and tastes fresh and moist, but the fried, crunchy exterior is seriously the best part. You get the satisfying crunch with every bite, the savory chicken taste and the sweetness from the honey glaze. I didn’t think I would be able to finish the entrée, but it was just so addicting and tasted so good – both chicken and waffle were piping hot (I could still see the steam coming out as I cut through the chicken) – that I didn’t want to take any home to save for later. I would definitely resort to this option whenever I have a hankering for chicken and waffles. Though, I have to admit, I am really curious to try the «Country Gravy» option one day … I have had chicken and gravy biscuit sandwiches on the mainland that I enjoyed, so I’m sure this entrée would be similar.
«Bene Florentine»: My friend really liked the eggs benedict that she got. It definitely looked healthier than my waffle option. This entrée included Canadian bacon, turkey, spinach and tomatoes and it came with home fries. My friend enjoyed the taste of the benedict and said it included a great medley of savory flavors. I had a bite of her home fries – which were basically seasoned potatoes – and the seasoning was on point. If you’re in the mood for bennies, this one surely won’t disappoint.

I’ve been to this place ten times, and all ten times I’ve gotten the honey butter chicken and waffles. I keep telling myself that I’m going to try something else but I can’t get away from it. It’s like when I walk into that place, it calls my name or maybe I’m just addicted.
Truth be told, I haven’t been here in a year. The food is still good and the portions are still big. The chicken and waffles plate was my breakfast and lunch. It was so huge that I had to split it into two portions. The chicken and waffles were sweet and salty. Yummers! I buttered the waffles and added extra syrup. I ate the chicken with ketchup.
The hubby got the cheese omelette and it came with a stack of buttermilk pancakes. For $ 2 more, he got me the mac nut haupia syrup. The haupia syrup was good but was way too sweet. The omelette was undercooked. The eggs on the inside were runny. My husband did not like that. I didn’t have a problem with it. I like my eggs runny, so I ate all the runny parts.

I love breakfast food! And this is one of the places with variety of good choice to choose from.
This is only my 2^nd time coming here, I’ve never dined it before because it always seemed busy to wait around whenever I’d pass by the area.
I would recommend calling and making a take out order for faster service. Turn around for pick ups were quick and ready to pay when I got there. There’s lots of parking available in the city square shopping center.
I placed a take out order for the florentine eggs benedict with fried rice. It came out to about $ 10, definitely worth it for its price for finding cheap decent breakfast food items. It was my first time having it and it was so filling and good that I wasn’t able to finish one setting.
Definitely going back to try something different.

1. VERDICT/​VALUE
Giving other plate lunch places a run for their money; come here in the very least for their honey butter chicken! It all may not be healthy but man, you’re here for the big portions, good prices.
2. FOOD
The Mushroom Cheeseburger Omelette ($ 9.49) was monstrous: a fluffy omelette with ground beef, mushrooms, and cheddar cheese accompanied by a short stack of three big, fluffy pancakes! I should have starved myself for a week before coming here!
This joint prides itself on it fried chicken and it didn’t disappoint — the Honey Butter Chicken & Waffle ($ 11.49) comes with three big pieces of chicken thighs with back attached, done up in signature honey butter-​fried style. Purists and others would say the meat doesn’t taste as marinated as that found at Popeye’s or Costco, but the battered skin sure is good. And with the sauce and oil dripping on the waffle below (butter and syrup included)…you’re in for a treat and a cardiologist visit.
3. SERVICE
The place is essentially a fast food joint with tables, so for what it is, the service is good and reasonably quick.
4. ATMOSPHERE
As a fast food place, it won’t be winning décor and design awards, but it’s open and clean. Be sure to arrive early as the traffic is constantly busy and so it could be hard to get a table if you’re eating in. Groups of 6 or less could probably work well here. Lots of parking is located in the complex, and hey, it’s turn down a place that has Kamehameha Bakery a few doors down for dessert after such a large meal!

Great breakfast! We enjoy our waffles… despite being known for their chicken and waffles, I still had to get the bacon waffle– a waffle with 4 strip of bacon made into it!!! My husband enjoyed the chocolate chip waffle as well!
Seemed like a place that locals love and so will you!
Plenty of parking and fast service with a smile.

This morning, we thought we would change up our normal weekend breakfast routine with a visit to Pancakes & Waffles instead of the Original Pancake House (up the road) based on the number of Unilocal reviews it’s received.
As we walked in, it instantly reminded me of a chain of diners in the Deep South called Waffle House. Seriously, it had the same color scheme and everything. All comparisons stopped there however as Pancakes and Waffles was NO WHERE near as greasy as Waffle House. Their food was also yummy and reasonably priced (by Hawaii standards).
I ordered the flagship dish — honey butter fried chicken and waffles. I really didn’t know what to expect, but DAMN, when it came I was stunned by the size of chicken (HUGE) and the lightness of the waffle. The flavors were also spot on !!! At first, $ 11 might seem like a lot, but if you consider the serving is enough for two people to share (or enough to have leftovers for another meal), the price was just right.
The restaurant was comfortable and casual. It had more of a fast food diner feel rather than a sit down restaurant (you order at the counter and they bring your order to you). But service was fast and friendly.
We will definitely be back (to try the loco moco). And now we know to share.
Tip: come EARLY if you can, it get crowded quickly.