Giovanni’s Shrimp Truck, Kahuku, Oahu

As promised, here is my impression of Giovanni’sShrimp Truck, just down the road from Romy’s.  Last week, I gave Romy’s stellar marks for its prawns and li hing mui pineapple.  This week, I’m going to give Giovanni’s stellar marks for its lemon butter shrimp (left in the second picture below) and garlic shrimp scampi (right in the second picture below).   Both were, drum roll…  Great.  I’ll talk more about the shrimp in a bit, but first a few words on the menu at Giovanni’s.  From my memory, there was not too many choices on Giovanni’s menu.   I actually think that it is pretty cool and it worked quite well.  Namely, Giovanni’s sticks to what it is good at and focuses on that exclusively.  No diversification here, no weak attempts at BBQ chicken wings or Kung Pao chicken to appease to the masses or get that few extra customers.  Just make the best shrimp and have people come to you for that.  As stated in a few lines above, pretty darned cool and pretty effective in this case.

Each plate was 13 dollars and contained a dozen shrimp.   The shrimp were perfectly cooked, not chewy as overcooked shrimp can get.  The shrimp scampi (right) was full of flavor, pleasant, carmelized garlic is great.  The lemon butter shrimp (left) were the favorite with my group, good for kids and a fresh flavor.  Not exactly sure what I mean by fresh flavor, but try them and you’ll agree.  Both were a mess in terms of deshelling the shrimp.  Luckily, Giovanni’s had very good facilities to wash hands.  From my memory, I believe Giovanni’s actually had non-portable restrooms too.  

Many of the shrimp truck reviews warn of long waits for orders, but since we went around 4ish to both of them (on a Friday), we were not hit by the long wait times, roughly only 15 minutes each.  I can imagine that on the weekends and for lunch and dinner, you might have to wait a long time though.  But for the shrimp and prawns that Giovanni’s and Romy’s have to offer, the wait is well worth it.

My review, five out of five shrimp for Giovanni’s lemon butter shrimp and shrimp scampi.

Romy's Prawns and Shrimp, Kahuku, Oahu

I'll add my second post about Hawaii, the first added two days ago in my discussion about Honolulu Coffee Company at Ala Moana Mall.  Romy's is the second of two shrimp trucks/shacks that we went to a few months ago, and from what I ordered, it was my favorite of the two.  Had I ordered identical items from both of them I could do a better comparison.  I'll write about Giovanni's, the other shrimp truck, next week.  In this regard, what I ordered at Giovanni's tasted great too.

We went to the shrimp shacks/trucks in succession as they were on the same street and we were pretty hungry.  One thing about the shrimp trucks, they are great, but are not the cheapest.  You'll be paying at least 12 bucks for a plate of 12-15 shrimp (more money if you get prawns, and less prawns than shrimp).  But in my opinion it is well worth it; they are absolutely delicious.  Here are some pics and comments. 

Well, we got there around 4:30ish and here is a picture of the establishment.  Seating is all outdoors, so I expect it could get pretty hot in the summer.  There are bathrooms in the back and a facility to wash your hands.

I ordered prawns and li hing mui flavored pineapple (Chinese dried plum flavor, unique to Hawaii (in America at least)).   The woman at the counter looked behind her and asked if they still had prawns left and I quickly became horrified that there would be none left for us.  I was relieved when the cook told her that there were some left for us.  A pound of prawns was 18 dollars and the pineapple was 4 dollars.   After waiting for about 15 minutes (there were not many people around because it was not 5 or 6 yet), my number was called and I brought the food to our table. Here it is:

The pineapple was delicious, very fresh and full of the li hing mui flavor.

The prawns were, well, to die for.  They were the little red superstars of my Hawaii trip.  The prawns were roughly the size of hand (fingers and palm; I'd say I have average-sized hands).  They were crunchy and juicy all at the same time, perfectly cooked.  In fact, they were like little lobsters.  I savored the tails, but what I really liked was sucking the head and all the stuff in there.  I was sad when I downed the sixth one.  Right now, I'm getting hungry just thinking about them.  We will definitely head back to Romy's for the prawns next time.

Romy's has an option where you can fish for your own shrimp and then have them cooked.  If we have more time next time, I think that would be pretty fun.

In closing, I give Romy's five out of five prawns for the prawns and pineapple.