Aala Meat Market

Rude on phone

A «Crash» moment if there ever was one. This was not my first visit and all prior had been very positive. I am a Texas BBQ enthusiast and have had no problems purchasing boneless beef brisket here UNTIL TODAY. I was second in line and apologized that I’d not called ahead but was curious if they had any brisket. I did not come straight from the beach but the woman who helped me (I assume the proprietor) WHO I HAVE SPOKEN TO BEFORE begins to go on and on about «how expensive the brisket is per pound» and that she «does not want to have her time wasted».
I heard this from her THREE times. Her employees on the other hand were very kind, while she insisted she had nothing for me, the employees indicated they did have a cut in stock. The cut turned out to be 13 pounds, much larger than I needed.
Understanding that she did not want my business and the remaining cut was much larger than I needed, I left without a word and VERY DISAPPOINTED BY HOW I’D BEEN TREATED. It’s been a year since I last supported this business and must say that I will not support this business ever again.
Epilogue: I bought an equally beautiful (while perhaps not «organic or free range») cut of brisket at KAPAHULU SAFEWAY. With a lot of ALOHA SPIRIT.

I come here for the Ahi belly every so often. Its alway cut fresh daily so there’s no problem with freshness.
Although I haven’t tried the waygu beef, I always see it in the window. Sometimes it looks fresh but sometimes its a different shade of color like a dull red. I haven’t seen any grey ones like other reviews have mentioned. If it was that color I wouldn’t buy it in the first place. At $ 19.50 lb it’s kinda expensive for a small 3 or 4 lb piece. I’d rather go Costco and buy some boneless shortribs. Besides, its not real wagyu. The real stuff comes from Japan and raised under much stricter conditions at a much more premium price. This is more «just like wagyu» stuff imo.
Customer service wise, the young Japanese butcher is really nice. That’s the guy I deal with whenever I go there. If he’s not there then it’s one of the ladies behind the window on your left. They are friendly but it’s safe to say they seem like they could be easily pissed off so I tread lightly. Kinda like a soup nazi tread so to speak.
Saying that, I would continue to come back to this place. I haven’t pissed anyone off yet so I should be in good standing.

Went here yesterday and had one of the worst experiences ever. First, I want to say that I read the great reviews and have wanted to check out Aala Meat Market for some time. I was passing by yesterday and thought I would stop in to pick up some ground pork and maybe a steak. I entered the store and was underwhelmed by the initial appearance. There was an office to the left of the entrance and a freezer in the front. All of the steaks were grayish brown in color and did not look fresh at all. I have seen grass fed beef at other locations, including Whole Foods, and they never appeared this color. I suspect that the beef is not that fresh and may be rotting. Maybe if it was aged, I would understand, but nowhere did I see «aged grass-​fed beef» on their signs. Moving on, I was greeted by a lady and I told her it was my first time in the store. I looked for ground pork on the menu, but didn’t see it, so I asked her if they had it in stock. She said they did, and that it cost $ 3 a pound. I told her that I would take a pound. I was going to order a steak, but the brown/​rotting color led me to reconsider. Instead I decided to order a pound of ground beef that looked fresh. The price for the beef was $ 5.50/LB. The lady yelled to a guy in the back to get the pork and then I hear her debating with him over the fact that they only have a bulk package and she didn’t want to break it up. The guy told her it was ok, and he proceeded to break off a chunk of the pork. Then I hear her tell him, «You can’t give it to him like that.» I’m not sure what she was talking about. As the two are conversing over my pork, I notice she is holding my beef in front of her face while it is in a plastic bag. Then I watch as she coughs right onto my bag… without even trying to cover her mouth… GROSS. I was ready to say something, but I figured that my meat was in plastic and I might be ok. Finally, the guy gives her the pork and she starts to ring me up. She then tells me that I owe her $ 13 something and change. Now I am not great at math, but $ 5.50 for the beef and $ 3 for the pork doesn’t add up to $ 13 and change. Even with tax, I shouldn’t be paying more that $ 10. I told her that I just wanted a pound of pork, and she told me that the guy had to break up a bulk package and that is the amount that I would have to pay for. It was at this point that I became outraged and decided to point out that I should not have to pay that much and pointed out the price that she gave me. The lady did not understand that I only wanted a pound, not two, three, or four. I honestly felt that she was trying to rip me off. I told her never mind and walked out. As I was leaving, I heard her yell, «GET OUT OF HERE!» Wow… really. Talk about bad customer service! This place is disgusting, and I probably lucked out by not trying their products. If they can’t present steaks properly (as in fresh versus rotten), I’m sure that there were probably issues with their other meats. I probably would have ended up with a case of salmonella poisoning or some hideous disease from the nasty old lady coughing all over my ground beef. Stay away from Aala Meat Market and go somewhere where the meat looks fresh, they accurately weigh your order request, and your business is appreciated. BTW, I went to Whole Foods today and had amazing service at the meat section. The meat looked great, the variety was amazing (ie. I got fresh blueberry maple sausage links for $ 3.50 ½ LB… Yumm), and the customer service was superb. It was like night and day in comparison to my horrible experience at Aala.

I buy beef knuckles and shanks here to make stock. They are very friendly and cut the bones up for me so I no longer have to take a hammer to them at home. Price is $ 2 a pound, which seems typical for Hawaii. CASH ONLY and parking le sucks in that area. They are my go to source for beef bones and I will continue to purchase from them.

I heard about this shop from a friend who said they had the best prime rib. Well I took his advise and bought my first USDA Choice and was not disappointed. My brother and his girlfriend said they thought it was even better than house of prime rib!
I let it come to room temperature about 2hrs. I then started with 425 deg F for 15 min then cooked it to a internal temp of 120deg F. Then covered with foil and let it sit for 15min. It was perfection didn’t even need aujus. It was explained to me that this was natural beef free range no hormones, I would do it again and would buy it from Aala meat market.

Disappointing. The quality of the meat is fine, although it was fairly grey when pulled from the package. There is no information on the pre-​packaged meats to give you an idea of when the meat was butchered. If that were the only complaint, I would have been happy with it.
The disappointing part is HOW the meat is butchered: very sloppily. One t-​bone purchased was about 1 ¼ inches thick on one end but only ½ an inch on the other, making it impossible to cook evenly. The bone itself, however, was a solid 2 + inches thick, making it heavier than the meat itself. Very odd.
The stew meat was a disgrace — teeny tiny pieces mixed in with huge sinewy chunks. Flat pieces hacked off of other bits and tossed in, no uniformity whatsoever. Yes, it is stew meat, but at least some level of consistency in terms of the size of the chunks is required for even cooking.
We had higher hopes. Too bad.