Romy’s Kahuku Prawns & Shrimp, Inc.

Lining Kamehameha Highway on O’ahu’s North Shore are a number of shrimp trucks. The only one that I continually return to, however, is Romy’s Kahuku Prawns & Shrimp, Inc. Unlike all of the other shrimp trucks, Romy’s can boast that its prawns and shrimp are freshly caught.. just twenty feet from their shop, actually!

Reid of ‘Ono Kine Grindz reviewed Romy’s last year, but out of love for Romy’s, I must contest his post. :)

He noted Romy’s shrimp and prawns for their freshness, but found that the sauces they were cooked in were lacking. I’d like to point out that a preference between Giovanni’s or Romy’s will depend on what you’re looking for.

Take a bite of Giovanni’s garlic butter shrimp and what do you taste? That delicious, sinful garlic butter sauce that make their shrimp truck so popular.

The point of Romy’s is the freshness of their shrimp and prawns. The flavors are scaled back so that the sweetness of the shrimp is complimented by the garlic butter sauce. While Romy’s garlic butter sauce lacks the punch of Giovanni’s, it showcases the taste of fresh shrimp.

Oh. But I totally agree with Reid on the sweet-sour shrimp. Skip it.

My recommendation is to go for the prawns, simply steamed and served with two sauces on the side. The prawns are sweet, succulent.

And with their long claws and large, beady eyes, they are pretty fun to chase people around with.

There’s a fruit stand somewhere along the highway, with a sign that advertises “Kahuku Super Sweet Corn.” (Yeah, there must be a bunch of stands with that sign.) The fruit stand is run by an old Filipino couple, and along with fresh and cooked Kahuku corn, they sell mangoes, guavas, and many other fruit.

I stopped there about a month ago to pick up some corn and when I told the Filipino woman that my family and I were hanging around the North Shore because we came to eat shrimp, she asked where we’d eaten.

“At Romy’s, of course!” was my mother’s response. “They are the only ones with fresh shrimp and prawns.”

The Filipino woman nodded in agreement, and explained that she grew up eating fresh seafood in a fishing village in the Philippines. “At Giovanni’s, they just put a lot of flavorings. The shrimp doesn’t even have any taste because it’s frozen. But at Romy’s you can really taste that it’s fresh.”

Voila, if you were looking for an expert’s opinion.

But my recommendation is this: If you are looking for absolutely delicious garlic butter shrimp, whose sauce you’ll want to pour down your throat, with your head tilted back and eyes closed.. there’s Giovanni’s, or any of the other shrimp trucks.

But for the sweetness, succulence, and delicacy of fresh shrimp and prawns, Romy’s is the only place to go.

Romy’s Kahuku Prawns & Shrimp, Inc.
56-781 Kamehameha Highway
(808) 232-2202