BANYANS Craft Kitchen and Lounge — Restaurant in Oʻahu

I have been to bayans before with friends for dinner and was not impressed. Food was weird, expensive and underwhelming. Today my clients asked me to join them to discuss some business there and from the moment we stepped into that space it was not welcoming. .Our waitress was not very helpful with helping us make menu choices so we all kinda just went with what sounded good. I had the biscuits and gravy with chicken.... it was terrible... the biscuits were so hard and burnt, the chicken was wayyy too spicy and had onions and cilantro. No where on the menu did it state spicy, cilantro or raw onions on it. The plate was half full and the gravy was cold. I love spicy but that was not edible. My client and partner were also disappointed with the food. Besides the food quality our waitress was not helpful and when I told her my biscuits was burnt she came back with a dry piece of toast lol. Im like ok... we were treated very differently than other tables. Waters were empty and she hardly came back to check on us. Also didnt offer us dessert just came back with a check and for me that was pretty rude. We asked about the cheesecake and she said they didnt have any, I told her isn't it on the menu? Then she said she wasn't sure if they had it. We are pretty easy going but that was a bad experience.. We are kanaka chefs that own a personal chef business so we understand the challenges of a kitchen, we just couldn't understand why things could not have been explained when we had questions or why the menu doesn't have a detailed description of menu items. Also my client asked if there were specials and the waitress replied not today but we usually have Quiche lol. Why say something u don't have ... I will never go back...

Took my date, who is vegetarian here...

Overall, I was disappointed in the experience. Our server greeted us by complaining that they started the day and already got thrown 3 tables at once, so I kind of figured we were not in for a great time. The server was still attentive throughout our dinning and did keep asking us if things were okay, so that was a relief.

My main disappointment came with the food being less than room temperature when it came to our table. The dishes that were meant to be cold had great flavor and tasted like they were supposed to. My tacos were flavorful and had the most tender pieces of octopus (tako) I have ever had, but because they were less than room temperature it was not as enjoyable as it would have been fresher from the kitchen. The pasta and vegetable medley were the same as the tacos, had a good flavor profile, but because they were brought cold to us, the dishes were not enjoyable. Even my water, which was filled 3 times tasted like it was straight from a tap, which I don't mind, but it was never cold water and serious was like I drank from the hose outside my house. The shining star of the night came because our server made a mistake with a dish we ordered, so the dish was remade to our request and that dish came to us warm and tasted wonderful. I guess, if our server made more mistakes, I would not have ended up so disappointed. I hope others have a better experience than I just had.

For reference, we ordered the dip trio, a beet and orange salad, the tako tacos, the vegetable medley, the potatoes with whipped goat cheese and no bacon, the meatball pasta without the meatballs and a recommended cocktail. I don't have photos...

The atmosphere is great, but the food and service leaves something to be desired.

The bread pudding French toast was highly recommended on social media, but I found it to be pretty flavorless with little textural interest. It was essentially a splash of sweet cream on bland soggy bread. It’s really disappointing that the best part was the fruit that came on the side.

We also got the kalua pork hash, which had a really great sauce, but HALF of the dish was just zucchini. The zucchini wasn’t on the menu as part of the dish and we wouldn’t have gotten it if we had actually known that. You’d think it being such a large portion, it would be listed. My husband and I ended up having to swap plates so I ate the other half of his dish (literally all zucchini, which he hates) and he had the rest of the bread pudding.

Also, I’m pretty sure based on flavor that the guava juice was the same cans you can get at literally any store here, so $5 a glass (one can) was a little much.

Overall it was just pretty mid. We made a special drive out there from town just to go to this place and we’re not likely to come back unfortunately. It just goes to show that videos on social media aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. It’s a beautiful restaurant but it’s like all their effort went into the atmosphere instead...