Grubshack

Pin It Now! San Jose is home to a large population of Hawaiians so its never a surprise when another Hawaiian spot opens up.  Hawaiian food is already an mashup of different foods and cuisines, but Grubshack takes Hawaiian food to another level of fusion.  They even offer low calories dishes like low cal loco moco (?!) served with brown rice and a turkey patty.  Weird, but true.

First thing I noticed about Grubshack is that majority of the items have kalua pork.  The kalua sliders are set on soft Hawaiian rolls and mozzarella cheese.  I actually wasn't able to identify any cheese on this.  The kalua pork was tender and flavorful  throughout all the pork dishes.

The dungeness crab fries was one of those dishes that sounds really great on the menu, but in reality you want to kick yourself for ordering.  These fries were topped with meager chunks of plain crab meat and supposedly lobster sauce, but again, I couldn't distinctly tell anything seafoody about this dish besides the very plain crab meat. 

 

A Hawaiian rice plate is a must when eating Hawaiian food.  The GS special comes with Kalua pork and garlic shrimp.  Its topped with a runny, fried egg and served with a side of rice and mac salad.  While the kalua pork was already confirmed to be a solid choice, the garlic shrimp was plain and rubbery.  Decent mac salad though.

Along with burgers, Grubshack also serves hot dogs.  The kalua dog (aka death wish) is made of a hot link (or polish dog) cut in half and grilled for a nice charred, crispy taste then dressed with the go-to kewpie mayo, glazed onions, and seaweed.

By this time, I realized that almost everything on the menu was a mix of the same ingredients.  The kalua fries were the best dish of the meal and that wasn't saying much.  The fresh cut fries were topped with kalua pork, green onions, jalapenos, and their special sauce.

I saw a pic of this dish before I came here and its the one dish I was most excited to eat.  It had me at runny egg.  The taco is layered with kalua pork, mozzarella cheese then topped with a fried egg.  The flavorless taco was a huge letdown.  It was missing something, but nothing a squirt of sriacha couldn't fix.

Address:                    Grubshack
                                   93 E. Santa Clara St.
                                   San Jose, CA  

Type:                          Hawaiian/Asian Fusion

Popular chomps:        loco moco
                                   kalua fries
                                   kalua sliders
                                   cukui tacos

Chomp worthy:          kalua fries