Kona Grill Restaurant Review

Kona Grill is located at the Dolphin Mall in Doral. When you think of a mall you don’t necessarily think of a nice restaurant, however this is the exception to the rule. Kona Grill has dim lighting, a nice open kitchen and a huge aquarium as soon as you walk in. Naturally, we started with cocktails. A strawberry basil lemonade – Bacardi dragon berry rum, lemonade, basil, strawberry and sprite for me and Sparkling sake sangria – gruet brut gekkeikan sake, fresh squeezed fruit for my man. My lemonade was sweet and fresh and I was told that the sake sangria was just as good!

One of the first things we tasted off of the Kona Grill seasonal menu was the Tuna Mango Roll – tuna, togarashi, mango, macadamia nuts, avocado, rose nectar cream cheese, habanero sauce, cilantro. This is absolutely not for the faint of heart! Thankfully, I love spicy. The mango and cream cheese balance (or try really hard to balance) the spicy habanero sauce. I also loved the macadamia nuts in this, I’ve never had them in a sushi roll before.

Next up, possibly one of the simplest yet best things we had. The Salmon Wasabi Sashimi – fresh wasabi root, pickled onions, cucumber salad and yuzu ponzu. This is such a simple dish but has such complex flavors between the vinegar-ey onions, spicy fresh wasabi and buttery salmon.

Another unexpectedly delicious dish we had was the grilled chicken & Pear Salad – romaine, dried cranberries, spicy walnuts, Danish bleu, thyme, walnut vinaigrette.

I love salads with tons of “stuff” in them. This definitely fulfilled my wishes. They did not skimp on any of the ingredients including the walnuts and I couldn’t get enough of it. The first main we tried was the Pork Tenderloin – almond-crusted, house mashed potatoes, baby bok choy, shiitake mushroom sauce. Kona Grill did a fantastic job plating this dish, it was beautiful. The pork tenderloin’s crispy exterior paired with the savory mushroom sauce was a great combination.

Now, I don’t normally like to play favorites but the Miso-Sake Sea Bass – shrimip & pork fried rice, pan-asian ratatouille was to die for. I’m not a huge fish person and this seabass blew my mind. It was so buttery and had such good flavor from the miso-sake glaze. As if that wasn’t enough, the shrimp & pork fried rice is packed with flavor and crispy bits of rice.

After consuming all of this delicious food, we barely had room for dessert. However, there is no way that I would EVER skip dessert so I proceeded in ordering the salted caramel crème brulee – salted caramel custard, fresh whipped cream, homemade caramel popcorn. I liked the addition of the popcorn on top of this, it added another complexity that you don’t normally get with a crème brulee.

Kona Grill is located at the Dolphin Mall 11401 nw. 12th st, #r104 11401 nw. 12th st, #r104 Miami,FL 33137 For reservations or more information, call: (305)-515-2633 or, visit: http://www.konagrill.com/reservations