Kona Grill Dishes Up Happy Hour Specials

Kona Grill has been one of my favorite Happy Hour spots for many years. Located in Summerlin at the Boca Park center (Rampart and Charleston), they dish up awesome Happy Hour specials every day of the week and on most days, it's both afternoon and night. While the offerings have slightly changed throughout the years, it has stayed more or less the same in selection while the theme of "Half-Off Pricing" has consistently made it a winner for me.

The Kona Grill Happy Hour schedule is as follows:
Monday-Friday: 3-7 PM
Monday-Thursday: 9-11 PM
Friday-Saturday: 10-12 AM
Saturday: 1-5 PM
Sunday: ALL DAY!

Double check that their winter hours haven't taken effect yet - that would only affect the late night Happy Hour ending times. 

Happy Hour offers half price food and $6 "essentials". Each table in the bar or outdoor patio will have a mini-stand that has the menu inserted on one of the sides.

Menu:

Sushi
Philly Roll, Atlantic Roll, Fiery Shrimp Roll, Spicy Tuna Roll, California Roll, Vegetarian Roll, Crab Special Roll, Crab Crunch Roll.

The sushi is good here. I primarily eat tuna and salmon based rolls so I have tried the Philly Roll (spicy tuna with cream cheese, the Atlantic Roll (cooked salmon with eel sauce on top), and the Spicy Tuna Roll (like the traditional...spicy tuna inside). They are all good and I see plenty of tables and parties ordering plates upon plates full of sushi.

Appetizer Items

Potstickers: These aren't your traditional potstickers with the traditional lump of meat filling. In fact, when you bite into it, the meat is more of a loose minced style and will come spilling out. So if you dare to dip the potsticker into the very tasty sauce they give you and to re-dip, beware, most of your filling may end up in the sauce. To prevent this kind of incident, I like to pour the sauce on my potsticker instead of attempting the task of dipping.

Sweet & Spicy Shrimp: I haven't tried this one yet although I spotted another table with it and I am definitely going to try it next time!

Chicken Satay: This is a really nice simple dish with grilled chicken breast on skewers. The peanut dipping sauce or the hoisin sauce they give you makes the dish yummy. Hoisin is a Chinese sauce that is often served with Chicken Lettuce Wraps in other restaurants so give it a try. It's tasty. The chicken is laid on coleslaw although I opt to ask for their "island rice" instead which is a fried rice with some shrimp.

Avocado Egg Rolls: Hands down this is one of my absolute favorite items on their Happy Hour menu. It's an avocado mixture in an egg roll wrapper deep fried and served with this out-of-this-world sauce. I can't even describe it but it's so darn good!!!!! If you like avocado, I 1000% (yes, one thousand) recommend this!

Flatbreads: They serve three different kinds - Margherita, BBQ Chicken and Pepperoni. Like it sounds, it's a  oblong flat dough that is served on a wood board. They used to serve traditional round pizzas and I must say that their transition to the flatbread is a definite plus! My favorite is the BBQ Chicken because of the integration of red onions, BBQ sauce, diced chicken and fresh herbs. It's just a nice gourmet tasting flatbread.

$6 Essentials

While the other items above are half-off their regular price, the following items are straight up six dollars.

Specialty Sushi: Bama Roll, Voodoo Roll, Wave Roll (I haven't tried any of these so I can't describe them.)

Kona Calamari: It's a nice lightly breaded calamari with a mayo-like dipping sauce. I prefer asking for some red marinara sauce with it and extra lemons as well. This is a good dish to share so you can eat other items without getting too full on just calamari.

Twin Mini Cheeseburgers: These are surprisingly good - why I say surprisingly isn't because I don't expect Kona to have great food, but I normally think that a mini cheeseburger is going to taste like the typical one but these are very delicious and would make you want to order them again.

Chicken and Shrimp Lettuce Wraps: This dish has a tangy sweet type of sauce on it. With all versions of lettuce wraps, they have their own flavor. This one is quite good and the last time I ordered it, it came out piping hot temperature wise and they gave me tons of lettuce for wrapping so I was a happy camper.

Tacos: These are fish tacos in a tortilla wrap over coleslaw if I remember correctly.

Drinks

Happy Hour wouldn't be complete without drink specials - so here they are:

Margarita - $3-4.50
Cosmo - $5
Sake Bomber - $7.50
Gekkeikan Draft Sake Bottle - $6
Bud Light Draft - $3.50
Sam Adams Selection - $4
Featured Wines - $5

PLUS! Wednesdays is Wine Down Wednesdays featuring half price bottles of wine all day on all bottles!

Happy Hour at Kabuki

I would eat Japanese food more often if it were friendly on the wallet, but sometimes it isn't. Luckily, at one of my favorite Japanese digs in Las Vegas, Kabuki (at Town Square or Tivoli Village), offers certain hours where eating off their menu becomes more affordable. Sure, you're not going to get every item at a discount, but for those meals that you want Japanese flavors without dinging the budget too much, Kabuki's got Happy Hour for you - not just one, but two!

Happy Hour #1 at Kabuki is Monday thru Friday from 3pm to 6pm. In a general consensus, you get anywhere from $1-$3 off of normal menu pricing. 

Appetizers range from $4.95-$5.95 and include Fried Tofu, Gyoza, Chicken Tokyo Quesadilla, Mixed Tempura, Sesame Chicken and Calamari Rings.

Salads are $4.95-$5.95 and include Seaweed Salad, Tofu Salad, Spicy Tuna Salad and Krab Salad.

Sushi and Rolls are $2.95-$3.50 and include Salmon/Sake, Albacore/Bincho Mauro, Shrimp/Ebi, Spicy Tuna Roll, Salmon Skin Roll, California Roll and Philadephia Roll.

Specialty Rolls are $5.95-$6.95 and include Spicy Tuna Crunch Roll, Shrimp Tempura Roll, Alaskan Roll and Vegas Roll. 

There are also numerous Sake, Wine, Beer and Specialty Cocktail Specials. Hot Sake is $1.95. Draft beer starts at $1.75. 

Happy Hour #2 is aptly labeled "Reverse Happy Hour" and is available from Monday thru Thursday, 9pm-close, and Sunday, 8pm-close. 

While the prices remain relatively the same for Reverse Happy Hour, the menu selections have simmered down to six appetizer and salad items and nine rolls. The drinks specials remain much the same with the same amount of selection as the afternoon Happy Hour.

While I have only gone there for regular lunch or dinners, on my way out of dinner there last night, I couldn't help but notice the large Happy Hour card for taking that laid on the host stand. I always had a reason to go back to Kabuki for their great atmosphere and food, but with Happy Hour, I have even more reasons to go visit them!

Ra Sushi Uniquely Celebrates Half-Birthdays

Every year during our birthday month we get pretty spoiled. Every restaurant that we've consented our information to has sent us an invite to enjoy goodies that range from a free dessert to an all out free meal. Typically with a one month expiration date, we have our entire birth month to enjoy awesome dining at a lower cost.

For Ra Sushi however, they have decided to go the other way - they celebrate your half-birthday which is genius. Do what most others don't. When I recently dined there during Happy Hour, we were sat with our menus and a postcard that informed us of their half-birthday promo called The Hook Up. While I could hand fill out the form, I decided to go online to their website to get "hooked up". While it did say that it could take a few weeks to start receiving things, I was pleasantly surprised that my sign up just a few weeks ago yielded my half-birthday $20 gift for this month! That was fast! (My b'day is in October.)

Twenty dollars at Ra Sushi definitely affords you a great meal. Bring a friend or loved one and it'll feel like a two-for-one dining experience.

Now, Ra Sushi also has Happy Hour (both traditional and reverse) which is a dining deal. Monday-Saturday: 3-7 pm and 10 pm - close. Appetizer, sushi and drink specials are available. I'm a typical tuna and salmon sushi eater and for the cooked foods, you really can't go wrong but I would definitely get the Chicken Yakitori which has a really cool sweet sauce on it.