If you grew up on Oʻahu, you probably know the ritual. Get there early, point at the trays behind the glass, and build your own plate: a scoop of chow fun, a piece of mochiko chicken, a hot dog, maybe some vegetable tempura. At Fukuya Deli & Catering on South King Street, that ritual has been going on since 1939.
A new behind-the-scenes feature in HONOLULU Magazine, by former dining editor Martha Cheng, follows the shop from 4:30 a.m. to noon. It’s a good excuse to look back at how this family business has lasted 87 years while so many others closed.
Born next to a quarry
Fukuya started with two people. According to a 2020 HONOLULU Magazine neighborhood guide, Jihei and Tsuya Takayama, the great-grandparents of today’s owner, opened the shop in 1939. They made bentos for the men working at the Mōʻiliʻili quarry up the street, land that is now UH Mānoa’s lower campus. The couple lived upstairs and worked downstairs in a building down King Street from today’s shop.
The model was simple. Owner Arrison Iwahiro has described it the same way to several outlets: the founders cooked in the morning, put the food out, and closed when it sold out. Many of those first customers were Japanese laborers, HONOLULU Magazine reports.
Four generations behind the counter
The business passed down through the family. Iwahiro’s grandparents ran it starting in 1965, and his parents, Lorna and Edward, took over in 1975, according to the 2020 HONOLULU guide. About five years later, Fukuya moved to its current home at 2710 S. King St., a former racing-parts shop. Iwahiro’s father, who liked construction more than cooking, gutted the building and designed the kitchen and storefront himself, the new HONOLULU feature says.
Iwahiro grew up in the shop. He told the magazine he learned to cook from his grandparents. He was cutting vegetables for nishime and namasu by intermediate school, and by high school he was making deliveries and cooking shoyu chicken and chow fun. In an April 2026 Star-Advertiser Island Eats column, he said he was catering funerals from about age 15. He took over from his parents in 1999. He now works seven days a week, he told the paper, and calls the business “super demanding.”
From weddings to funerals
Catering is the other half of Fukuya’s story. In a 2011 Star-Advertiser Dining Out feature, Iwahiro said that by the 1970s the shop was already moving from “cook until it’s gone” to replenishing trays all morning, which took more staff. Catering grew around the same time.
At first that meant weddings, at churches, social halls and the Blaisdell. As weddings moved into hotels, Iwahiro’s father began giving menus to mortuaries, and that business took off, according to HONOLULU Magazine. Today Fukuya is known around town as a funeral caterer. The new feature counts several okazuya that once did the same work and have since closed: Hisago and Ebisu in McCully, Honda Delicatessen in Liliha and Kaneda’s in Nuʻuanu.
The 2020 guide reported that the largest order Fukuya ever filled was a funeral for 1,600 people.
What a morning looks like
HONOLULU Magazine’s visit captures the scale. The kitchen starts around midnight. On Saturdays and big catering days, cooks may fry 1,500 pieces of mochiko chicken in a pressure fryer that holds 50 at a time. Even so, much of the food is still made in small batches. On the morning the magazine visited, 100 orders of egg omelet were made one by one in two pans, and the display case fills with about 30 items before the doors open.
The regulars are part of the story too. The magazine met a postal worker who has stopped in for 25 years, and a Mililani couple who drive in about once a month.
What makes it different
- Build-your-own plates. In the 2011 feature, Iwahiro said the family-style setup, where you pick exactly what goes in your bento instead of buying a set box, is what sets Fukuya apart.
- Nori chicken, one whole thigh at a time. Iwahiro added nori chicken sometime in the 2000s after hearing about it from family friends connected to Hilo Lunch Shop. Fukuya wraps a whole deboned thigh per piece, HONOLULU Magazine reports. It’s become one of the shop’s most popular items.
- Fresh ʻahi on weekends. On Fridays, Iwahiro buys a whole fish at the Pier 38 auction and breaks it down for weekend poke and fried ʻahi, according to the magazine.
- Recipes with long roots. He told the Star-Advertiser the base sauce for the shoyu chicken goes “way back.” His parents added mochi and manju after buying a longtime mochi shop, and the cookies came from a couple who taught them the recipes.
- Mochi for the New Year. A stone rice-pounding machine that Iwahiro estimates is nearly a century old is used only for kagami mochi at New Year’s. He told HONOLULU Magazine the shop once needed 5,000 pounds of rice for the holidays and now pounds less than a third of that.
- Bread hash. It’s one of the oldest items on the menu, made with bread, corned beef and mashed potatoes. The cooks usually make just one plate a day.
What to order
Regulars and staff in these stories keep naming the same favorites: chow fun, mochiko chicken, nori chicken, shrimp tempura, vegetable tempura, hot dogs and shoyu chicken. The 2020 guide also mentions miso butterfish and potato mash. If you want bread hash or a particular item, go early. Around midday the kitchen switches to the next day’s prep and catering orders, and popular trays run out.
Know before you go
- Where: 2710 S. King St., Mōʻiliʻili
- Hours: Wednesday through Sunday, 6 a.m. to 2 p.m.; closed Monday and Tuesday, per fukuyadeli.com
- Phone: (808) 946-2073. The website says catering requests need at least 72 hours’ notice, so call for next-day orders. Funeral and large-party orders are accepted seven days a week.
- Parking: The shop has its own small lot, signed for Fukuya customers only.
Will there be a fifth generation?
In the 2020 HONOLULU guide, Iwahiro said his two daughters weren’t interested in the work, though he left the door open. For now, Fukuya is still doing what it has done since 1939: feeding Mōʻiliʻili one plate at a time.
Sources
- HONOLULU Magazine, “Through an Okazuya Window: Behind the Scenes at 87-Year-Old Fukuya Deli” by Martha Cheng (Nov. 2026): https://www.honolulumagazine.com/behind-scenes-fukuya-deli/
- HONOLULU Magazine, “Hawaiʻi Field Guide: King at University” (Jan. 2020): https://www.honolulumagazine.com/your-oahu-neighborhood-guide-king-street-at-university-avenue-in-honolulu/
- Honolulu Star-Advertiser, “Moiliili: old school favorites and modern bites” (April 1, 2026): https://www.staradvertiser.com/2026/04/01/food/island-eats/moiliili-old-school-favorites-and-modern-bites/
- Star-Advertiser Dining Out, “Catering to the Customer’s Choice” (Nov. 2011): https://dining.staradvertiser.com/2011/11/features/catering-to-the-customers-choice/
- Fukuya Deli & Catering, homepage and contact page (hours checked Nov. 8, 2026): https://fukuyadeli.com/ ; https://fukuyadeli.com/contact-us/
Filed under Honolulu
The Oahu Local newsletter
Enjoyed this? Get Oahu Local every week.
Our free weekly email helps you plan the weekend: events, food, hidden gems and the local news that matters, written by people who live here.
