Sam Choy’s Poke to the Max now open in downtown Tacoma

Seattle-based Hawaiian fusion restaurant Sam Choy’s Poke to the Max is now open in downtown Tacoma. The restaurant opened with limited hours Wednesday.

The restaurant will be open at 11 a.m. through Saturday, but expect hours to be limited in its opening days.

The restaurant will close for Easter Sunday and reopen Monday with its regular hours.

The restaurant with a focus on poke — pronounced poh-kay — opened in the former home of Granola’s Frozen Yogurt at 1716 Pacific Ave.

Owner Max Heigh is a family friend of Sam Choy, a highly regarded Hawaiian chef. Heigh partnered with Choy on his first poke truck in Seattle in 2011 and has since expanded to three trucks and a brick-and-mortar location in Seattle’s Rainier Valley neighborhood. Heigh runs daily operations.

Heigh had his eye on Tacoma since visiting with his truck. The University of Washington Tacoma location was a perfect fit. “It just has a great vibe to it. There’s been a lot of movement down there with different breweries and restaurants opening up,” Heigh said in January.

The menu is the same as the Rainier City location with poke rice plates offering a choice of ahi tuna, salmon, octopus or tofu ($9.99-$11.99). Poke plates are served with seaweed salad, mixed greens, sliced cucumber salad, ginger, scooped rice and a choice of raw or seared poke. Also find poke tacos ($11.99), poke nachos ($11.99), poke wraps ($12.99) and poke salad ($12.99).

The menu also lists plate lunches with loco moco ($9.99) kalua pork ($9.99), chicken katsu ($9.99), short ribs ($9.99) and other options. Rounding out the menu are pulled pork, braised pork belly or fried shrimp sandwiches ($9.99-$10.99); a burger ($9.99) and eight kinds of musubi ($7.99-$11.99).

The style of service is order-at-the-counter. The casual restaurant has seating for about 30.

This is the second poke restaurant to open in two weeks in the area. Aloha Poke opened April 3 in Fircrest. Here’s a first-bite report.

This story was originally published April 12, 2017 at 3:45 PM with the headline "Sam Choy’s Poke to the Max now open in downtown Tacoma."