Chef Mavro is one of the top-rated fine dining restaurants in Honolulu. Chef Mavro serves Hawaiian style fusion cuisine; in other words, taking into consideration local ingredients and produce, the chefs prepare modern and innovative menus. Chef Mavro has a three-tier tasting menu: three, four, or six courses. Carefully pre-selected wine pairings for each menu are available as well. Seasonally, the entire staff will work together to research and select menu items and pairings. It was this collaborative energy of the staff that impressed me most. They all worked together and knew what was going on at every table, rather than each table having a specific server who diners can’t ever flag down. For this reason, the service and also the atmosphere were really great, but the cuisine didn’t wow me — everything was good, but nothing jumped out as mind-blowing. While the pricing was in sync with the top restaurants in New York, the food was not. Nonetheless, I was glad I tried it. I had the four-course menu with spiced bigeye ahi to start, then fish chicharrón infused with anise seeds, fricassee of baby fennel. The main course of Snake River Farm Kobe-style beef included two types of beef: roasted bavette and braised short rib. The tender braised short rib melted in my mouth and made its counterpart, roasted bavette, seem coarse in comparison. The dessert, lilikoi (passion fruit) malasadas — Portuguese-influenced Hawaiian doughnuts or beignets) with guava coulis and pineapple-coconut ice cream was quite a delight and a perfect way to end my Hawaii vacation.