How To Equip a Kitchen for Speed, Fresh Food Quality

Hawaiian Bros is growing. The island-inspired restaurant concept opened its first restaurant in Missouri in 2018 and has grown to 80-plus stores across 14 states. It has more than 350 additional restaurants under development agreements. It announced in October plans to bring 52 stores to Florida.

Hawaiian Bros’ menu is inspired by the traditional Hawaiian plate lunch and built around a limited number of freshly prepared products. It features chicken or pork, white rice and macaroni salad or vegetables. The brand calls out how it doesn’t use freezers, fryers or microwaves. To explain more about how it equips and designs its kitchens, SVP of Operations Chris Habiger offers the following details via an email interview:

Chris Habiger

FER: What are Hawaiian Bros core equipment pieces? 

CH: Our kitchens are built around a focused set of equipment, with each piece serving a clear purpose:

• Grills are central to preparing our signature chicken offerings.
• Rice cookers produce the steamed white rice that serves as a foundation for our plate lunches.
• Combi and convection ovens support our cooking processes and provide flexibility in food preparation.
• Refrigeration and cold-holding equipment help maintain food safety and ingredient quality throughout preparation and service.
• Hot-holding equipment maintains proper serving temperatures and supports speed of service.

Together, these pieces support a straightforward flow from preparation and cooking through holding, assembly and service.

What is an example of how the kitchen layout minimizes unnecessary movement for employees?

The plate assembly process is a good example. By positioning rice, proteins, sides and packaging close to the team members assembling orders, we can bring a meal together with minimal walking, reaching or backtracking. That also helps limit cross-traffic, so team members aren’t repeatedly crossing one another’s work areas during a rush.

We’ve also incorporated a dedicated service line for drive-thru orders into our kitchen design, helping organize the work around how guests receive their food.

A few steps saved on each order become meaningful when that process repeats hundreds of times a day. Those details support productivity and our target of 30 seconds at the drive-thru window, while making the kitchen easier for our teams to operate. A well-designed restaurant should make the right operational behaviors the easiest ones to execute.

Could you share a glimpse—equipment- or design-wise—into the future of Hawaiian Bros?

As we grow, we’re focused on making our restaurants easier to operate while preserving the food quality and hospitality that define Hawaiian Bros.

On the design side, that includes compact, flexible formats such as freestanding drive-thru restaurants, endcaps and inline locations. The options allow us to adapt to different sites and ordering preferences while maintaining a consistent operating model.

For equipment, we look beyond the purchase price to reliability, productivity, maintenance requirements and the effect on food quality. We’re interested in equipment and technology that improve cooking consistency, reduce repetitive tasks and help team members work more effectively.

Standardization remains important as we support both company-operated and franchised restaurants. Our goal is to make successful processes easier to repeat, support strong restaurant economics and consistently deliver the Hawaiian Bros experience as we enter more communities.