Pokérrito (Marine Way): Poké in Burnaby

Recently, Pokérrito opened up a new location in the Marine Way area of Burnaby. While it’s true that most poke places in the Vancouver area have very little resemblances with the poke places in Hawaii, it’s probably unfair to compare the two. In Hawaii, the best poke spots focus mainly on the freshness of the seafood and the various marinades that they use to accompany them. At most, you’d enjoy the poke in Hawaii with some plain rice to really savour the flavours. In Hawaii, you’d rarely find all of various toppings that accompany “poke bowls” in Vancouver.

Now, with all of that being said, there’s nothing wrong with the poke bowls in Vancouver… especially if it gives the customer what they want. Pokérrito is one such establishment that allows you to either pick from a list of pre-selected bowls or you can go out-of-the-box and fully customize your bowl.

On my first visit during their soft opening in mid-July, there was already a line up inside with hungry customers. I opted for their signature Aburi Bowl ($13.35 for regular size) with flame-seared ahi, miso glaze, green onions, imitation crab meat, lemon, sprouts, furikake, and crispy tempura bits. You have the option to have this served on a bed of brown rice, white rice, or salad and I thought it was pretty good (although I thought it could have used some more sauce).

A couple of days later, I returned to try their Hanauma Bowl ($12.50 for regular size) on a bed of romaine lettuce, cilantro, and kale. Inside the bowl, you get salmon, seaweed salad, imitation crab meat, edamame, ginger, sprouts, masago, and furikake. Again, a very well put together bowl (but it’s difficult to see the seafood underneath all of those toppings).

The following week, I decided to branch out and try to customize my own bowl. This time I picked a Poke Salad with Kale Noodles. The regular size bowls lets you pick 2 proteins and I opted for the Marinated Ahi ($1.50 extra) and Salmon. For my mix-ins, I went with cucumbers, sweet onions, green onions, and cilantro. For my 2 sides, I opted for the avocado ($1 extra) and imitation crab and for my 5 toppings, I picked pineapple, corn, edamame, radish coins, and masago. Topped everything off with some of their signature umami sauce and I was good to go. All in, this bowl came out to $15.75 (think the kale noodles added $0.75 to the price).

On a return visit, I got my Poke Salad to-go ($12.50 for regular size) and upgraded the 2 proteins to Sockeye Salmon (+$1) and Marinated Ahi (+$1.50), with mango and imitation crab as the 2 sides, along with edamame, corn, pineapple, and masago.

Realizing that I actually like the option with their kale noodles, I decided to customize my own bowl and got another Poke Salad with Kale Noodles. This time, I settled on a large size with 3 proteins: spicy tuna, salmon, and octopus. To that, I added some more kale, crunchy cucumbers, sweet onions, green onions, cilantro, spicy seaweed, mango chunks and imitation crab. Then, topped it all off with some edamame, pineapple, radish coins, pineapple, corn, and crunchy onion bits. With all of these items in the bowl, it was a bit difficult to mix everything all up but I somehow managed to do that without spilling it all over myself.

So, while this might not be like the true poke that you’d get in Hawaii, I do like the options that Pokérrito lets you choose from.

7368 Market Crossing
Burnaby, BC

www.pokerrito.ca