You will soon be able to get your Poke fix at Carle at the Fields in Champaign.
King Kuma, which slings the popular Hawaiian rice bowls at Urbana’s Broadway Food Hall, will open another location in a small storefront at Carle at the Fields, the rapidly growing mixed use development in southwest Champaign.
It will not be a full-service restaurant, but a “carryout Poke counter.”
Urbana real estate developer and entrepreneur Matt Cho made the public announcement via news release.
Information related to retail development at Carle at the Fields has been revealed at a furious pace in the past few weeks. Last month, DESTIHL surprised many — and disappointed some — with the announcement of its plans to move out of downtown Champaign and into Carle at the Fields by 2020.
It appears that King Kuma may be located in the same building as Hickory River Smokehouse, the Texas-style barbecue joint which announced it will be opening a second area location at Carle at the Fields in the summer of 2020.
The first full service restaurant to open in Carle at the Fields is El Toro, which started serving earlier in March.
King Kuma was one of the first places in Champaign-Urbana to serve poke (pronounced poh-kay). Poke means “chunk” in Hawaiian. In the past, poke could be any kind of meat; today, when someone says poke, they are usually referring to seafood – and most commonly in the mainland U.S., poke means tuna.
Our reviewer said in January 2018 that the “poke steals the show” at Broadway Food Hall. “A poke bowl is like a giant, deconstructed crunchy spicy tuna roll, but with more vegetables. As someone who always asks for extra spicy mayo on my sushi, I was in heaven.”
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