Local Sizzler franchisee
gains newbie notoriety

Clinton Goo, franchisee and owner of four restaurants on Oahu, was singled out for reestablishing the casual eatery's brand, year-over-year sales increases and high service marks.

"Sizzler customers actually deserve the award, because it was they who have come back to Sizzler Restaurants to try our new quality food and better service," Goo said.

Goo was presented with the honor at a Sizzler convention in Las Vegas last week.

Choy-ful reunion

It's good to have friends. It's even better to have friends that can boost one's business when your get-togethers are distributed to 80 million cable television households.

Chef, restaurateur and local TV cooking show host Sam Choy is buddies with Food Network rock star and restaurateur Emeril Lagasse and recently returned from New York where he taped an episode of "Emeril Live." The show's air date has not been determined.

The two had so much fun, "we wound up with only 15 minutes to put some food out," Choy said.

In preparing for the show, the producer asked the chefs what their plan was for the taping. Lagasse replied that when he and Choy are involved, "There's only one person who knows what's going to happen, and that's the Lord," Choy laughed.

At the start of the trip, Choy and his 19-year-old son Christopher arrived in Newark, N.J., to blizzard conditions. Christopher had boarded the plane in Hawaii wearing shorts and asked his dad to pack long pants in his carry on bag. The carry-on wound up in daddy's checked-in luggage, meaning Christopher's legs were about to become colder than the can at the bottom of a galvanized bucket at a baby luau.

Father counseled son that the only remaining course of action was to get a picture taken of himself outdoors, in shorts, with a blizzard going on all around him.

"He looked like (KITV sportscaster) Robert Kekaula," Choy chuckled.