By Kimberly Chun

One Honolulu secret eat that's jealously guarded by locals: Liliha Bakery, way off the beaten path for most tourists, in the gritty locals-only wilds of Kuakini Street.

It's just a single breakfast/lunch counter, running alongside with the bakery display cases, but you can pretty much guarantee a line for seats at almost any hour of the day. The secret? It might be in that giant gold mountain of butter in the kitchen. Or in the sugary noggin of the frosted, kimono-ed Hello Kitty cookie.

I think it's in the spot's famed breakfasts: people swear by the grilled Hawaiian sweet bread, the cinnamon toast, and the diner's weirdly indefinable radioactive-red jelly. Hawaiian/American grub of the first blissfully simple order. Another plus: it's open 24 hours a day from Tuesday 6 a.m. to Sunday 8 p.m. So you can find the city's club rats and bar crowd converging here after-hours, as well as everyone's tutu and popo during the day.

Liliha Bakery
515 N. Kuakini St., Honolulu
(808) 531-1651
lilihabakeryhawaii.com