Kadota Liquor - Hilo CDP

Best and most complete liquor store in Hilo, hands down. The staff know their stuff and you'll get individual attention if you want it (ie if you need help selecting a wine to match your dinner). Or if you just need to grab a quick drink, you'll be in and out in no time. Stop by next door to grab a swirl ice cream cone while you're there.

On the bright side, this place has a great selection of wine and spirits, as many reviews have noted. On the downside... Are you familiar with the term cooked ? It refers to a wine that 's spent too much time at excessively high temperatures, ruining the flavor a serious consideration in a location where daytime temperatures typically run in the mid 80s and it often doesn 't go below 70 at night. A recent experience suggests that the proprietors of this not air conditioned shop have not considered this. Recently, I was delighted to see they had a few bottles 2015 Ridge Petite Sirah for roughly the same price the winery sells the currently available vintage, the 2020, for. Maybe I should have been suspicious, but I bought it and yeah, it was cooked just on the far side of drinkability. I think it 's safest here to stick to buying just the current releases and not anything that has likely been sitting in the shop baking for a year or more. It 's a pity, they have a great selection and lots of wines I would love to try, but I 'm not wealthy enough to routinely pour $45 (what I paid for the Petite Sirah) or more down the drain.

Great selection of wines. It took a while for us to decide what to get. We probably stayed there over 30 mins to pick a few.

This long time business has been the go to place for booze. BUT today I bought a six pack of Elysian Space Dust IPA for $17.10 then discovered it was beyond its best use date when I got home. Not good Kadota Liquor!

I was referred there fro Hilo Bottle Shop- which is where I went first but they did not have what I was looking for Kadota had it! They were out of hennessey on the shelves but one of the staff members was kind enough to look and retrieve one from the back. I grabbed the last grand marnier they had in stock and paid for my findings. They have their own branded shot glasses at the counter which was also handy. I walked in and out before they closed that day before the holiday. I mark down 1 star because when I got home I found that my sealed Grand Marnier was completely liquified- normally it has a thick consistency when poured as it is liquor. I found this very odd. Yet is smelled and tasted fine- not sure if it was a defect or not following FIFA protocols.