"'No! No! No!,' he told me. 'Not even by a dollar,'" said Chan, who with Choy took over this Kapolei Marketplace restaurant last August. "He tells me to stay in the kitchen and let the customers eat."

Chan's concerns, though, are warranted. On any given night, the restaurant will go through countless shrimp and mussels, and up to 10, 25-pound boxes of crab legs.

"And they're not snow crab legs either, but Dungeness crab legs," Chan said. "We stress quality here and use only the best ingredients, which includes our spices and even the oil we use for frying."

Available only during the evening buffets, the Dungeness crab legs are flashfried then sauteed with salt, pepper, garlic, green onions and bits of chili flakes.

"You don't even need a sauce to dip the meat in," manager Anson Lam said. "Other restaurants will only provide steamed crab legs and some butter for dipping. I think our way of preparing the crab legs tastes a lot better."

Priced at $11.95 per person Mondays through Thursdays, and $14.95 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights (from 5:30 to 9 p.m.), the all-you-can-eat crab and seafood fests don't break the wallet.

"Where else can you get this type of quality food for such a low price?" Lam asked in a rhetorical tone. "I think we're the best Chinese restaurant on this side of the Island. We even get customers who come from as far as Hawaii Kai just to have our crab legs."

They also make the drive in the evening for the crabmeat-and-cream-cheese wontons, which go like hotcakes, according to Lam.

"We also put out at least 20 to 25 different items," he continued. "And this is just counting our hot items."

On the cold side of the buffet, patrons will find a garnish-your-own tossed green salad, desserts and soft-serve ice cream.

During the day, HO HO's lunch buffet (from 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.) is economically priced at $7.95 per person.

"That's about what you would pay for a three- to four-item plate lunch," Lam said. "But here you get a lot more than just rice, salad and vegetables."

Guests can get their fill of such items as beef broccoli, kau yuk, black pepper steak, mapo tofu, cold ginger chicken, kung pao chicken, fried rice, noodles, crispy wontons and springrolls.

Anson Lam stands behind the quality and value of Ho Ho's buffets.

"We make everything here," Chan proudly said. "The dough is rolled here, the wontons are stuffed here and they're all baked and steamed here."

This includes the custard pie ($6.99), which is a must-try. The airy, fluffy texture of the thin-crusted pie isn't overly sweet, nor is it heavy. Lish!

"We sell a lot of these pies," Lam said. "The feedback has been 100 percent positive. Not one person has responded negatively about it."