Editor's note: The following "Our Honolulu" column by Bob Krauss originally ran on Dec. 11, 1996. Krauss, a reporter with The Honolulu Advertiser for 55 years, died on Sept. 10. "Mama" Yoshiko Masuoka died on July 28, 2004.

Every worker at Masu's Massive Plate Lunch on Liliha Street was $85 richer yesterday because that's when "Mama" Yoshiko Masuoka made her 85th birthday.

When Mama turned 70, the help gave her 70 long-stemmed roses. At age 80, she received 80 strands of pikake.

"This time she decided enough is enough," said her son, Paul. "She didn't want anything. She said it was time to pay back so she gave every one of our workers $85."

Mama, who weighs 65 pounds and stands 4 feet 6 inches tall, thinks she might consider quitting at 90.

A couple of years ago, she fell on the escalator at Ala Moana Center and fractured her arm in two places. Two days later she was back in the kitchen at Masu's Massive Plate Lunch.

That day, she peeled 50 pounds of salad potatoes with one hand.

I discovered where the name, Masu's Massive Plate Lunch, comes from when Mama took me back through the kitchen to look for Paul.

Two women were putting together 47 take-out orders of a plate lunch that is listed on the menu as David Daniel's Yuletide Bento. Here are the ingredients:

A baked baby lobster tail stuffed with crab and bacon, charcoal broiled sirloin steak, teriyaki sauce, fried chicken, a heavy slab of baked Spam, shrimp tempura, two shoyu hot dogs and crab potato salad made with real crab meat.

Ferd Borsch, veteran Advertiser sports writer, said he's glad Masu's Massive Plate Lunch moved from Kaka'ako to Liliha because it's closer to the hospital when he comes in for his triple bypass special.

The walls are covered with pictures of entertainers, sports stars, politicians and journalists Paul and Mama admire. Massive plate lunches are named after them.

"(Singer) Melveen Leed suggested that we ask for favorite recipes and put them on the menu," said Paul. "The first recipe turned out to be a disaster so I used my own recipes and named the dishes after celebrities."

But it's Mama whom people come in to see. She's there from 4 a.m., when she and Paul start preparing to open at 7:30 a.m. They close at 7:30 p.m.

"Years ago in Kaka'ako a bunch of rowdy teenagers came in, swearing and using bad language," Paul recalled. "Mama told them to talk nice or she wouldn't serve them. I thought, oh, boy, there's going to be trouble.

"But Mama has a way of handling people. Today one of the boys, Roddy, is married and has a child. Every time he comes in he goes back to the kitchen to hug Mama."

Paul said layoffs at Pearl Harbor and the slowdown in construction put businesses on Liliha Street, including Masu's Massive Plate Lunch, into bankruptcy.

But creditors are reluctant to hurt Mama. They've accepted a Chapter 13 bankruptcy so she and Paul can pay back the money now that business is picking up.