Many people read my blog to see all the foods that I eat around Honolulu, but I am often eating a lot of processed, fatty foods. After two whole weeks of fast foods, I knew it was time to reset my palate.

I recently had lunch at Hale Macrobiotic Cuisine, right in my neighborhood. If you are like me, you may have been curious about this place but had preconceived notions about healthy food: that it's bland, not very filling and consumed by progressive tree-huggers.

In one lunch, my misconceptions were corrected.

About a year ago, Hale owner Motoko Kubota got turned on to macrobiotic cooking and went to Japan to study the science behind the art. She came back to Hawaii, transformed the former Kai space on Makaloa Street and started sharing her new passion with the world.

Macrobiotic cooking involves grains as a staple food supplemented with vegetables and beans, while avoiding the use of processed or refined products. Since Kubota uses items eaten in season, she buys local foods whenever possible.

We tried the Macrobiotic Lunch Plate ($12.95), which is a sampling of five macrobiotic vegetables and tempeh with miso soup and organic brown rice. It was amazingly tasty, and hard to believe no refined products were used in making it. We got the full range of sweet, salty, sour and bitter tastes in this very vibrant plate.

We also ordered the mahimahi with a teriyaki miso sauce ($10.50) special, which had all the taste of a plate lunch but none of the added salts or sugars that you would normally find.

Both of us also had a bowl of the cremini mushroom soup ($3), which — despite having no cream or butter — was more rich and savory than any we'd ever had. It was quite amazing to experience such extreme taste sensations in a "healthy" menu; more than that, we walked out completely stuffed, with enough leftovers for dinner.

You don't have to be detoxing to eat at Hale: It's open Tuesdays through Sundays from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 5 to 9:30 p.m. For reservations, call 944-1555 or visit www.halemacro.com.