Tag Archives: hawaii

East Village, Fusion, Other, Restaurant Reviews

Paradise Lost

January 22, 2024 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

I didn’t really take pics at this place, so you should watch my episode of Around the Hood HERE:

This place is an awesome tiki bar in the east village that serves up some great food in addition to their awesome selection of tiki drinks.

We tried the Holy Ground ribs, chicken thigh skewers, pastrami musubi and shrimp skewers. All were good, but the ribs stood out as the best, with the shrimp being the last in the lineup.

I will definitely be back here again to try more tiki drinks!

PARADISE LOST
100 2nd Ave
New York, NY 10003

Burgers, California

Causwell’s

June 7, 2019 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Before heading to San Francisco my friends and I poked around and did some research on where to get a good burger. One place that kept popping up was Causwell’s.

Our research proved correct: this places serves a great burger!

Their Americana burger is a nice Big Mac style double smash that really satisfies. The fries are great too.

We also tried their Loco Moco burger, a nice tribute to the Hawaiian ground beef, rice, onion, cheese and gravy plate.

This was really great, and it embodied all those flavors that you expect from the Hawaiian classic. I just wish it came with a cup of gravy for dipping with each bite. We had fried onions with this, which were really nice and crisp. Shredded style.

I highly recommend this if you find yourself in that beautiful disaster of a city known as San Francisco.

CAUSWELL’S
2346 Chestnut Street
San Francisco, CA 94123

Hawaii, Other, Restaurant Reviews

Ululani’s

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Ululani’s, Lahaina – Maui, Hawaii

This shave ice chain is often called the best on Maui. This colorful little kiosk in Lahaina has a great atmosphere, in a cobblestone alley with lots of umbrella’d seating nearby, accommodating customers for the other food places in the alley as well. This joint uses the flower-looking plastic containers instead of the styrofoam. I think I like these better, because they are more iconic, and the shape allows for melted ice to run back into the cup-like base.

My wife had an awesome combo of coffee, chocolate and almond flavorings, with coconut cream topping. Nicely done!

American, Hawaii, Non-Steakhouse Steaks, NY Strip, Restaurant Reviews

Lahaina Grill

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Lahaina Grill

Our last meal was a great one, and this joint represents probably the only real-deal fine dining establishment we went to (with Koa’s coming close behind).

We celebrated our anniversary here in style, and had a really great waiter named Justin, who chatted with us about the all-natural grass-fed steak purveyors on Maui, and the Idaho aged beef guys with outposts in San Diego, which is where they get their meats. That naturally lead to NYC steakhouses and this blog, which he actually took the time to browse between check giving and check paying (when all the convo started).

We started with some awesome cocktails. Mine was a tequila, honey and smoked salt drink, and my wife’s was a jalapeño vodka and cinnamon syrup drink. Crazy good.

For starters, we had the “cake walk,” which was a trio of lobster cake, crab cake, and tuna cake. All were good, but the tuna was more like a tartare than a cake. Fine by me.

My wife had a chili relleno for her app. It was served with a blue corn crust and surrounded by a tomato sauce that tasted like homemade chili, and stuffed with cheeses, corn and all sorts of seafood goodies.

My entree, was, of course, the largest steak on the menu. They didn’t have rib eye but they did have a decently sized boneless NY strip steak. Pretty nice for 14oz.

I wasn’t crazy about the red wine reduction sauce, but the meat was good quality. It would hang tough in NYC, I think, though certainly not in my top 10. It was cooked perfectly to medium on a skillet – nothing fancy, just real technique:

My wife ordered the coffee crusted rack of lamb. This was a little gamey for my liking, but it was cooked nicely and the crust had a nice flavor, though not as strong in the coffee department as I might have expected.

We planned to skip dessert, since we wanted more Ululani’s before our trip home, but Justin brought us out a triple berry pie on the house.

This was awesome. The berries were smooth, fresh and delicious. The pie crust was crispy and covered with granulated sugar that gave it an awesome texture.

And then the management came by and took a nice photo of us. They even gave us a card from the staff for our anniversary.

American, Diner, Hawaii, Other, Restaurant Reviews

Slappy Cakes

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Slappy Cakes

This place is a chain that lets you cook your own pancakes at the table on a skillet.

You order your batter – we chose lemon poppy, their seasonal batter – and then you start making shit.

Some people get very creative. Check out this design!

We also tried a funky item – chicken fried bacon. Thick cut bacon that has been battered and deep fried like chicken. What could go wrong? Well, it was a bit heavy. I’m not used to taking on breakfast too often anymore – I usually skip – so this was a bit much for me. I was full until dinner.

I should also mention the cool drinks we had here. These were non-alcoholic, though they do offer alcohol drinks here as well. Really good lemon and fizz type drinks. All very fresh.

Product Reviews

Drums of the Pacific Luau

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Drums of the Pacific Luau

The Hyatt in Kaanapali puts on a great show via Tihati Productions. This was a double whammy for my two big hobbies, other than writing: photography and eating.

Dinner at the luau consisted of the following menu:

As you can see, if you look closely, it says “Huli Huli Chicken!” I was really fucking excited for this, almost as much as the imu pit pork… but my boo-hooing started again when the sign at the buffet actually said teriyaki chicken. They must have went with teriyaki instead of Huli Huli that night. Oh well. I guess I’ll just have to make it myself.

We started with a shitload of all-you-can-drink items. Blue Hawaiians, Mai Tais, Beer, Pina Coladas, etc.

Anyway, the performers had a nice little ceremony where they unearthed the pig from the imu pit. This is called kalua pork. The pig is roasted whole in a shallow pit in the ground. The pig is wrapped in banana leaves to keep in the moisture (steamed), and flavored with Hawaiian salts and spices. Since it is cooked directly on hot lava rock and charcoal, there is a really nice smoke flavor to the pig when it’s all done.

I don’t think, however, that the pulled pork we had from the buffet line was from the same pig that was unearthed in the ceremony. First, it was ready too quickly (most of the buffet was already set up and covered prior to our arrival as well). Second, there was no skin or hot drippy fat to be seen. Most of the meat was on the dry side, though it did have a lot of flavor.

Here’s the buffet line:

Here’s my plate, locked and loaded:

The ahi poke was much better here than in Hana, by the way.

Dessert was pretty nice here too. There was macadamia nut fudge brownies, macadamia nut chocolate mousse, coconut custard, bread pudding, and pineapple upside down cake. All of it was really nicely done.

The luau show itself was really fun and entertaining. Check out some of the pics below. There was even some crazy fire knife dancing!

Burgers, Hawaii

Teddy’s Bigger Burger

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Teddy’s Bigger Burger

This is a Shake Shack / Smash Burger type of joint here in Hawaii. You can order your patties in three different sizes: 5oz (big), 7oz (bigger) and 9oz (biggest). Then you can go double on them if you want.

For my 5th burger of the trip, I went with a biggest (9oz) burger with American, jalapeños and all the fixings. Take a look:

It was slightly over medium, but not by much. I liked this burger a lot. It had a good bun (though not potato, or “King’s Hawaiian” as I might have expected), great cheese coverage, and quality toppings.

On the side we tried the tater tots, which were awesome and crispy, and the garlic fries, which were really overloaded with minced garlic.

Hawaii, Other, Product Reviews, Restaurant Reviews

Dole Whip at Lappert’s Ice Cream

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime 2 Comments

Dole Whip at Lappert’s Ice Cream

This Dole Whip business is dairy free, gluten free and cholesterol free.

Essentially it is pineapple that has been whipped into some sort of magical soft serve ice cream swirl. Apparently they also have it in other locations, like Disney World or something.

It was good! Soft, tasty, fresh. It would be very easy to put down gallons of this shit.

American, Hawaii, Non-Steakhouse Steaks, Other Cuts, Restaurant Reviews

Koa’s Seaside Grill

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime Leave a comment

Koa’s Seaside Grill

Dinner at Koa’s was really insane, in terms of the view.

We were seated in the corner overlooking that ocean just before sunset. Check out some of these pics I grabbed as the sun was going down throughout our meal:

The meal itself was pretty good too. We started by sharing a hearts of palm salad. I was somewhat expecting a non-leafy greens salad, and something more along the lines of just hearts of palm, some kind of vinegar dressing with onions and cucumbers and shit. But it was green, as one might expect upon hearing the word “salad.” It was good. It had a nice citrus-based dressing, and all the shit was fresh and bright.

I had the coconut curry grilled mahi maui. It was a bit is mall, but it tasted really nice, and the fish had a good crisp to the texture. Unfortunately it was a slight bit dry.

My wife got the winning dish here: kind crab legs and steak.

The meat was decent – sirloin. I’ve had better. Probably not on par with the aged, prime meats I am used to, but it certainly gained traction with the absolutely delicious king crab legs. Awesome.

Service here was excellent, and the atmosphere makes all the difference in terms of your dining experience. The host, John offered to take pics of guests near our table since it had the best view in the house. Here my favorite shot that he took of us:

American, Burgers, Hawaii, Restaurant Reviews

Cheeseburger in Paradise

October 16, 2015 Johnny Prime 2 Comments

Cheeseburger in Paradise

Tourist trap? I don’t care. The food and atmosphere were awesome here. You’re right on the fucking pacific.

In fact when waves roll in hard sometimes you can get sprayed if you’re at a table on the first floor in the back by the windows. There’s a little tiki bar on the second floor, along with a Jimmy Buffet-esque singer/guitarist playing tunes.

I ordered the classic cheeseburger as my 4th burger of the trip, which came with pepperjack, lettuce, tomato, onion and special sauce on a salt and pepper bun. Really nice looking burger.

It was cooked perfectly at medium, super juicy and good cheese coverage. The soft bun added a lot of flavor with the seasoning on top. I devoured this thing!