Maui 2008: Ba-Le Sandwich Shop

Ba-Le Sandwich Shop

Fast food Vietnamese in little strip malls. The location we went to was a part of a food court -- you'd order at the counter and pick it up within 5 minutes.

I meant to get the 'Spring rolls' wrapped in rice paper, not the deep fried ones... but I guess they refer to those as "Summer rolls".. oops.

The good news is, these turned out to be quite delicious! They were surprisingly crispy and flavorful rolls, plated with lettuce, cucumbers, mint, noodles, for you to grab together and dip into nuoc mam – very tasty, fresh, delicious

Pho Tai – good broth, noodles with great consistency, tender beef, and fresh ingredients. SO MUCH better than the other restaurant we visited in Maui (see previous blog)

Since it's called "Ba-le sandwich shop", I decided to also choose a sandwich from their HUGE selection. Since we don't have this in Chicago, I ordered 'Steamed pork and pate sandwich' – bad mistake. The bread was overly chewy, and didn't seem fresh. Steamed pork turned out to be a fishcake –like product that tasted artificial. Dipping it into nuoc mam made it taste better, but that sauce didn’t come with the sandwich (I used the sauce that came with spring rolls)

Here's Bob holding the sandwich with his skeptical look. You can see the counter behind him with photos that went with their popular dishes.

Ba-le Sandwich Shop
270 Dairy Road in the Maui Marketplace
Kahului, HI 96732
(808) 877-2400

Maui 2008: SeaWatch

SeaWatch Restaurant on Wailea Gold Course was rated as one of the best breakfast places in the area. Great ocean / golf course view, warm ocean breeze, indeed made this a wonderful breakfast destination.

The waiter greeted us with a friendly smile, asked what we'd like to drink, and said, "I just brewed fresh 100% kona coffee that i strongly recommend." That alone made the coffee sound so good I had to give it a try. He returned with a beautiful silver pot with a long stout and poured us two cups of coffee.

Bob ordered one of the local favorites, and again, strongly recommended by our waiter (he was Filipino and said this dish is perfect for people who love Asian flavors)

-Loco Moco – rice with gravy and over easy eggs -- delicious and definitely very filling. I tried this at Big Island Steakhouse (on Big Island), and this completely beats that 100%.

I ordered the Crabcake Benedict, because I am a HUGE fan of benedicts, and was addicted to ordering seafood in Maui -- unfortunately this was not as exceptional, slightly overly creamy, but still good. Loved the potatoes it came with – crisp, fresh, and nicely seasoned. P.S., I don't like the tacky looking drizzle either.

We also tried their Southwest Beans / Sausage Soup - nice, hearty, soothing soup

Highlight was definitely our waiter, who made this one of our BEST waiter experience in a long while. He was very conversational in a comfortably fun way, and passionate about particular must-order dishes. I'm not one to typically carry conversations with strangers, but I almost felt like I made a new friend, because I really enjoyed listening to his information on Maui real estate, rental properties, Oprah, etc etc...

SeaWatch (on Gold Course of Wailea)
100 Wailea Golf Club Drive
Wailea, HI 96753

Maui 2008: Sansei in Kihei

Since Bob and I are completely crazy over food that we decided to check out Sansei after our sushi dinner at Koiso (as previously blogged). We went to Maui for our honeymoon, tried the Sansei in Kapalua, and absolutely loved it. Online blogs / search boards advised against the Kihei location, but I figured we'd check it out anyway.

We went to the Kihei location for the after 10pm sushi/appetizer 50% off special. We don’t know whether it’s a difference in location, or our change in taste, but the food we tried this time turned out to be sub-par.

Dynamite shrimp – a slightly less sweet version of Chinese dish, “Walnut Shrimp”, except the shrimps here were tiny, and the skin aren't as crispy.

Kenny G – Hamachi sashimi with Masago and ponzu / basil – freshness of ingredients / taste – mediocre

Miso Butterfish – fish was moist and delicious, flavor was good except the additional sauce on top of the fish made it too salty

Poke – good flavors, decent tuna --but not impressive

Interesting experience with live karaoke, but sub-par food left us disappointed. This was a meal we tried to squeeze in since it was the last day, but we went home feeling like we should’ve saved the money and calories.

P.S. My mother-in-law noticed my terrible picture-taking skills at this particular restaurant, and said I must've had a less than enjoyable experience here -- she's so right!

Sansei
Kihei, HI

Maui 2008: Koiso Sushi Bar

I am terribly slow at keeping up with updates -- since I recently came back from NYC, I figured I should finish up my Maui reviews...

This is probably the first place that comes to mind when someone asked me about restaurants in Maui. I LOVE sushi, and was so thankful God dragged my hungover ass over to Koiso Sushi because it's one of my TOP THREE Sushi Restaurants in U.S. thus far. It's an incredibly tiny shack that only fits 1 sushi bar and 1 table (for 4). A waitress/hostess takes your drink order, and processes your payment. The Owner / sushi chef takes your order after he finishes with the dishes for other customers that came before you. His skills are exceptional as he whips up dish after dish while having conversations with his guests (most of which are local regulars that calls him by his first name, some of which makes a quick reservation with him as they leave). A whiteboard behind the sushi bar is the daily special (and also the only menu of the restaurant for customers to choose from).



Very nice variety of fresh fish (toro, big toro, medium toro – all of which fatty, fresh, and delicious). Homemade tamagoyaki (egg) was one of the best I’ve ever had (my husband teases me about eating this because it’s generally for little kids, but I LOVE eggs, so I always love to try this at restaurants, especially if they’re homemade). They also had 'monkfish liver', which I always try to order since it's rarer to run into. I never found one I enjoyed more than Echigo Sushi in L.A. (even though I don't like the rest of their sushi).

After 13 nigiri (or so...including tako, sake, aji, saba, hotategai, etc),
I wanted more…but I overheard the chef mentioning that he's getting tired during this busy night, and saw more customers trying to come in – so I decided to be kind to this excellent chef and give him a break.

This is a Must return.

Koiso Sushi Bar
2395 S Kihei Road Ste 113 (in Dolphin Plaza)
808.875.8258

Maui 2008: Great Golf Snack

I need to give a shout-out to Maui Prince Hotel's little coffee shop that's near the entrance. Lady at the counter is very sweet and kind -- she even directed me to a gas station on the way to the airport when I was disappointed that they ran out of spam omusubi. Coffee is good and only costed $1... so unheard of. Of all places I tried "spam omusubi", this coffee shop made it the BEST. Lightly pan-fried chunk of spam over even bigger chunk of rice ball -- gotta love that.

It was on this trip that my Japanese hubby told me omusubi's (御結び) actually another way of saying onigiri (御握り). What is it? It's a snack of rice formed into triangular or oval shapes, often wrapped in nori (dried seaweed). Traditionally, it is filled with umeboshi (picked plum), salted salmon, katsuobushi (husband's favorite -- fish flakes w/ soy sauce). My favorite is mentaiko (spicy marinated roe). According to wiki, the common misconception is that these rice balls are a form of sushi. omusubi is made with plain, lightly salted rice. Sushi's made of rice with vinegar. They are different.

Here's a photo of the Spam Omusubi we bought at the gas station... good, but I liked the pan-fried ones from Maui Prince much better:


Can't wait to try making some with brown rice for our golf outings, esp using our favorite ingredients!

Maui 2008: Vietnamese Cuisine

Completely NOT something we expected to try in Maui, but after a night of beers, wine & Absolute, we needed a cure...

We saw "Vietnamese Cuisine" when we visited Izakaya Matsu the night before, so instead of looking up a good V. Restaurant to go to (again, hungover), we decided to check it out.

The room was big, looked tacky (as with most V. places, which I don't really care), and barely had any customers at 1pm or so on Thursday.

I don't remember seeing Green Papaya Salad on many V. Restaurant menus, and only tried the Thai versions, so I thought.. why not, lets check out Maui's V. version. The carrots and papaya were soaked through with with nuoc mam (fish sauce, sugar, water, lime juice, etc), topped with chopped peanuts and 2 pieces of shrimp. The flavor was good, vegetables were addicting, and peanuts really worked well with the dish. The shrimp wasn't very fresh -- tasted rubbery like it was def. frozen for a while.

Summer Rolls - the nuoc mam sauce was good but it was stuffed with too much noodles, and pretty flavorless by itself. There was no pork inside, so I think it lacked that meaty saltiness... and again, the shrimp wasn’t especially fresh/crisp.

Purpose of our trip -- Pho Tai. Their soup base was very good, meat well cooked, but the noodles were of a thicker variety that was precooked and just dumped in the broth, so we had a hard time breaking it apart and hoping it'd soften (it didn't entirely). The plate of ingredients for us to put into the soup didn't look fresh either... the basil had these white stuff in one of the stems that seemed like mold. The lime slices where small, thin and yellow, so I asked for more... and the ones given were still small, thin and yellow. It just looked old...

It seemed like a wife-husband duo that was running the restaurant. Husband was eager to fill our waters, ask about the flavors of their food, and spoke about their salad with much excitement. Wife seemed annoyed, and simply wanted to take our order, give us the food, and give us a check.

overall – good flavors, but they definitely lack in freshness of ingredients. The noodles definitely need to be replaced -- tasted older and were way too thick.

Vietnamese Cuisine
(Azeka Center)

Maui 2008: Sarento's on the Beach

This was a last-minute decision because we wanted to stay around our hotel that night. My sister recommended this place because she heard good reviews from the hotel concierge. We don’t often try Italian when we travel (even though it’s one of my TOP favorite cuisines) so I thought it’d be interesting to give it a try.

I was SO glad we did. Bread was warm, chewy, delicious, served with a curry hummus. Even though we were trying to save room for the actual dishes, we couldn't help but finish all of the bread..mm..

Pan Fried Crab Cakes with Yuzu-Dijon Aioli, Basil Oil -– big chunks of fresh crabs, nice flavors, but the portions were too teeny...

clam pasta – chewy, perfectly cooked linguini in a fresh clams white wine sauce. The only thing I did not care for was the toast with perhaps goat cheese? Not good. The pasta though, was delicious...

We also ordered a market-price special that was a cilantro crusted fish in a perfectly delicious tomato based sauce filled with Italian sausage and clams that I wish to recreate…BURSTING with great flavors. Under it is polenta, which my husband ended up loving. I just miss the sauce...

As announced by one of the waiters, "A team of us will be serving you today"! The "team" included a timely water filler, a great waiter that took our orders and made excellent recommendations with great details, knowledge, and passion...and finally the waiter who made the 'announcement' that didn’t bother apologizing when we asked for bread (they didn’t give us any). He rushed off without saying anything, leaving us confused...then came back to dump the bread on our table.

Overall, nice ambience (another beachfront restaurant), delicious food. Definitely worth returning to (even if it's owned by a restaurant group).

Sarento’s on the Beach
2980 S Kihei Rd, , HI.
Phone: 808-875-7555.