Uni Pasta

My last uni pasta order will probably be my last order for a while.  I’m not saying uni pasta is not good, but well…okay it’s not great.  I used to love it but I wonder if it was under the allure of eating uni.  The actual taste of uni pasta just tastes like a really rich cream sauce.  I think the uni taste gets washed out by all the cream in the sauce.  The uni pasta dish is also usually one of the most expensive entrees!  So if you ever dine with me in the future and I seem to be wandering over to the uni pasta dish, stop me.  Please.

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La Tour Café – Honolulu, Hawaii

La Tour Café is a neat eatery on Nimitz right next to Tanaka Saimin.  They are under the same ownership as Bale so you know any breads or pastries they make will be good.  The first visit I had was when they were fairly new and I was pretty unhappy with my experience.  The customer service and food at the time was definitely lacking.  This past time, I had a much better experience.

130823-01Oh yeah…how can you go wrong…

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Alicia’s Market – Honolulu, Hawaii

I don’t think I need to tell people again that Kalihi has the best lunch spots, the only sad thing is that they are usually closed or have limited hours during the weekends.  One day, when I was running errands for work – I was able to drop into Alicia’s Market for lunch!  Oh my, my food was SO good.  I got a mini plate – two choice with poke.  How will be this served?  They actually used the square mini plate lunch box!  And boy was it STUFFED.  Check it out!

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I told you…

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Time Passes Too Fast!

I’ve been incredibly negligent on this blog and I apologize.  It has been quite crazy the past week or so.  Once I booked my trip, I just spent a lot of time at work super busy.  I even brought home my laptop this weekend to get some work done.  Did I do work?  No.  Of course not.  And guess what?  My trip to Chicago is tomorrow!  Am I packed?  Also no.  I used to freak out about trips and I used to pack super early.  The last two trips, I have been packing like the day before the trip.  Bad bad bad.  But I do have a very concise packing list so maybe that’s why I am not worried.  Okay I lied, it is now 6 pm and I have to pack and do some work for tomorrow.  I like to work under pressure but this is a bit too crazy even for me.

I hope the weather in Chicago will be on my side.  Although, I think the weather will be very similar to Hawaii.  A lot has happened this week alone.  Yesterday was my birthday and what a wonderful day it was.  I got to spend time with good friends and family.  I have an awesome dinner and received incredibly thoughtful gifts.  It was truly a blessed birthday and I want to thank everyone who made it wonderful, I really appreciate it.

Also, my iPad 2 broke this past week!  I don’t know how many of you have a tablet out there but I realized just how dependent I am on it this week.  I couldn’t stand it!  I took it into a place for an estimate on repair and it was quoted for $200.  That was a bit too steep for my pockets, especially for a tablet that will be outdated in the soon future.

Well, let’s cap this post off with a picture of food.  Although this picture might sick some of you guys out.  🙂

130819-01Natto Pizza!

Ingredients: Mini naan, mayonnaise and wasabi base, prepared natto, cheese and nori.  I used a pizza white cheese (if I had provolone, I would have used that).  I toast it in the toaster oven for a few minutes until it’s warmed through and the cheese melts.  Then I hit it with some shredded teriyaki nori and bon appetit!  I really like it and this is coming from someone who used to hate natto.

All Booked Up!

I have been doing very late preparations for my last few trips.  I’m not sure why – maybe I enjoy the pressure??  But I finally booked my Chicago trip along with the hotel stay.  Chicago definitely is not cheap and I didn’t leave enough time to do research for places to stay.  My cousin already has my next visit planned out, well dates anyway.  I’m going to become a total Chicago pro soon.  Well pro at Chicago tourist areas.  I hope everyone had a good week.  At first my week felt so slow but then yesterday, it just went by too fast!  I was able to get a lot of things done after the end of day so I feel good.  Got a lot to do next week, especially before my trip!

Anyhow, let me leave you with two pictures of something so cute!

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Can you tell what this is?  (besides being a flower bouquet!)

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It’s a Hello Kitty flower!  University Flowers is famous for this flower.  Isn’t it so cute?  The price for each flower though is $25 so I think this is definitely a luxury item.  But if you know anyone who loves Hello Kitty, this would be an absolute delight for them!

Dim Sum More

Not much to update on this post.  I did want to share a small pet peeve of mine and it involves driving.  There are times when you reach a stop light and there are two lanes, one that goes straight or turns left and the right lane turns right.  Well the general rule is, if the car in front of you is wanting to turn left – you can usually go around that car into the right lane to go straight ahead.  Actually now that I think about it, I don’t know if that’s exactly a rule but people do it.  Now, if the car in front of you is for sure turning with his/her signal on – I say go ahead and go right around him/her.  Today, I was the second car at the stop light and we both were going straight.  I see the truck behind me pull up into the right lane and just sits there.  That ticks me off.  I must warn you though, I do get road rage.  Anyhow, I didn’t do much of anything.  The car in front of me and myself, we went straight right when the light turned green.  And no, I did not let that truck cut in front of me.  Why should I?  Pretty sure he was pissed about it but I didn’t care.  Honestly, we all have places to go so just follow the rules buddy.

Okay, I will end this post with two pictures of my dim sum favorites.  I also love baked custard buns but I don’t have a picture to share of it right now.

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Delicious Siu Mai.  I don’t know how pork hash has become so different when it is served in a Chinese restaurant versus any place else.  My favorite comes from a legit Chinese restaurant.

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Custard Tarts.  Another specialty that is very different from the American counterpart.  I much prefer the Chinese version as well.

Already August

Can you believe it’s already August?  Where does time fly?  I’m planning a trip to Chicago in about two weeks.  I can’t believe I just said two weeks.  And let’s use the word plan very loosely because I have done no planning.  I have not booked the trip.  I have done a bit of research in the past week or so, so I don’t feel TOO worried.  This trip will be a bittersweet one.  I will be sending my cousin and don’t let her hear this, one of my best friends away for school.  It’s going to be very hard.  Well, I hope everyone had a great weekend.  My weekend went okay.  I’ve been prepping my lunches every week in an effort to be healthier.  I didn’t do it this week.  Got a bit too lazy.  Busy week ahead for me!  I hope I can keep my posting up for this week.

I leave you with a picture of my Ahi Poke bowl from Gyotaku a long time ago.  I tried to be artsy with this picture.  🙂

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I-naba – Honolulu, Hawaii

I-naba is a small little gem tucked away on South King Street.  I’ve long been a fan of soba so it was only destiny that led me to this restaurant.  We came here a bit close to their closing time but was able to get seated anyway.  Even though we thought we were a little late, there was still a small stream of customers that came in after us!

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I enjoy nice menus…come on in…

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Kiss My Grits – Honolulu, Hawaii

With a name like Kiss My Grits, how could you resist not trying it out?  Kiss My Grits has been in Manoa for about 2 years now and it’s a welcome restaurant!  I like it because we don’t have much Southern food in Hawaii so it was great to see a place open up that was so close to me.  You can never go wrong with Fried Chicken…

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