Mixed Plate Friday

Happy Aloha Friday! We are creeping closer and closer to Christmas. You ready or what? I am writing this post early but I’ll just say yes to move this along. I plan to do some baking this season as well so let’s see how that goes. This is probably going to be my final Florida post on food – then we can get back to the regular schedule. Can you guess where my first meal in Florida was?

It’s a laugh I even walked around the store beforehand. Get me to thee meatballs!!!

Swedish Meatball Plate | $5.99
Traditional 8 pc. Swedish Meatball Meal served with Mashed Potatoes and Lingonberry Jam

This dish is my comfort food. After my bout of food poisoning while in the air to Florida, I just couldn’t wait to nourish my soul with some Swedish meatballs. Did they hit the spot? Absolutely.

Smoked Salmon Salad

I never saw this dish before and I can’t find the price, it’s just a simple salad with smoked salmon. The dressing is very strong in dill flavor.

Apple Cake | $1.99
tart with layers of almond paste, apples and crumble

Oh yes, my apple crumble adventures continues. It happens here in Hawaii and of course twice in Florida. It was pretty good! Served cold. I was kind of good, I mainly ate the topping and left most of the crust. I guess that makes it a diet dish? Ha. Ha. Ha.

There was an AYCE hot pot place right next to our hotel so while our meals were usually spoken for, we did make it out to this restaurant once. And well, once was enough. It’s not even worth sharing the name of this restaurant – they are incredibly busy so reservations are highly recommended. They have a gimmick, one of those cute robots that take you to your table. Cute and creepy? Anyway, the service was severely lacking and we didn’t even get the drinks we ordered until we had to remind them and they made them wrong but it wasn’t worth the effort to flag someone else down. The buffet was okay, had some people (ahem Asians) just grabbing all the good stuff to take to their tables. Come on guys, leave some for the rest of us and just grab more later. Ah what can you do. I miss Little Sheep so much. 🙁

So like, I think we ended up at Chipotle like every night. Hahahaha long days of walking led to getting late dinners at Chipotle. Boy did the locations differ in staff and ingredients available. The first bowl pic was basically all I could get because they ran out of everything. The second bowl was much better. Must be the Asian in me, I just wanted one big bowl of rice. Love their toppings and the fresh ingredients. Also love their chips with queso dip. Augh, wish we had a Chipotle here in Hawaii too.

You know what else I did? I bought Shake Shack burgers and Chick-Fil-A sandwiches the night before my return flight home. Threw them in the fridge over night and then straight into my luggage. Yup, I risked another bout of food poisoning. I wanted the boys to experience these burgers/sandwiches because they never have. Happy to report that none of us got sick and I was informed that Popeye’s Chicken sandwich is better than Chick-Fil-A. Have a great weekend folks.

Meatball – Kapahulu, HI

Meatball opened a few weeks ago in Kapahulu and I was super excited when it did! I love meatballs and thought a restaurant specializing in meatballs gotta be good! So how was it? A mixed bag. This could just be growing pains but I have a few thoughts. First, let me explain how to order. The base order includes the meatballs, your choice of sauce, and two small slices of garlic bread for $8.50.  Then to make it a “meal” which means adding starch, you have to pay $3.00. Yes, if you want to add plain rice – you would have to fork out $3.00.  Let’s get to the pictures and details.

140405-01Chicken Meatballs with Bacon Alfredo Sauce on Shells ($11.50)

140405-02This comes with 4 meatballs. My coworker got this dish and she was incredibly unhappy. The meatballs were just okay and they cooked the pasta all wrong. The shells were still hard and I don’t know if you can see it, but there are clumps of shells stuck together that were also not edible. She ended up throwing out most of the dish.

140405-03Vegetable Balls with Mushroom Gravy – $8.50

140405-04Another dish from my coworker. She didn’t have nice or mean things to say. I asked how the taste was and she mentioned it tasted like…vegetarian balls. Sometimes places are able to make their meatless dishes taste very meaty – I don’t think they succeeded here.

140405-05Beef Meatballs, Mushroom Gravy ($8.50), Rice ($3.00), Side Egg ($1.50) = $13.00

140405-06Here’s the garlic bread turned over. I guess it’s good that it’s made inhouse? It definitely was not memorable.

140405-07This dish is PRICEY. I can’t get over how much rice is and how little you get for this price. How’s the meatball? I will admit the beef meatball is very unique in flavor. There is a bit of game-y taste but definitely in a good way. I enjoyed the mixture of different meats in the meatball.

So do I recommend this place? I can’t say I can. It’s very pricey for a small quantity. I always try to give places another chance so perhaps I would return when they settle into their space a bit more.