SNAPSHOTS | HAWAII 2020 | DAY 3

On our third day in Hawaii, my siblings and I planned to hike up Diamond Head! We weren't keen to wake up to catch the sunrise but we did want to go relatively early before temperatures peaked.

For fuel, we stopped at Musubi Cafe Iyasume to grab some spam musubi! This little shop also has six other franchise locations. They specialize in spam musubi, traditional Japanese onigiri, and pre-packaged bentos.

For those who didn't know, Hawaiians consume more spam per capita than any other state. Spam musubis can be found at almost every corner shop, including 7-11. It's a quick, portable snack made from rice, grilled spam, and nori (seaweed). We figured they would be filling enough but not heavy as to weigh us down during the hike.

There was a small line when we arrived. It did take a little while before we got to the front with only one person working the cash register. Some of the musubis are pre-made but the stock is constantly being replenished from the small army working in the back.

They have almost 50 different types of spam musubi and onigiri on the menu, so we were able to try out an assortment. On top of the spam, some of the additional toppings we ordered were egg, cucumber, bacon, avocado, and eel. Most of the musubis were $3 and under which makes them really cheap and affordable!  

My musubi of choice was the avocado, bacon, egg, and spam ($2.98). Literally the perfect breakfast in a cute, convenient package. I grew up eating spam my entire life so this really hit the spot. I also shared a tuna mayo onigiri ($1.98) but I probably wouldn't recommend it since it's a lot more rice than filling. 

We grabbed an Uber shortly after to start our hike! Admission to the park is $1 per person or $5 per car. We were a bit worried when it started to rain but it actually felt more like a mist. If anything, it helped us keep cool while we ascended the trail!

The trail starts out paved and then gets rockier as you go further up. I'm probably the least athletic person you'll ever meet but I thought the hike was more than doable. It took us a little over an hour to complete the round trip but we also spent 15 minutes taking pictures at the different vantage points on the trail. It's definitely a must-do and see when you're in Hawaii!

In the end, the rain was a blessing in disguise since we were treated to a rainbow at the very top!

When we finally made it back to the starting point, we grabbed a pineapple juice and smoothie from the food truck parked at the base of the trail. It was probably overpriced but it was refreshing at least!

We planned on grabbing another Uber to get back to civilization but saw a sign for the Waikiki Trolley and decided to ride one! It was a bit pricey at $10 per person but we thought of it as a once-in-a-lifetime experience. We did have to wait a while at the bus stop since there are a lot of different trolleys picking up hotel guests or tour groups.

The trolley does a big loop before arriving in Waikiki so we requested to be dropped off sooner than that. We ended up in a residential area and walked 10 or so minutes to Kapahulu Avenue.

Before our trip, my brother was super keen on trying out some of the fast food unique to the states. His plans backfired when he was at the Denver airport and realized that Chick-fil-A was closed on Sundays! So his only form of consolation was to try the infamous Popeyes chicken sandwich. When it was introduced last year, it instantly went viral. The sandwich was so popular that *literal* fights would break out over it. Unfortunately, the sandwich hasn't graced the Canadian market just yet but I hope that when it does, we could be a little bit more civil about it.

My brother ordered the spicy chicken sandwich combo ($8.50) which comes with a side and a drink. The sandwich is relatively simple in its construction -- a toasted brioche bun, buttermilk-battered and fried chicken, pickles, and spicy Cajun sauce. I was only given a bite (after having to beg for one) but I was impressed! The chicken was an actual piece of chicken -- it was crispy and juicy with a good amount of heat. Thankfully we didn't have to fight off anyone for it.

But I, for one, did not travel all the way to Hawaii just to eat Popeyes. So after my brother finished his lunch, we walked a couple minutes north to Ono Seafood!

Ono Seafood is a tiny hole-in-the-wall spot known for its fresh poke bowls and poke by the pound. It's won numerous awards, including Yelp's top 100 places to eat in the U.S. There was a line out the door when we arrived but it moves fast!

The menu is really simple: ahi poke or tako (octopus) poke in a variety of different flavours (shoyu, Hawaiian style, miso, spicy, and wasabi). When we went, they also offered salmon in a couple of the marinades. For each poke bowl you order, you're given a choice of white or brown rice, and then your choice of up to two different types of poke. It also comes with a free drink!

We ordered two regular bowls to share ($11.75). Our first bowl was half shoyu ahi and half spicy ahi, while our second bowl was half Hawaiian style ahi and half miso salmon. I normally don't care for raw tuna but the texture of the ahi was unreal. Unlike the mushy stuff we get back home, the ahi was firm but buttery smooth. The sauces were super flavourful but they didn't overpower the freshness of the fish at all. Honestly speaking, the cold fish with the hot rice was heaven in a bite. A definite recommend!

We scarfed down our poke bowls in record time and then made our way over to Leonard's Bakery. Another Hawaiian institution, Leonard's has been open since 1952. They're known for having fresh, made-to-order malasadas, which are Portuguese doughnuts (without the hole!). Although they offer other pastries, cookies, and bread, everyone comes here just for the malasadas.

The malasadas are $1.35 each and come dusted in three different coating options: original (plain sugar), cinnamon sugar, and li hing (pickled plum). They also offer malasada puffs ($1.65), which are the original malasadas filled with pudding-like centres. The fillings include custard, dobash (chocolate), haupia (coconut), macadamia nut, guava, and a monthly feature (ours was strawberry).

We planned on buying half a dozen, but we found an extra malasada in our box that we didn't pay for. Score! The malasadas are best eaten fresh, while they're still hot out of the fryer. While our malasads were warm, they weren't as crispy as I had hoped. The insides were soft and fluffy, but I didn't really care for the fillings. I think having them plain is best!

We headed back to the hotel afterwards for a shower and some much-needed rest.

For dinner, we had made a reservation at Tonkatsu Ginza Bairin the day before. I heard of this restaurant back when I was planning our trip to Japan a few years back. When I found out they had a location in Hawaii, I knew I didn't want to miss out on my chance again! The restaurant is quite small, so making a reservation is key to not getting turned away.

My mom and I decided to share the mixed katsu set ($24.00) and the pork tenderloin katsu sandwich ($10.50). It was a lot more food than I was expecting! I thought the tonkatsu was good but I wasn't really blown away. The panko breading was a little bit on the denser side.

Service was also on point, but my only gripe was their restaurant policy on tipping. There's an automatic 15% service charge on the bill but none of that money goes towards the wait staff. You would have to pay an additional tip on top of that. It quickly becomes an expensive meal and I don't think it was truly worth it.

Regardless, our stomachs were full and we headed out to explore for the rest of the night.

There was a 7-11 nearby so we decided to stop in just to take a look. The 7-11's in Hawaii remind me of the ones in Japan since they carry a lot more than just hot dogs and taquitos!

I found a slice of chocolate haupia pie from Ted's Bakery in the fridge and grabbed that right away! Ted's Bakery is located on the North Shore but their pies are sold in various retailers so you don't necessarily have to make a trip up north. The pie is layered with chocolate pudding, haupia (coconut), and whipped cream. It's very light and airy. It's so easy to eat the whole thing without knowing it!

Another dessert we had was a shaka-boom cone ($6.50) from Kokoro Cafe in the food court of the Royal Hawaiian Center. It's a riff on traditional taiyaki (fish-shaped waffles), but in the shape of a hand doing the shaka. You have a choice of filling, soft serve, and two toppings. The soft serve we chose was a dole whip and cherry twist. It's a race to eat it before it melts but it's very cute and Instagram-worthy.      

Before going back to the hotel to crash, we did a quick detour to Waikiki Beach. It's just as pretty during the night. Now more than ever, I wish I could go back!

- CT

SNAPSHOTS | HAWAII 2020 | DAY 2

Our first full day in Hawaii! Warning: lots of eating ahead!

Arguably the most popular restaurant in Waikiki is Marukame Udon. Our hotel was just down the block so we would always see a line of people outside at all hours of the day. Trying to beat the line, we decided to have udon and tempura for breakfast, and honestly, I wasn't mad about it.

Marukame is a Japanese-based noodle chain with over 1,000 locations worldwide. The restaurant is set up like a cafeteria where an assembly line of workers prepare your noodles. As you go further down, you can also pick-up a variety of tempura and musubi. It's easy to go a little overboard because everything is just so affordable!

Once you pay at the very end, there is a self-serve station where you can pick up water, cutlery, condiments, and garnishes. Seating wasn't hard to find since there's a constant turnaround, but we did have to split into two different tables for our group of five.

Between my siblings and I, we decided to share two bowls of udon and an assortment of tempura and musubi to share. Their best seller is their nikutama udon (regular size $6.80) which includes an onsen egg and a sweet beef and onion topping.

To be honest, I wasn't expecting much even with all the hype. I assumed everyone ate here because it was cheap. To my surprise, it was actually super delicious. The udon is perfectly soft but chewy. The broth also clings to the noodles really well; it's light but extremely flavourful. I also liked how the egg provided some creaminess while the beef and onion was soft and sweet.

As for the sides, I thought the tempura was good, although quite standard. A good thing about Marukame's popularity is that the tempura gets replenished fairly often so it's pretty much guaranteed to be fresh and crispy.  

After we finished, we headed over to Hawaii's only Starbucks Reserve Bar for a pick-me-up. The Reserve locations are larger stores that are a bit more specialized in their coffee and production methods. They still carry regular Starbucks menu items, but you'll also find cold brew, nitro, and pour-overs.

Next up, we headed over to the International Marketplace. It's an open-air shopping center that was completely renovated a few years back. We found ourselves here a lot since our hotel was directly across the street.

The mall has a mix of low and high-end stores. There's also plenty of dining options, including a third floor solely dedicated to restaurants. There's also a large banyan tree that runs through the middle, which they've preserved during the renovations.

One of my favourite stores in the mall was Mitsuwa. It's a Japanese supermarket that sells a variety of Japanese groceries, snacks, and prepared food. They also had a few independent food stalls towards the back, including Hokkaido Ramen Santouka, matcha LOVE, and MoDo.

I was really excited to try MoDo, as they specialize in mochi doughnuts! The shape of the doughnuts brought me back to Japan, with Mister Donut and their signature "pon de ring".

I would definitely recommend going earlier in the day if you want the full selection of flavours. We were there quite early but we saw someone leaving with boxes and boxes of doughnuts which meant two of the flavours I wanted to try were already sold out. (Ube and lilikoi, I'll come back for you!)

In the end, I went for black sesame, cookies and cream, matcha, and strawberry. The doughnuts were individually priced but they were all under the $2 mark. Each doughnut has the same mochi base. It's fluffy, chewy, and surprisingly not greasy or oily to the touch. Out of the flavours we chose, my favourite was the strawberry glaze. It didn't taste at all artificial; instead, it reminded me of a really fresh strawberry ice cream. 

While we were in the mall, we also stopped at the Honolulu Cookie Company (HCC) to pick up some souvenirs. Like ABC Stores, you'll find HCC at almost every corner. They make the best shortbread cookies. 

We dropped off our haul at the hotel and then headed out to see Waikiki Beach for the first time. We spent a good amount of time walking the entire stretch of sand. It's definitely crowded and busy, so not exactly my idea of peace and relaxation. 

To beat the heat, we stopped at Banán. It's a "beach shack" located on the side of Royal Hawaiian Center. They specialize in dairy-free soft serve made entirely from frozen bananas.

We went for the cup-sized Riss Moore ($8.00) which is a swirl of their original banana flavour and their açaí flavour. It's surrounded by papaya, pineapple, strawberries, granola, puffed quinoa, shaved coconut, and a drizzle of honey. The banana flavour is pretty strong, so if you aren't a fan of bananas, it probably won't be your cup of tea. It's definitely a sweet treat that you won't feel guilty eating!

Later on in the day, we took an Uber over to Ala Moana Centre. It's the largest shopping mall in Honolulu and also the largest open-air shopping centre in the world. We browsed through a few stores but didn't go crazy since we were already getting tired from all the walking.

For lunch, we stopped at Shirokiya Japan Village Walk which is a sprawling Japanese food hall in the basement of Ala Moana. If you were overwhelmed with the choices at Waikiki Yokocho, wait until you see Shirokiya! I think we took multiple laps around the place just trying to decide on what to eat.

My sister and I weren't very hungry so we picked up a snack at Takoyaki Yama-chan. They sell a variety of different takoyaki, okonomiyaki, and yakisoba. We went for a 10-piece combo set where you can choose two different flavours. We opted to try the regular, topped with takoyaki sauce, mayonnaise, seaweed, and bonito flakes, and the cheese flavour, which includes the same toppings along with a healthy sprinkling of cheese. A pretty standard takoyaki but I do like how they make them fresh the traditional way!

Another popular offering at Shirokiya is cheap beer!

My dad and my brother wandered off on their own, so I'm not too sure on which stall they ended up buying from. My dad went with a steak and shrimp combo over rice. It also comes with a side of green salad and corn. The steak was quite tender and the shrimp was covered in a creamy, garlicky sauce.

My brother opted for the same, only with creamy pasta and a side of garlic bread. He had no complaints.

While everyone was busy eating, I went off on my own in search of Hello Kitty waffles! The waffles are sold at kulu kulu, a Japanese-style cake shop with a variety of different desserts. The waffles are exclusive to the Shirokiya location.

There's a minimum purchase of six pieces for $4.00. I went for the plain mochi, red bean mochi, chocolate, custard, green tea custard, and strawberry. They were just okay. The waffle is soft and doesn't come with very much filling on the inside. But they're really too cute to pass up!

When we exhausted our shopping options at Ala Moana, we took another Uber back to the hotel.

Around dinnertime, my brother and I headed out in search of food while everyone else rested up. We decided on Maguro Brothers since it was conveniently located around the corner of our hotel. They specialize in fresh raw fish, in sliced sashimi or poke form. Their original Chinatown location is only open for lunch, while their Waikiki location is only open for dinner. It's also take-out only so we planned to enjoy our dinner out on the balcony. They open at 5:30pm and close when they sell out. We got there around 5 minutes before they opened but there was already a line 15 people deep! In total, it took about 30-40 minutes to order but only a few minutes before we got our food.

We got an XL poke bowl ($12.75) with half spicy mayo ahi and half shoyu onion ahi . What I like about poke in Hawaii is that it's just simply marinaded fish and rice. While I enjoy a good poke bowl loaded with toppings, this is the traditional way that allows the freshness of the fish to shine. I just wouldn't order the spicy mayo again because it was too spicy for us.

We also bought an XL king salmon donburi ($16.75) with a side of ikura ($4.50) and an XL chirashi donburi ($17.50) with extra scallop ($5.95). They already season the rice with a bit of soy sauce. The fish is also really fresh and makes for a nice light dinner. Eating it al fresco was just the cherry on top!

- CT

SNAPSHOTS | HAWAII 2020 | DAY 1

Aloha from Hawaii!

This past February, I was very grateful to have traded in a week of Canadian winter for the sunny blue skies and water of Honolulu! It's been forever since my entire family vacationed together so I considered ourselves very lucky that we were able to coordinate time off to experience Hawaii for the first time.

The first leg of our trip included a short layover in Vancouver. After the gong show that was US customs, it was otherwise smooth sailing to Honolulu.

Because we booked tickets separately, my brother's flight arrived about an hour later than ours. We ended up just waiting at the airport for him since it didn't make sense to pay for transportation to the hotel twice. Little did we know that there isn't much to do or see at Honolulu's airport...

When we reconvened as a group, we took an Uber over to our hotel. We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn, which was pretty much smack dab in the middle of Waikiki. I would say everything in Waikiki is within walking distance, but I found the location of our hotel to be particularly convenient. 

After dropping off our luggage and freshening up, we headed out in search of our first meal.

We ended up at Waikiki Yokocho, a Japanese food hall that mimics the restaurant and bar-filled alleys of Japan. The food hall is located in the basement of Waikiki Shopping Plaza and features twelve different restaurants and food stalls.

A food hall is basically a food court on steroids. The layout is pretty much an open rectangle, so you're able to walk around and peruse each restaurant's space and menu before making a decision. There are many tempting options, including sushi, ramen, tempura, kushikatsu, and yakiniku. As an added bonus, there's free arcade games for the little ones.

We ended up choosing Ramen Bario which seemed to be the most popular ramen spot out of the other four. This particular restaurant comes from Tokyo and is well-known for their super fatty and flavourful tonkotsu broth. 

I much prefer tsukemen to ramen, so it was no surprise that I went for their original tsukemen ($13.98). The broth was super cloudy, thanks to all the fat that got leached out from the pork bones. It's not overwhelmingly rich or creamy, since the flavour is balanced out with a tangy hit of vinegar, garlic, and spice. I found it a bit too salty for me though. The noodles, served separately from the broth, were probably my favourite part! They were thick, chewy, and firm. However, I wouldn't say they were the ideal type of noodle since it barely picked up any of the soup as it was dipped in. It was almost as if the soup was too thin, whereas a thicker consistency would work better for tsukemen purposes.

For dessert, we wandered over to Nana's Green Tea, also located within Waikiki Yokocho. Like Tsujiri, Nana's is another Japanese-based chain of tea houses, serving an array of matcha drinks, soft serve, and desserts.

We decided to keep it simple and stuck to their soft serve cones. My brother enjoyed his matcha-vanilla swirl ($4.90) while I went for the hojicha soft serve with warabimochi ($5.80). Hojicha is roasted green tea, and I actually prefer the nutty roasted flavour over traditional matcha.

The warabimochi was quite unique. It was my first time trying it, and unlike regular glutinous mochi, warabimochi is made from bracken starch. It's soft and jelly-like. It doesn't have much of a flavour besides the coating of kinako (soybean powder) and drizzle of kuromitsu (brown sugar syrup).

After dessert, we headed out to explore some of the souvenir shops. It's almost comical how many ABC stores you'll come across on the streets of Waikiki.

All stores pretty much sell the same things, so if you're looking to haggle, look no further than Duke's Marketplace. Tucked in a small alley, Duke's is a collection of carts filled to the brim with every tacky souvenir imaginable.  

Before calling it quits for the night, we also tried to stop by the McDonald's down the block for a taro or haupia (coconut) pie. Unfortunately, they only had apple on hand. They explained to us that taro and haupia pies were considered "seasonal." We had impeccably bad timing since I saw that they were selling them again once we were back in Edmonton. Guess it means I'll have to go back! 

- CT