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Kapahulu Poi Shop, a closer look
Aloha!
1/3/09 - A few weeks ago I got an e-mail from Mel, raving about an old-time Hawaiian Food Stop near the top of Kapahulu Avenue, just a few hops Diamond Head on the intersect with Winam Ave. I had heard good things about this shop for quite some time now, and, in fact, had a copy of their menu sitting on my desk for the last several months, but I guess it just took a little nudge to finally get me to put it on the site! Thanks, Mel!
Generations of faithful locals are probably happy that Ono Hawaiian Foods, located within eye-shot on Kapahulu Ave., gets all the attention and media coverage, as it's kinda nice to have quality Hawaiian food via the Kapahulu Poi Shop, instead, which is generally free of the sizeable crowds always lingering across the street. Don't worry, faithful locals, my site is so small-time, I don't even count as media coverage! The secret is still yours!
Don't you love a place with character? You know, character in the sense that a place just continues on being itself, unwittingly developing its own unique traits, standards, and even quirks, seemingly disconnected and definitely different from the environment that surrounds it? In this super-connected, oftentimes cookie-cutter world we live in, with everyone looking over their shoulders, each one trying to up the ante to bigger, better, and bolder, everyone strangely starts looking, feeling, and tasting a bit too much like everyone else, no?
That's why places like Kapahulu Poi Shop are such a refreshing change of pace from the modern-day rat race out there. Seemingly in competition with noone, you get the feeling they are completely content to continue on day after day, happily being itself, regardless of what the world says around it. Don't you just love that? There's a certain beauty in the idea, a quiet kind of charisma, an undeniable charm.
I mean, you could look at it as not keeping up with the times and the Jones's, but I prefer to say it's just a place with a whole lotta character! It's like, who cares what everyone else thinks, just be yourself! Noone minds that half your dining area is a storage room full of plastic cups, styrofoam plates, paper napkins, and coke-a-cola boxes, right? And if they did, oh well..... Forget them! This is old-school, where you don't have to put on an hours worth of make-up on, color coordinate your outfit, nor even comb your hair or wash your face before stepping inside! Who you tryin' to impress, anyway? I think I may have even had some maka-pia-pia in da eye, but no worries, brah... I don't think anyone noticed at all!
Despite the nice and cozy surroundings, wifey and I had mom waiting at home for lunch, so we had take-out, instead. As in most Hawaiian Food joints, the menu is very small, featuring only a handful of main items - lau lau, kalua pig (don't you hate when they call it kalua pork!), chicken long rice, beef or tripe stew, and chicken, squid, or na'au (pig intestine, or tripe, if you want!) luau. Side dishes include poi, rice, sweet potato, pipi kaula, lomi salmon, oil sardines, and haupia. Besides the sometimes-available ahi poke and raw squid, I just read you the entirety of the menu! Oftentimes, Hawaiian Food restaurants will also include local-style kalbi, shoyu chicken, macaroni salad, and other non-traditional dishes, but except for opihi, I can't really think of any other traditional dish Kapahulu Poi Shop hasn't covered. For a more in-depth explanation of these dishes, one by one, check out the Hawaiian Foods page.
Except for beef and tripe stew, the rest of the entree items can also be combined into two or three item plates, complete with lomi salmon, haupia, and either poi, rice, or sweet potato. And when available, they also include poke or raw squid on the three-item plate.
The plates we ordered on this particularly lovely day were all different, as we always try to cover as much ground as possible in a single sitting. Wifey is the only one that enjoys poi, and, coupled with the fact that it's good for you, particularly with digestion, she always orders it when available. The two main dishes on her plate were lau lau and chicken long rice, not to mention the pair of sides all our plates came with - lomi salmon and a small cup of that custardized coconut milk called haupia.
The thing that struck me most about the grindz here was the strong Hawaiian salt flavor everything seemed to have. In a good way, of course. It wasn't overpowering, but definitely full-flavored, and with the distinct taste of natural rock salt, not the more chemical-tasting, fine crystals of iodized salt. It seemed to work its way into every portion of meat, veggie, or starch, each bite exploding with flavor, unlike some places that undersalt, leaving some of the inner portions of pork or other meat a bit tasteless.
Though the chicken long rice was very humble, coming with only a few small morsels of chicken and no round onion whatsoever, it was certainly no exception to the rule of taste here, with a delicious, simple flavor and noodles that were a bit on the thicker side.
Mom's plate came with white rice, along with kalua pig and chicken luau. The rice was local-style all the way, coming super-sticky and mushy, which is a style many out there love, but one I'd rather feed to the mynah birds! We actually ended up throwing it out and using some left-over rice in our rice-cooker, instead.
As you can see, "plates" are not really plates at all, but thin cardboard boxes, and pretty good-sized ones at that, in which contained smaller containers of various individual dishes.
I actually ended up eating half the chicken luau, even as mom ate half of my lau lau. It was apparent by the color of the chicken luau that there wasn't a whole lot of coconut milk mixed in, something mom appreciated very much, but not me - it still tasted great, but I'd have loved it even more with the rich, creamy flavor of a stronger coconut milk!
The final plate, mine, contained the last starch not yet ordered, sweet potato. The large, yellow pieces were sliced into three of the thickest parts of the potato, and was delicious, coming with a perfectly soft, moist, and, yes, sweet flesh. Lots of places use the popular Okinawan sweet potato, with its distinctly purple insides, but I've found that the purple's have a tendency to dry out at times, and always seem a bit heavier. But that's just me...
I initially ordered my plate with a combination of lau lau and chicken long rice, but since I wanted a side of pipi kaula and poke, as well, the kind counter-person suggested it would be cheaper to order a three-item plate, with pipi kaula as a third item. Remember, three-entree plates also come with poke or raw squid when available, so Bam! There's our poke as a free, added bonus! As the counter-helper, no doubt the owners son, began packing up my plate, or box, if you will, I quickly asked if they could pack the poke separate, instead, not wanting it to be enclosed with hot items during the 20-minute drive back home. The poke itself turned out to be nothing to write home about, and surely not from the best cuts, but aaah, perhaps just enough to satisfy any poke cravings out there.
And finally, on to the whole plate, itself. I quickly dispatched the wrapper of ti leaf surrounding the lau lau, chopped it in half, and gave one side to mom. Again, the recurring theme here was the nice, rounded, full-flavored taste of Hawaiian salt found in every savory item on our plates. The pork inside the lau lau wasn't particularly meaty, but not skimpy, either. Although most prefer it loaded, I actually like it with less meat and more luau leaf! Gimme a tiny bit of meat, lots of fat and protein-soaked greens, and everything mixed in with white rice (from our own rice pot!), and I'm aaalll good, lemme tell ya!!!
The pipi kaula, pictured on the bottom left of the plate above, was not bad at all. Some places use traditional, store-bought, bright-red, deli-looking meat with very little fat, while others use house-made varieties that look and taste very different, and more like crudely-cut, backyard smoked meats. Kapahulu Poi Shop's version leaned toward the former in general taste, but it also had a rustic look and feel that was more like the latter - more fat, irregular, thicker cuts, and a general lack of looking anything like a clean deli-style meat. It was pretty tender and moist for smoked meat, with a much mellower, more natural taste than grocery store varieties but not nearly as strong nor tough as the very smokey, very rustic house-made varieties (forgive me for a lack of a better term!).
Portions here are not as humongous as you might expect from a Hawaiian Food outlet, and I was surprised that there were no left-overs at all, as full-sized plates of any kind, whether they be plate lunch, Korean, Chinese, or anything else, are usually too much for the three of us to handle. Who knows, maybe the food was just so good, is all!
But let's not tell the whole world about this place, as regulars may not appreciate a sudden influx of people marauding their secret spot. People here are humble and down to earth, the surroundings waaay old-school, the food basic and simple, but very much honest-to-goodness great, in a home-style kind of way. With the two and three-item plates coming in at $9.25 and $12.75, the Kapahulu Poi Shop is a very affordable, much less-trafficked option for ono Hawaiian Food.
And with that, I'll leave you with a final, character-filled shot, and bid you all a happy first month of the best year of your life!
Take care and aloha till next time!
Aku
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