Big Island Grinds

Looking for a place to grind in Kona? Skip the resorts and anywhere on Ali’i drive and head one street up to Big Island Grill. You won’t find a loco moco like this anywhere nearby.

We got a super loco ($11.25). Choose 3 types of meat.

“Ok coming! My son loaded ‘um up.”, our waitress said with a smile. The family atmosphere in here really warmed up the place.

Isn’t it lovely? *brief pause to take it all in*

Crispy chicken katsu, juicy tender roast pork, and a nicely grilled homemade burger patty topped with 2 eggs and thick tasty gravy. I don’t think I’ve had all of my favorite things all on one plate before!

We also shared some banana pancakes ($7.25). These were light and moist. Bananas were sweet.

Come early. It was packed by 9am on a Saturday with a long wait list.

Big Island Grill
75-5702 Kuakini Hwy
Kailua-Kona, Hawaii

Fresh ahi poke, smoke pork w/guava jelly, Big Island beef burger, and $5 huge mugs of beer (happy hour). Meeeaan brah!

Hawaiian style Ahi poke ($9.95), more than half pound. Might be my favorite poke on the island! Perfectly seasoned and always fresh here.

Smoked pork w/guava jelly. Very addicting combination. Only $4.00 (half-off) during happy hour!

Big island beef burger on sweet bread roll. Good!

Service here is really friendly and family style. Definitely one of my fav places on the Big Island!

Pakini Grill
65-1144 Mamalahoa Hwy
Kamuela, HI 96743
(808) 885-3333
http://pakinigrill.com/

Love Island Natural’s ahi bento and poke! These guys make eating healthy taste good. Lightly breaded tender pieces of ahi over brown rice with a tasty teri sauce. The beauty is all of the little sides… juicy shitake mushroom, curry tofu salad, and even little pretty edible flowers!

The poke is from their amazing salad bar, which definitely requires a post on its own. Their produce section is also fantastic. We come here at least twice a week for lunch and their produce.

Island Naturals Hilo Market & Deli
http://www.islandnaturals.com
1221 Kilauea Avenue, Hilo, HI 96720
(808) 935-5533

Howzit! Lately I’ve been taking more pictures of food using my iPhone than my regular camera. While I still prefer the old way, I need to make it easier to post so I post more. Readers… are you still there? I hope you are and I hope you don’t mind some iPhone posts. It’s a sacrifice needed in order to keep blogging alive.

To test, I’m attaching a photo of one of my favorite delicacies enjoyed on a recent camping trip. Hope it works.

Freshly picked opihi. Risked my life for these but it was so worth it! Love it straight off the rocks or grilled (as seen) with some shoyu and lemon. Perfect with beer.

Visiting this place today brought back my passion in food blogging, something I’ve missed for a long time. In fact, I was so excited to share with you guys about this place I couldn’t wait (even though I still have a backlist of places I still need to write about). Hawaiian Style Cafe is my new favorite place for SERIOUS GRINDZ.

Brah!!! Just look at my breakfast, “Da Tita Mok” ($8.25):

Huge thick flame-broiled hamburger patty, 2 thick slices of spam, moist and crunchy chicken cutlet, 1 egg, grilled onions, fried rice, and rich tasty brown gravy over everything.

It tasted just as good as it looked. The hamburger patty was great quality local beef and fresh. It was actually on the leaner side but still very moist and meaty. Kind of like Ken’s burger but thicker and more moist. The chicken cutlet was my favorite. So moist and crispy on the outside and perfect with the gravy, which was very rich and homemade-tasting. Fried rice was really good too… not too salty and it didn’t overpower the rest of the dish. Grilled onions was a good touch and the spam was cooked just right. My only complaint was that the egg was a little overcooked on the bottom, but it was still nice and yolky. Wow. Quantity and quality.

95%

Bev ordered two pancakes ($2.25/each pancake) but we actually shared everything.

HUGE HUGE HUGE. I liked these. Soft. Spongy. Moist. I do wish they had a bit more cake-like texture because it was a little too spongy/bouncy. I also wish that it was more crisp on the edges. I still would order these again. They were so soft and tasty.

Here’s the specials menu that was up (they even have “Stew Luau”! aka Beef Luau):

Here’s the Breakfast & Lunch Menu:

How was the service? Friendly, local-style, like walking into your favorite Aunty’s kitchen… but very slow and sometimes forgetful (they were really busy). If you are in a rush to go somewhere, don’t come here. This is somewhere to go when you have all morning to eat and digest and all afternoon to sleep. One thing we missed was that you need to sign-in to the right of the door then wait until there are free seats.

The food made it all worth it though. I can’t wait to go back! I wish they were in Hilo!

Hawaiian Style Cafe
65-1290 Kawaihae Rd, Kamuela, HI 96743 (map)
(808) 885-4295

Ahhhh beef luau. One of my favorite dishes ever! Beef, luau leaves, water, salt… maybe an onion… and that’s it. Aren’t the simplest dishes always the best?

This weekend I had a mean craving for this (it might’ve been because of all the Hilo rain). The problem was that I never really made this myself before and searching the google internet machine resulted in no success either.

Why is it so hard to find a recipe for this? Luckily, the helpful guys at the HawaiiThreads.com KauKau Corner were nice to help me out. *s*

I used some of the tips they gave me and adapted it for the pressure cooker. Normally this dish would take 3-4 hours, but with a pressure cooker, only 1-1.5 hours.

Ingredients:

- 1lb Luau Leaves
- 2lb Beef Brisket
- Water
- Good handful of Hawaiian Salt
- 1 Large Onion sliced thinly

First step is to prepare the luau leaves.

Just make sure to cut out the big vein section that connects to the stem. Some people take all the veins out, but it’s really not necessary.

Next, pressure cook the leaves in water for 5-10 minutes (boil ~15-20 minutes if no pressure cooker).  I’m not too sure how much this helps, but it is supposed to make the dish “cleaner tasting”.

Then drain out the brownish water which has all that itchy-mouth stuff.

For the beef I used bone-in brisket because it’s a great stewing meat with good fat content which enhances this dish. Having the bone still on creates a richer broth. Cost-U-Less in Hilo has good deals on this. If you don’t have brisket, any good stewing beef would work just as good. Note: You may want to trim some of the fat if your cut is very fatty.

Brown the brisket.

Throw in a large chopped onion sliced thinly.

Saute for a few minutes.

Next, add some water and scrape all the brown yum-yums off the bottom of the pot. Then mix in the luau leaves and add enough water to cover. Yeah, my pressure cooker was too small for this.

Pressure cook for about 50 minutes. 3 hours if no pressure cooker.

The kitchen should now smell onolicious! Open up the pressure cooker and taste test the luau leaves. Are they still a little tough? Do they make your mouth itchy? If so, you need to cook it some more until it’s tender, moist and clean-tasting.

Once the leaves are all tender, add hawaiian salt to taste.

I added more water since I wanted it a more soupy consistency…

Grindage time!!!

Serve with rice or poi, raw maui onions and chili peppa water on da side. I think I going eat some more now…

Much mahalos to da guys at HawaiiThreads.com!