Dinner @ Hoku's By H

Tonight, M and I celebrated a special occasion, so we had dinner out at Hoku's, a restaurant at the Kahala Resort. We prepared for their extensive tasting menu by exercising in the morning and having a light lunch, but the 5 course meal was still daunting! The first course was an amuse bouche of seared salmon on a cucumber salsa.


The next appetizer course was a trio of oysters - From left, oyster with osetra caviar, baked oyster Rockefeller, and tempura oyster sushi. We both agreed the tempura oyster was the best of the three! Really clean tasting while preserving the natural oyster flavor.

The third course was a deconstructed salad of mixed greens with burrata cheese and figs with a crostini. We've never had burrata cheese before, but it was soft and chewy like mozzarella with a creamy flavor. The best part was the fig, which was slightly warmed before serving.


The fourth course was pan seared Chilean sea bass served on artichoke risotto and topped with a truffle foam. I thought this fish was endangered and not available anymore, but guess not. This is my favorite fish of all time, and we were happy to see it on the menu. The truffle foam made this course really savory, and the fish was cooked perfectly.


At this point, we were getting full and could have stopped, but then the main entree arrived. Pan roasted Colorado veal chop served with a side of Maine lobster with asparagus and potato confit. I always like a good surf and turf entree, and this was great. The veal was tender and perfect.


We're usually never too full for dessert, and this was no exception. We were served a really unique white chocolate - lilikoi fondue. Lilikoi is otherwise known as passionfruit outside of Hawaii, and added a really fragrant, citrus flavor to the white chocolate. We only used about a third of the chocolate fondue, and we debated on whether to ask for the remainder in a doggy bag before letting it be taken away.


There was an additional post-dessert dessert of a few little pastries. The best by far was the red guava-flavored gummy. But by this point, we were sort of limping to the finish line.


And finally, a congratulatory post-post-dessert. We couldn't eat this, but instead took it home to enjoy the next day. Overall, a really great and epic dinner, and we got to enjoy it all with an expansive ocean view with the setting sun. We'll come back again one day, but may skip lunch beforehand next time!

Temaki

Tonight, H and I had a 2 person make-your-own-sushi party. Yes, doesn't the picture look like it could feed more people? The rice is not pictured by the way. We weren't sure if we could eat all of the sashimi at first but after about 5 minutes, it was clear that we were on track to finishing it all off pretty quickly. In H's words, "a super luxurious but economical meal!" Today's miso soup made with kabocha (Japanese pumpkin), onions, and carrots may rank among my favorite combo of miso soup ingredients ever.

Seafood Pasta

After our tasty clam linguine dinner from a couple of weeks ago, we decided to try a mixed seafood pasta this time. The frozen seafood medley looked pretty good when we bought it, but by the end of our meal, we were reminded that the fresher the ingredients, the better! Next time we'll get fresh clams again.

Mackerel and Veggies

Last night's fish was mackerel, again in a miso stew with napa cabbage, again a little too salty...but surrounded by lots of fresh yummy veggies.

Hokke

Tonight's fish was hokke, or atka mackerel, a fish that I like to order sometimes at a Japanese restaurant we go to often. We happily discovered that we can have just as tasty an experience at home, and way cheaper too! It's a lean fish, but still soft and tender.

Salmon Rice and Tuna Belly Salad

Another fish-centered menu with salmon and ikura (salmon roe) rice, and tuna belly salad. We decided that tuna belly always looks yummier than it actually tastes. It's kind of sinewy and hard to chew. Next time we'll stick to salmon, hamachi, or some white fish sashimi.

Shutome Udon

Last week we enjoyed having J and B in town - visiting Hawaii in the middle of their around-the-world trip! - and ate out a bit, then H and I finished off the week with a very large and meaty meal at a Korean BBQ place right by our house. So this week's theme is: less meat, more fish and veggies, less overstuffing ourselves...We started the week with udon with shutome, or Hawaiian swordfish, a fish we discovered when H's mom was in town. The shutome is quite tender when cooked and we like it in soup!