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I sorry, but I getting tired hear about this place get the best beef stew and that place get the best hamburger steak and over dea get the best poke, or whatevah place get the best whatevah? And then I go try em and it's only OK. On top of that, times are hard and I like try make sure I no waste money on stuffs that not all that ono. So how I going find me where really get the best this and the best that? The other day I had one idea for how I maybe can find out.
What if, all the places that are supposedly the best places to get a certain kind of local food (e.g. best places for beef stew), all went head to head in a blind taste test? Yes, blind. Where the judges tasting the foods don’t know where the foods are from. And yes, head to head. Where the judges are tasting all of em at one location, side by side, so they can compare em right there. And the judges are everyday local folks like you and me. No reader polls, no popularity contests, no local food "experts", no loyalties to your favorite place, no forgetting how the other place went taste cause you ate em last month, no big name chefs, no small kid time memories, no ignorance. No nothing influencing the judges except the food. Which one will the judges like the best? Will the one you thought was the "Winnah" turn out to be the “Winnah of the Winnah”? I don’t know...maybe...we go try find out. Welcome to the Winnah Of the Winnah (WOW) Grinds Blind Taste Test Challenge.
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Sunday, 04 October 2009 00:00 |
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Mahalos for voting and helping us select the next grinds challenge. It was a close race over the past week between garlic chicken, teri burger and mac salad. Edging out garlic chicken and teri burger by only couple votes was mac salad. This should be one interesting blind taste test because get so many styles of local style mac salad. Get the old skool spaghetti noodle kine, get some with tuna or relish inside, get some that's watery and some more on the dry side...all kines. Pretty soon we be posting the voting to see which mac salad legends will be selected to compete for the title of WOW (Winnah Of the Winnah) Mac Salad! Btw, the mac on the left if from Uptown Cafe...was ono with their hamburger steak! |
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Tuesday, 29 September 2009 00:00 |
I just checked out the Tasty Island food blog and the latest blog entry features the wonderful Ethel's Grill in Kalihi. And then I heard the Honolulu Advertiser recently did a write-up on Ethel's too. So I was thinking if I saw those guys at Ethel's because I've been eating there kinda often the past couple months. So I figure I share my Ethel's pics too. First, if you get lucky, you might get one complimentary plate of the Tataki Sashimi. Nice cuts of seared ahi in a ponzu sauce...I think. Before time the Tataki used to come with warabi (baby fern shoots), but maybe was too expensive to keep up this ingredient in a complimentary dish. I was so happy when the guy put em in front me and said, "on the house." The garlic chicken was recommended by Judge Yamanoha DNA who is a garlic chicken lover. He thinks this is one of the best he's had. Lightly battered boneless fried chicken pieces drenched in some kind of a garlic-ee, shoyu-ee, mirin-ee sauce. Then my good friend who works at the shipyard told me to try the pork chops. My friend folks used to go Ethel's all the time after work and his favorite pau hana grinds was the pork chops. The pork chops was plain and simple. Two hunks of deep fried pork-o-licious magic with the edges all crispy and salty. No forget to suck the bone...mmmm savage! Last but not least, the mochiko chicken was crunchy crumbly and was just right mochiko chicken flavor. It came with this ono ponzu sauce for dipping the piping hot pieces of boneless chicken inside. Stuffed to satisfaction is what I was after these meals. Ethel's give pretty big portions for a decent price. If you like eat there, go early morning or late afternoon because always get choke long line during lunch hour. Btw, for you fiber fanatics, the guy said they only serve hapa rice (brown/white mix).
| Tataki Sashimi |
Garlic Chicken |
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| Fried Pork Chops |
Mochiko Chicken |
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Monday, 28 September 2009 09:42 |
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Aloha folks! We're gearing up for the next WOW Grinds Blind Taste Test Challenge. So far, the online poll shows a relative tie between Mac Salad, Teri Burger and Garlic Chicken as the next battle royale. To give people a chance to throw in some more votes, we'll wait until this Friday 10/2/09 to take a look at the votes and see what the next challenge will be. Thanks for voting and helping us select the next challenge.
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Monday, 21 September 2009 00:00 |
The other week I was in the Aiea area kinda often in the mornings. Was lucky for me because I got to go try more stuff at Forty-Niner Drive-in. In the past, I had their fried rice and teri burger. Both were ono and reminded me of small kid time going with Dad to the little diners and saimin shops late at night. So this time I tried some different stuffs. The Portuguese sausage, egg and fried rice plate was sholid and big portion. I think they gave 6 pieces Rego's Purity PS. The Belgian waffle was crispy on the outside and light airy on the inside...almost like the Belgian waffle at Original Pancake House (Kapiolani/Dillingham). And finally, the smoke meat and eggs looked small kine funky at first with the big slices of shiitake mushrooms, but when you take the meat, onion and shiitake all at once and dip em in the egg yolk, was bust the mouth smokey goodness. I not sure if other places on Oahu serve smoke meat and eggs for breakfast, but I hope more places serve this winnah combo. If anybody know, I like know where.
Portuguese Sausage, Eggs and Fried Rice
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Belgian Waffle
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Smoke Meat, Eggs and Rice |
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Wednesday, 16 September 2009 00:00 |
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The other day, my friend asked me one real hard question. He asked, "Goma-tei Tan Tan Ramen or Tenkaippin Paitan Ramen...if you had to eat one for the rest of your life, which one would you chose?" I was thinking so hard going back and forth, back and forth, I thought my head was going explode like the people in that movie Scanners (warning you the link is gross). After about a week, I never decide yet. Both are delicious in their own way. Goma-tei get the hearty sesame flavor broth and their noodles are just right chewy. Tenkaippin get that rich velvety broth that almost taste like they put heavy cream inside. I not sure if I'll ever be able to choose, but I leaning towards Tenkaippin...I think...for now.
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Sunday, 13 September 2009 00:00 |
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About 5 or 6 years ago, my Father-in-law asked me if I could try find him dried abalone. I said, "dried abalone...what's dat?" He told me in his hanabattah days, plenty boys used to carry around a hunk of dried abalone in their pocket. Throughout the day they used their pocket knife to shave off thin slices to munch on. When he was telling me about the dried abalone days, he had the nostalgic tone in his voice and twinkle in his eyes, so I knew it meant a lot to him to taste it again. So I went all over Chinatown, the fish markets, poke shops and called some local seafood distributors, but everyone had the same answer, "nobody make dried abalone anymore." He was pretty disappointed when I told him no can find, but I told him I would keep an eye out for it. All the years passed and then couple months ago, my bro told me that Alicia's Market (#1 limu poke in the WOW Grinds blind taste test) had dried abalone. I went the next day and picked up some pieces. The guy at Alicia's said they started drying their own abalone again recently. I not sure if this is the same thing my Father-in-law had back in the day, but was tasty. Had a sweet salty glaze on the outside...more on the sweet side. The meat was slightly chewy, but still tender enough so your teeth sink in easily. And then had that oh so ono oceany flavor that abalone usually get. I still gotta take some to my Father-in-law...hopefully soon. Would be nice if it brings him back to his hanabattah abalone days. Btw, Alicia's Market making abalone poke too.
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Monday, 07 September 2009 00:00 |
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Couple weeks ago my cousin from California came to Hawaii for a week long vacation. I never see him for about 2 years, so was unreal good to reconnect with him...and was even better that he wanted to try all kine local grinds. Here's some pics of some of the places we took him to grind. He said everything was "so good" and his favorites were Alicia's Market Limu Poke/Smoke Tako Poke, Helena's Shortribs Pipikaula, Sorabol Steamed Kalbi, Zippy's Chili Loco Moco and Boots and Kimo Mac Nut Pancakes.
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Tuesday, 11 August 2009 00:00 |
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The Chicken Katsu Classic took place on July 26, 2009. Nine of Oahu's best chicken katsu clashed in a WOW Grinds Blind Taste Test. For those that voted in the preliminary regional poll you helped select the top chicken katsu from each region on Oahu providing a wide range of ono katsu competitors. Unfortunately, the Honolulu region competitor, Sugoi's, was closed on Sunday, so we went with the second place vote-getter in the Honolulu region...Kent's Drive-in. In the end, the Central Oahu regional competitor, Young's Kalbee, won the first place spot by a supa narrow margin. Congratulations Central Oahu! A sub-battle that arose out of the regional online voting poll involved a duel between two different L&L locations...the original L&L on Liliha St. and the L&L at the Pearl City Wal-mart (the Leeward region competitor). The original L&L gracefully defeated the L&L Pearl City location hinting that maybe the original L&L never share all its secrets with the other locations. Anyways, click read more to see the full results table.
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