our hawaiian traditions

When we visit Oahu we have traditional things that we always do. First thing is usually to eat at Zippy's straight from the airport. Next, is every morning we go to Starbucks to get an oatcake and coffee of course. The oatcake is a very healthy sort of hard cake-like bakery item with oats, dried cranberries, dried blueberries and some other stuff that Jeff told me not to look at and is only made (and sold) in Hawaii. It's really good. We thought of bringing some home but decided to look forward to our next trip instead...

Next we always go to the Aloha Stadium Swap Meet. It's a great place to get souveniers at a good price. It's usually really hot so we try to go early. Jeff says the trailer that sells malasada's is the best he has ever had (even better than ever popular Leonard's). We usually meet my cousin Laura and her daughter, Kassidee at the swap meet and for lunch after.


The swap meet goes around the outside of Aloha Stadium, where UH football is played and the NFL Pro Bowl.

Jeff and Kassidee

Lunch time!!! We wanted to try Chun Wah Kam Noodle Factory, a place that we found on the Internet as a must try place. They are supposed to be famous for Manapua and giant plate lunches. It's sort of a Hawaiian and Chinese thing. A big bun (baked or steamed) filled with various items. This will be a new addition to our tradition list.

It was very crowded. You have to take a number and someone takes your order. Laura and Jeff figured out what to get while Kassidee and I saved a table.

Box of dim sum. 2 manapua, one steamed (chicken) and the other is baked char su (bbq pork). One sesame ball, 2 pork hash and 2 moon something that Laura ordered.

Beef Broccoli and Hot Dog Fried Rice

Chow fun (my favorite food) and Cold Chicken (also my favorite)

Jeff enjoying his baked manapua!!!

Close up of the char su filling (roast pork). We really liked Chun Wah Kam Noodle Factory. The food was really big and tasted good too. We are glad we tried it

Next stop is always the North Shore. It was a cloudy day but still warm and beautiful as usual. This trip we went to Pipeline, where they have big waves that are turn into glassy tubes of water.

Playing in the sand.

Watching the surfers.

We were walking along the beach and saw this house with a Volcom symbol on it. Must be a house where Volcom surfers stay. It was interesting to see. We had a very nice and relaxing afternoon at the beach...

After the beach we went shopping at Ala Moana Center. Our first stop is Shirokiya a Japanese store. We always stop at the bakery and since it will be Girls Day on March 3rd, they had these really cute cakes. Wish we could have gotten one!!!

Jeff's favorite at the bakery are these long johns. He never goes to Hawaii without eating several of these.

At Shirokiya we saw these new sweets. Mochi Cream, we didn't know what they are but asked the sales girl and she said mochi filled with whipped cream. We decided to try some. The sales girl said to wait 5 minutes before eating them (they were frozen). It was a long 5 minutes for me!!! I got chocolate and was a little disappointed. It was filled with chocolate flavored beans and a tiny bit of whipped cream. A little strange but Jeff said he thought it was good. Always fun to try new things.

Dinner time and of course Jeff had to go back to Palace Saimin. Laura and Kassidee joined us. We all had the saimin. If you want a soda, you have to purchase it from a machine.

This time Jeff got an extra large size and enjoyed it very much. I was starting to get tired of saimin and sort of grateful that Palace Saimin is closed the next 2 days cause I am sure we would have been back!!! Now we just have to wait till our next trip to Hawaii. Our traditons list is getting longer...

leap day

Aloha and happy leap day. This morning we flew to Hawaii for the weekend to celebrate our anniversary. Wanted to get some warm sun and eat some good food. Our day started off with the computers at the airport not recognizing leap day and we had to get checked in manually by an agent. We were hoping this was not a bad sign. Our flight was good and we arrived in Honolulu in one piece.

Jeff was really looking forward to trying a new saimin place that Uncle Richard told him about. It has strange hours so Jeff thought he should try it on the first day in case it is really good he wanted to make sure he could eat it at least one more time. He said he knew where it was located but an hour and half later we could not find it. Jeff called them 3 times for directions and each time they hung up on him. I was starving and almost died of lack of food so we ate at Zippy's. We got saimin and a zip pac which consisted of rice, spam, fish, chicken and teri beef. Our food was good but Jeff was still disappointed he didn't get to try Palace Saimin Stand.

Close up of Zippy's saimin

noodles, soup, green onion, fish cake and bbq pork

Long Johns another of Jeff's favorites of Hawaii

long doughnut filled with custard

We are missing the grand opening of the very first Nordstrom in Hawaii.

Opens March 7th.

We stayed at our favorite hotel. Hilton Hawaiian Village. This time we tried a different tower, Kalia. It is the newest one. Our room was nice and came with an ocean view.

Jeff ordered extra pillows on the internet. They arrived before us. Last time we didn't get them.

Bathroom, small but nice.



View from our room.

Diamond Head

Sunset

Every Friday night there are fireworks at the Hilton. This is our 4th stay and the first time we have seen the fireworks on the beach. It was really nice.

Finally, Jeff looked up the location on Palace Saimin Stand on his computer and found out that it's close to the airport on the way to the hotel. We decided to drive by it at night (they open at 8pm for dinner) in case it was in a bad neighborhood we would just check it out and if it's safe we would stop and eat dinner.

It looked OK so we went in.

Pretty small menu and cheap too.

Wun tun min

Saimin

BBQ sticks

After eating our dinner. Jeff declared that this is his new favorite saimin place. Even better than Hamura's in Kauai where it is not uncommon for him to eat three meals there a day. He liked the crunchy (not literally) noodles. He vowed to come back tomorrow again for dinner since they are closed on Sunday and Monday...

new eats

While visiting Mom in the hospital we discovered some new places to eat. Chicken Pie Shop. It was like going back to the 50's even the waitresses were all old and grouchy too. For $5 you could get soup or salad and a chicken pot pie and mash potato. It was really good.

The other place is Portillo's. Clyde and Kelly first told us about it. They specialize in beef sandwiches and Chicago style hot dogs. Jeff' claim's it's the best chili dog he has ever had. Can't wait to go back. Just wish they had one closer to our house!!! There is only one location in California. The rest are in Chicago.

Interesting decor






Chili Dog




Beef sandwich

mom

Mom at the rehab center

Update on Mom. On Febuary 6th, Mom didn't feel well. The next day she finally went to the hospital and found out she had a heart attack. That night she had a balloon pump inserted next to her heart and found out that most of her arteries were badly blocked. On Febuary 10th (Brian's birthday) she had open heart surgery (5 bypasses). She did really good in surgery but was not stable and had some bleeding so that night she had a second surgery. They opened her up again. Looked at her heart and stopped the bleeding. It took her a long while to wake up. Slowly, each day she got better and better. She was released from the hospital on Febuary 15th and is now in a rehab center. At first she was really weak and couldn't sit up or even walk. She is making very good progress and will go home when she is able to resume normal everyday tasks.

As you can see she is doing really good.

toffee

On a recent trip to Disneyland we discovered these tasty treats. English toffee. It is the best we have ever had. We thought we would share some photo's of how they are made. If you are at Disneyland, this is a must try. Although, these treats are pricey at $12 a bag!!!

First they make the toffee.

They are hand dipped in chocolate.


Lastly, they are rolled in chopped almonds.

Jeff enjoying his Engish Toffee!!!