Germaine's Luau: Don't go for the food!

Mira and I took off for Germaine's Luau over the holiday weekend. The entertainment was great! The food was all you can eat, but less tasty than the price tag led me to expect.

The fried chicken and fried mahi mahi were astonishingly bad. My piece of fried chicken looked freezer-burned after I pulled off the greasy, tasteless breading. The bottom tip of the breast had cooked into jerky. The fish had all the texture of an overripe banana, including the breading. Here's a tip for good deep frying: use hot oil, (400 degrees or better) chill your ingredients well, and then use a draining rack. Keep the fried stuff hot after frying. That's the best way to keep it from going soggy.

Redeeming the meal, the lomilomi salmon (basically raw salmon salsa) was great, and some chips or pita bread would have complimented it well. The teriyaki beef and the pit roasted pork were ok, and some good BBQ sauce would have brought the pork into the front row seating it deserves on the plate.

The Haupia (coconut gelatin) came with a warning from our host to beware it's laxative effect, but the flavor wasn't bad.

As for the rest, nothing stood out. rolls, rice, salad, macaroni salad, 3-bean salad, and sheet cakes were all cafeteria standard, adding bulk but no innovation.

I'd been wanting to try poi, and I did. Anyone who tells you it tastes like paste is right. In fact, if I mixed a paste from raw cornstarch, water, and a drop of purple food coloring, you wouldn't know the difference between that and poi. I think poi must be a missed opportunity for flavor. It is a blank canvas, waiting for a creative cook. I want to experiment with it, and here are my initial ideas, trying to keep it generally Hawaiian, instead of treating it like polenta or grits. 

 Image: Germaine's poi

1. Pineapple juice and coconut milk instead of water as a base, and served as a dessert pudding.  
2. Fry it into a pancake with green onions and pork.
3. Make it into a funnel cake!
4. Shred the taro with a julienne slicer and mix with coleslaw.
5. Use it as a platform for a curry sauce.
6: Add sugar and a bit of egg white and whip it into a cake frosting, with shredded coconut on top.
7: Use it as a base for a fish chowder.
8: Cookies?
9: As a deep frying tempura batter for the fish.
10: As wallpaper paste.

I'll have to get my hands on some so I can try out my ideas in a future blog.

Finally, here's me with one of the hula dancers

Phuket Thai in Waikiki: Skip the Appetizers.

Mira had the masumum curry at Phuket Thai. I had black bean and ginger beef. Both were solid entrees. neither amazing nor disappointing. The flavors were well balanced and the ingredients were good, although the plating was pretty boring. The restaurant won a few local awards in years past, but seems to have missed out on accolades for 2010 and 2011, and it was clear why. The appetizers sucked.

Let me expound a bit. I ordered the appetizer platter with fish patties, spring rolls, egg rolls, and the one attention getter: the Phuket stuffed chicken wings. It was well below my expectations. The spring rolls were lukewarm, while they should be served well chilled. The egg rolls and stuffed wings were only slightly warmer, and both managed to be greasy and bland. I've had microwaved egg rolls that were better.

I added some peanut sauce to the stuffed wing (above) to make it palatable. The breading was dry and mealy.


Phuket Thai is a nice walking distance from the East side of Waikiki. It is just far enough to build your appetite for some spicy food, but not far enough to give you blisters. The decor was nice inside, and it all tied together well, which was a nice touch. I recommend it for quiet atmosphere and well-flavored entrees, but the seats aren't comfortable enough to stay for more than one course.