Regal Bakery expands to McCully

Regal Bakery has expanded from its airport site to McCully Shopping Center (in the Regal Diner plate lunch / dim sum spot...which still serves plate lunch and dim sum. They just added a donut display case in the front).

Can't miss the giant donut outside the shop:

 You are greeted by a tempting display case of donuts at the entrance. Only $10 for a dozen!

 The entire menu:

 My box of a dozen assorted:

 Wow. Seriously a work of art. They only do cake donuts.

 Frosted flake crunch and multi-colored jimmies:

 Maple and cinnamon sugar

 Orange and pink

 Coconut and oreo crush:

Regal Bakery

The original: http://www.yelp.com/biz/regal-bakery-honolulu-2

3040 Ualena St
Honolulu, HI 96819

(808) 834-4423

The new one:

http://www.yelp.com/biz/regal-bakery-honolulu-3

1960 Kapiolani Ave
Ste 115 (next to 7-11)
Honolulu, HI 96826

Tour of the Island: best bakeries & what to get at each one

one of my friends, m, spoils us every year with her annual dessert party. it's a great way to catch up with all the friends who are only home in hawaii for the holiday...and, to gorge ourselves on sugary sweets.

this year she decided to pick up her favorite sweet treat from each of hawaii's top bakeries, so everyone could get to try them in one place. man, i recommend that everyone has the chance to do this one day!

#1) Pecan bars from Cakeworks (the old Mary Catherine's, known for wedding cakes)



#2) Cocoa puffs from Liliha Bakery

#3) Cupcakes from Cake Couture: there are a lot of opinions and a lot of new cupcakes in town (Hokulani, Let them eat cupcakes, Poppy coffee shop...), but Marissa and I both swear by Cake Couture. She recommended the Key Lime Coconut flavor (Tuesdays) so that is next on my to-try list.

#4) Pumpkin Crunch Cake from The Alley at Aiea Bowl. Legendary.

#5) Lemon Bars from Kaka'ako Kitchen

#6) Not available anywhere else: homemade bacon flan. Wowsers.

There was also a fruit tart from St Germaine (?) but I missed taking a photo of that one.

Leonard's Bakery: Whaaaat, not the malasadas?

Yummy visit to Leonard's last week when a friend was in town on vacation. We were wondering where to go for dessert after taking her to Ono Hawaiian Food, so I sneakily suggested either Bubbie's or Leonard's, since I'd been hoping to try either (a) the holiday flavor mochi ice cream at Bubbies -- cranberry & pumpking, or (b) the banana cream pie at Leonards. Random, right? Who goes to Leonard's for the pastries? I can't remember where I read about it, but I knew I had to try it.

Malasada menu: Just 90 cents! For Original, cinnamon sugar, or li hing mui (sour plum powder). And just $1.25 for a custard filled malasada (original, chocolate, haupia, or flavor of the month).

Love the schedule of malasada filling: mac nut, pineapple, mango, guava and lilikoi.

 Mmmmm, the squares of banana cream pie. They don't look that good behind the glass pastry case, but man they were worth it.

Inside the bakery

 Some cute holiday cupcakes: poinsettia and snowflake

 All wrapped up to go

 Ooh, I want some of that Portuguese sweet bread next time I am there.

933 Kapahulu Ave
Honolulu, HI 96816

(808) 737-5591

www.leonardshawaii.com

Yelp 

This is it: Best bagel on the Island!

I miss my east coast bagels. I still remember when my dad brought home a bakers dozen of H&H bagels and I finished them off in a few days. Heaven on Earth. Chewy but soft. I tend to avoid bagels when I'm at home (although I do like Lox of Bagels on Sand Island), but I wanted to pick up bagels for my office the other day. So I decided to stop off at This is It in Kaka'ako...for the best bagels on the island. Here's the baskets of fresh bagels. You can see all the donuts in the back! They also have a separate case with pastries and scones. I got a dozen mini bagels and some cream cheese for my office. And also picked up a sandwich for lunch. Wasn't sure how I was spending $7 or 8 on a bagel sandwich, but it was SO worth it. The bagel was delish and the perfect base for my ham & cheese sandwich.

And also a scone for the road...yum...

443 Cooke St Honolulu, HI 96813

(808) 597-1017

Yelp

Liliha Bakery pancakes & pancake batter

Everyone knows Liliha Bakery for their cocoa puffs. But I'm trying to spread the word that they should also be known for the_best_pancakes_on_earth. And not just pancakes at their in-house restaurant (because it takes forever to get a seat) but for their take home pancake batter! They sell it in the refridgerated case across from the main bakery case. You get a take-out container that looks like this: Only $5.25 and it makes more pancakes than my family of 4 can eat. The pancakes puff up miraculously. I'm actually horrible at making pancakes on my own (they always look terrible and burn) but these come out perfectly every time. Perfect for having all of your friends over for a Sunday Brunch!

515 North Kuakini Street Honolulu, HI 96817

(808) 531-1651

lilihabakeryhawaii.com

Yelp

Favorite sweet treats on Oahu

When I'm craving sweets (as I have been recently) there are a couple of places I always turn to:

+ Cake couture
Mmmmm, I can't get enough of their cupcakes ($2.50 each). Perfectly moist cake, just the right amount of frosting (in a ridiculously decadent way) to make all of your worries go away.

+ Ted's

Ted's Bakery is out on the North Shore, which is super far away, but oh so worth it just for this carrot cake. They are definitely more famous for their chocolate haupia pie (available at most grocery stores on Oahu too) but I am a fan of their carrot cake. The cake is super smooth and textureless (my hypothesis is that they use carrot puree, instead of shredded carrots) with a delicious cream cheese frosting. (I borrowed this pic from Flickr...the cake is actually round; $4/slice or $18 for an entire cake).

+ Kamehameha Bakery

Kam bakery is in Kalihi and is famous for their taro doughnuts. Check out the purple color below!

Top left: taro doughnut

Top right: regular glazed doughnut

Bottom: butter roll

Also famous for their banana bread:

+ Otto

My family is loyal to my aunty's homemade lilikoi cheesecake, which has to be one of my favorite foods. I thought it was the pinnacle of cheesecake until I tried Otto. Otto is a tiny hole in the wall in Chinatown that opened maybe a year ago? I don't know how he does it, but this is the smoothest, creamiest cheesecake I've ever had. The crust is the perfect balance of sweet and buttery. He sells by the slice ($5) or by the entire cake. He has more flavors that I could ever have imagined for cheesecake; below is the lemon.

+ Thang's

When I'm walking around Chinatown and want something sweet (and that I can pretend to myself is somewhat healthy), I stop a Thang's for a durian or soursop smoothie with pearls. Heaven on earth.

After surf breakfast in Kapahulu

I was starving after a near dawn surf the other day, so I stopped at Diamond Head market on my way home. I was hoping for a piece of cornbread, but it wasn't out yet, so I got a banana cream cheese scone ($3.50). It reminded me of Sconee's banana bread :)
Then as I was driving up Kapahulu towards the freeway, I spotted Bento-Ya Iyasume (in the little mall near Tutti Frutti frozen yogurt). I thought it was Iyasume musubi, which I had read a great review of on Tasty Island, but had never made it over there since it's such a pain to get to anywhere in Waikiki, with the lack of free parking.

I wasn't 100% sure if they were the same owner, but according to Yelp, this one on Kapahulu is the main kitchen, and they send musubi & bentos over to the Koa St location.

Mini bento ($3.50?): choice of one musubi (choose from ume, bonito, salmon or konbu), two pieces of fried chicken, and two little sausages.

A side of nishime ($1.92). They also had other okazu choices, including gobo, eggplant, mac salad, which all looked delish.

A very filling breakfast :)

Diamond Head Market & Grill

3158 Monsarrat Ave.

732.0077

Bento-Ya Iyasume

611 Kapahulu Ave

735.3530

Iyasume Musubi

2410 Koa Ave.

921.0168

Sconees

Mmm....snacks after yoga yesterday. Banana bread with the little brown banana specks:

...and a blueberry mini scone...yesterday was pastry heaven :)


Sconees
1117 12th Ave
734-4024
Yelp

Best cupcakes?

I've never lived in New York, but I used to go and visit friends there every year, when the cupcake craze was just taking off. We'd visit Magnolia, Buttercup, Dean & Deluca, and others I can't even remember. So that's how I got hooked on cupcakes.

While I was living in Shanghai, one girl brought the cupcake craze to the city but only via delivery, so it wasn't as though I could go pick up a cupcake whenever I was craving one (although she did later start distributing through Gloria Jean's coffee).

Now that I'm back home, I've been craving cupcakes. I guess it's mostly just because they are available! I tried to bake some (usually, I'm a pretty decent baker) but for some reason, they were all disastrous and like solid little lumps, instead of nice light, moist, risen delightful cakes.

So I went cupcake exploring and tried out 3 of Honolulu's cupcake shops. Here are my favorites:

#1) Cake Couture (Aina Haina)
This is my ultimate cupcake. The cake is moist and has the perfect crumb. The frosting is sweet, buttery and loaded on. The store is perfectly designed - very clean, modern look.

#2) Cake Creations (Manoa)
This is a relatively new shop, I believe. She started out doing wedding cakes and expanded to have a storefront bakeshop. The cupcakes were beautiful - best presentation - but the cake tasted a little like a cake mix and was not as moist as Cake Couture. Only 3 flavors available in the shop when I was there.


#3) Hokulani (downtown / restaurant row)
Most variety of flavors but lacking in presentation and taste. They were cute, but more of in a home-made looking way. The cake was a little dry.


Tell me, are there any cupcakes out there that I am missing?

Coffee break downtown

When one of my friends moved home to Hawaii, the first thing she did was search all of the cafes and coffee shops downtown, so she could explore them and find her favorite place to sit and read or work online (unlike when I come home, I look up all the wine shops, so I can figure out where to buy some yummy alcohol :) ).

Today she took me to visit one of her favorites: Downtown Coffee Honolulu. We had excellently made cappucinos - a double shot in even the small size...a big caffeine rush!

Conveniently, Hokulani Bake Shop has a kiosk right outside Downtown Coffee (well, maybe not so convenient for my waistline, but oh well...). Now, I am a true Cake Couture devotee, and I have trouble wasting cupcake calories on inferior cupcakes. But Hokulani was right there, and I'd never tried their cupcakes, so I thought why not give them a shot.

Hokulani wins on offering more flavors (I could barely decide between strawberry guava, coconut, and all sorts of other yummy tropilicious flavors) and having cute Halloween cookies, but I didn't think the frosting or the cupcakes could compete with Cake Couture. CC's cupcakes are moister and have a better texture, and they put a lot more frosting on the cupcake (you have to really, really like frosting!).

Here are the Hokulani strawberry guava cupcakes:

And the cute halloween cookies:

Downtown Coffee
900 Fort Street Mall
599-5353
Yelp

Hokulani Bake Shop
532-2253
Yelp

Visit to Champion Malasadas

I have a pregnant friend. She just got over the morning sickness (thank goodness!) and is kind of hungry again, but hasn't had any of those crazy pregnant-lady-i-have-a-good-story-about-her-cravings stories. Until today.

Today, right after we had finished a plate lunch from Gina's, she suddenly announced, "I want malasadas. Now."

Seeing as how it was 4 pm, I didn't think either Leonards or Champion would be open. But I did a little googling, found their numbers, and gave both a call. Suddenly we had our choice of malasada shops! We ended up going to Champion (even though I still haven't tried the lilikoi malasada at Leonards) because it was closer, and I told my friend that it's superior to Leonards (but just my opinion here). Plus they have sponge cake :)

* Champion from the outside *


* The menu - I bet it hasn't changed in years! *



* Sponge cakes - chocolate, orange, lemon and guava *



1926 South Beretania St.
Honolulu, HI 96826
(808) 947-8778

Ted's Bakery...the best pies & cakes

Ted’s Bakery
59-024 Kamehameha Hwy
Haleiwa, HI 96712
(808) 638-8207

Yelp

This was definitely the highlight of my trip home this month. Anyone in Hawaii when asked about “Ted’s pies” will automatically respond “ohhhh, chocolate haupia pie” (or in my case, since I don’t do chocolate, “ohhh, macadamia nut cream pie”). But not everyone knows that Ted’s Bakery on the north shore also does plate lunches, fried rice, loco moco, and more pies, cakes and pastries than you can count.
We went for lunch on a weekday; it was full but luckily not too packed. We were unfortunately too late for spam musubi (“All sold out. You have to come for breakfast”) but got a garlic shrimp plate for lunch instead. It comes with 2 scoops rice, 1 scoop mac salad, 6 or 8 shrimps (peeled, swimming in butter and sprinkled with some nice parmesan) and a portion of sweet chili sauce for dipping. Yummy buttery goodness.

Then we moved onto the “breakfast” course, with one of their famous donuts (it’s a regular glazed donut but for some reason in a log-shape). Tasted like a cross between a donut and a malasada.
Finally, onto dessert. We couldn’t decide, so ended up with a slice of pie, cheesecake and carrot cake. They were all to die for, but the carrot cake was definitely the winnah. I would drive back out to the North Shore anytime for a slice of that heavenly cake.

MMM carrot cake

A selection of pies

Ted's from the outside...love the waves

Pineapple cheesecake...a layer of carrot cake, pineapple puree, cheesecake, and more pineapple