MAUI ISLAND: WAIKUPU & CHOCOLATE AT THE MAUI TROPICAL PLANTATION

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chocolate, Confectionery, delicious, good eats, Hawaii, hidden gem, Maui, Melanie Boudar, Shopping, Sweet Paradise Chocolatier, yum

Tucked inside the Maui Tropical Plantation in Waikupu is one of the two most divine shops on all of Maui: SWEET PARADISE CHOCOLATIER. The delightful Melanie Boudar, owner and chief chocolatier owns, not one, but two shops on the island. (thus, one of two best shops in Maui-the second being located in the Shops at Wailea, across from Monkey Pod).

Some chocolates I had a helping hand in making!

I spent about 2 weeks with Melanie in her kitchen factory doing what I love: make chocolates. See if you can find me! Melanie has some delicious recipes that I was glad to try my hand at, along with plenty of technical practice working along side Sandra, Lauren & Donald. Melanie shared her knowledge on the business side of things and I can admit that is something I’ll need to invest more formal education in for myself. All those little nuggets of info I’m so grateful for, I’ll keep to myself and hopefully put them to good use later when I startup my own shop.

More chocolates I helped make!

Part of being a chocolatier is, of course, making chocolate, but also EATING chocolate! Yay! Now, folks who come into shops (all that I’ve ever been working in) very often comment or ask “Wow. If I worked here, I’d eat all the chocolate!” or “How do you work here without eating all the chocolate?!” The answer is simple. I don’t come to work to EAT chocolate; I come to work to MAKE chocolate. For YOU to EAT! More yay! However, that doesn’t mean I don’t eat the chocolate I make. Part of making good chocolate is tasting for quality and consistency in flavors of the chocolates we love. When you come back to have that favorite flavor bonbon again, you want the same delicious taste you remember the first time you ate it that puts you in a state of bliss. Yes, chocolate bliss. It gets me high and happy.

The red building is Sweet Paradise Chocolatier tucked away inside Maui Tropical Plantation and that beautiful green, is theobroma cacao-the one and only, chocolate plant.

Melanie was also gracious enough to show me her cacao farm; her home. Hidden away, but not for much longer, in Haiku are the humble plants that are the beginnings of chocolate. Cacao plants are very delicate and susceptible to many maladies, requiring constant care for them to flourish. It is by no means an easy job. The dedication towards this precious little tree shows how passionate she is in her craft.

Yes, chocolate is a craft. Not just anyone can be a chocolatier or succeed in the chocolate confectionary business. You don’t choose chocolate, chocolate chooses you. Lucky, lucky me!

Many Mahalos, Melanie –for everything!!

MAUI ISLAND: WAILUKU – IAO VALLEY

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beautiful view, green, Hawaii, hiking, Iao Valley, Iao Valley Needle, leaves, Maui, nature, Nature Center, river, rocks, stream, tramping, trees, Wailea, Wailuku, waterfalls

Wailuku is one of the smaller towns located in the middle-is north “dip” of Maui’s Iao Valley. The valley houses one of the most accessible hikes to see the Iao Valley Needle and it’s surrounding lush green forest. I stayed at the Nature Center for an awesome CouchSurf w/my host John, who was kind enough to show me the center’s “backyard”, a smaller trail hike in the valley. Referring to it as small is an understatement, as it boasted just as much greenery, mini waterfalls and views. The town of Wailuku itself is fairly small, but has important things like a famous breakfast joint, good coffee shop and pizza!

Iao Valley “small trail”

 

Iao Valley & Me in the park

I ate in Wailea:
Stillwell’s Bakery – Cream Horns! Flakey pastry filled with sweet cream and chocolate glaze. They taste like a cross between a NY cannoli and a lobster tail. So good!
Wailuku Coffee Company – Coffeeeeee!
Giannotto’s Pizza – Couple of slices to appease my grumbling tummy one afternoon. Pretty sure the owner is originally from NJ!

Aloha and many Mahalos to John, Katie, Andrew, & Gabe

MAUI ISLAND: KEIHEI – WAIALEA – MAKENA

Tags

beaches, chocolate, fine dining, good eats, Hawaii, Kihei, Makena, Maui, plate lunch, restaurants, sailing, shave ice, Shopping, State Park, sweet treats, Wailea

Kihei is a long town which runs north/south along the coastline. The beach and parks are on one side and all the shops and restos are on the other. As I mentioned in my other post, it was a pretty mellow couple of weeks there. Waialea is south of Kihei and is a bit upperclass/expensive. There are cute shops there and fancy restos. Oh, and the fanciest hotels and golf courses. Makena is a smaller town that is home to two of the most local/popular beaches south on the island, Big Beach & Little Beach and also the State Park. I didn’t see much of the town, because, well, its mostly suburbs. Nobody goes to Hawaii to see the ‘burbs. They go to see the beautiful beaches!

Makena Beach Sailboat

I ate in Keihei/Waialea:

Pita Paradise – Fresh Ahi Skewer. Seriously, the dude that owns this particular franchise catches his own fish DAILY. It came outta the water that morning and in my mouth that night. Awesome.
Monkey Pod – Came for happy hour, also a big thing on Maui-well all over HI really. Had their pizza which was half price for HH. Their special chicken, mac nut and spinach was da kine!
Da Kitchen-plate lunch chicken teriyaki, rice and mac salad – ridiculous fresh chicken breast teriyaki! Aloha Maid green tea.
Haukohi Shave Ice – my first ever!  I got Maui Sunset: watermelon, guava, pineapple flavors. Shave ice, not shavED ice, is superfine ice chips that are drowned in real flavored cane sugar syrups. soooo good and refreshing. Slurping up the last melted bits at the bottom is no ka oi!
Fred’s/Moose McGillicutty’s – Fred’s is downstairs, MM upstairs. Tried both places on different Tuesdays for Taco Tuesdays (a phenom across Maui every Tues eve happy hour). Kaula pork at both places was great. I had Ahi at MM and Ono at Fred’s, both also so good. However, MM was better overall. Local brew here from Maui Brewing Co. called Mana Wheat. Mmmm.
Horhito’s Fish Taco Truck – and had Kaula Pork tacos! Can’t get enough of that stuff!
Foodland – the usual, supermarket.
I also had a giant mai tai one night, but I forget what the place was called.

Aloha and many Mahalos to Brenna, Jennifer & Jay, Scott, Mike, Kristina

Ono Grinds

Tags

chocolate, Food, good eats, hawai'ian slang, Hawaii, kalua pork, Maui, pig, tako poke, yum

In Hawai’i:

Ono (oh-no), means delicious. (also, a tasty white fish found on most Hawai’ian menus)

Poke (poh-kay), is raw seafood salad, consumed cold. Usually ‘ahi (yellowfin tuna), salmon or octopus(called ‘tako’), mixed with salt, soy, chili, tomato, onion, garlic and other sauces or spices.

Kalua Pork (not kahlua the coffee liquor, but pronounced the same) is piggy roasted in an underground oven.

Now, if you’ve read the previous post on some common slang, this next couple of  sentences and photos should be clear.

Tako Poke No Ka Oi   !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kalua Pork No Ka Oi !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kalua Pork & Tako Poke

I would fly back to Maui just to eat these two things, hana ho! (one more time)

More ono foods coming soon! Including chocolate!

A Location Update

Hey family, friends and new peeps,

I’m in NEW ZEALAND! For a couple of weeks now, actually. Since I’ve been out TRAVELING, my blog posts are a bit behind. I’ll be catching up, hopefully, soon with more Hawai’i and some New Zealand goods!

I’ll be in NZ until the middle of January, so both my xmas and new years will be here! Stoked!

Happy Everything Everyone!

Much love from waaaaay down here in the southern hemisphere!

~j

HAWAI’I BEACHES!

Tags

beach, beautiful, cliffs, happy, Hawaii, Kihei, Kihei Hawaii, Lahaina Hawaii, Makena State Park, Maui, nature, Paia, sand, turquoise

The beach!!! Ha! Well, many beaches!

Kihei’s beaches, Makena State Park-both Big Beach and Little Beach, and Waialea beach, Baldwin Beach in Paia, Lahaina’s beaches, Ka’anapali’s beach, Ma’alaea Harbor, Waihe’e’s Beach & La Perouse Bay. I pretty much saw the entire coastline of the whole island, except for a tiny part far north west. All the beaches are different shades of brown/white/black sands and blue/turquoise/aqua waters. I could carry on and on about  all the different qualities of each beach, but ultimately, they’re just brilliantly beautiful.

Beautiful Hawai’i Beaches

Clockwise from upper left corner:
Napali Cliffs
Lahaina Beach
Hookipa Lookout
Ma’alaea Harbor
Wailea Beach
Makena Big Beach (Little Beach is a little hike up and over the lava at the far right.)
La Perouse Bay
Wa’ahaia Beach

And me in the middle – upcountry in Kula on the side of the road!

Hawai’i Slang

A note about some Hawai’i slang in the next several posts:

da – the
shoots – oh shit
brah – brother
shoots brah! – oh shit, bro!
kine – it  (pronounced kah-I-nnn)
da kine – the shit, the best, -also our version, our type
mac salad – macaroni salad (elbow pasta, mayo, carrots, etc)
mac nut – macadamia nuts
grinds(z) – good eats, local food
plate lunch – local grinds(z) usually meat, white rice and mac salad. the meat is really the only thing that changes. occasionally the mac salad will be cole slaw.
no ka oi – this is the best ever!
shaka – hand gesture for aloha, hang loose/ten, hello, goodbye, thanks, yeah,  love, awesome, cool

Shaka

Rainbows

Rainbows everywhere!! And they’re gigantic! And double pretty often!

rainbow all the way down to the water!

Living Aloha!

Tags

airport, beach, Cali, excited, Hawaii, Ho‘okipa, hot weather, Kahalui, Kihei, lei, Maui, meditation, relax, silver lining, sunset, Travel and Tourism, United States

I’ll admit it right away, I fell in love with Maui and I’ll definitely be back!

Arriving Kahalui Airport, Maui, Hawaii

At the airport in Kahalui, Maui Hawaii and met up with Brenna, my Airbnb hostess. I was a bit wiped out from the flight from Cali, but we took a nice easy drive up the coast so I could settle in on land. We popped out to Ho’okipa Lookout in Paia for my first sunset in Maui-amazing. Picked up a few things from Mana, the local grocery store and then drove down to the southwestern town of Kihei (pronounced key-hay) where her cottage was located. I stayed in Kihei for 10, hot hot hot days! There are so many microclimates in HI and Kihei is one of the hottest and driest.

Clockwise L-R: me in a lei Ho’okipa Lookout in Paia my first day in Maui, silver lining on the clouds at sunset, maui sunset, glowing sunset

I wasn’t feeling so well my first few days, but relaxed at a semi-private beach just a 5 minute walk from the cottage. I hadn’t been in the ocean in years and the first day I just sat on the edge of the beach so the water came up to my waist. The next day, I went a little further into the small pool created by the lava rocks off to the side. It was so relaxing and cleansing. Definitely put me in a meditative state. I spent most mornings there after breakfast for a few hours for the 10 days I was there.

my private beach in Keihei

Having a car is required on Maui, so I rented a little beater rental car, which turned out to be a Hundayi Accent. It was a lovely shade of dirty silver with bird poop, cat paw prints and scratches all over! Since it was a local rental place, Kimo’s, it was cheaper than a national rental and perfect for what I needed. It was especially fun speeding on the highway, mostly because everyone else was! Also, putting 2nd gear to good use going downhill because there are tons of hills upcountry where I lived for a while.

Being on Maui for a whole month and living in three different towns really made me feel like a local. Each town has it’s own quirks and charms, yet each has the same easy, positive energy.

More on Maui to come!

Aloha!

Cozy California

After my stint in Seattle, I headed down to see my darling friends Sarah & Chris, and their new addition, Devland. He’s such a cutie pie and smart smart smart to boot! I took to calling myself Aunt Jill towards him, as I do with my nephew James, and Devland was totally on board with this! I even “helped” with a new teeth brushing song! (that I’m hoping works for a long time!)

Devland & Aunt Jill

It was a nice long weekend of everyday stuff. No lines to wait on at  attractions or events, fees to pay to enter, or fake smiles plastered on for the “tourists”. It was just home, good food, good company, and green things. There were visitors to their green backyard, like the blue jay and a praying mantis that Sarah relocated due to a boo-boo arm on him. Then we visited public green, and took in all the greens and colorful flowers at the local nursery. We played in the green and sandy park. Even got to hang out with Momma Tam and Phyllis.

Clockwise fr top left: blue jay in the yard, me and my dolly Sarah, rescued praying mantis, flowers at the nursery

It was so nice to be among friends and to play and relax fully and let my guard down. That was one amazing weekend!

L-R: Devland, Momma Sarah, Daddy Chris

love love love!