Are you a fan of Top Chef?

For those of you who are, go ahead and skip to the next paragraph.

For those of you who aren’t…shame on you! Just kidding. Hubby and I love this show and have been watching it religiously since it first came on the air. Taking advantage of the popularity of reality TV land competition, Bravo came up with a show pitting cooks against each other. Think of it as Survivor for Chefs.  Thirteen Chefs battle it out for weeks until “there can be only one”.

Every week a new cooking challenge results in the elimination of one of the chefs by a panel of judges. The judges include Tom Colicchio, Padma Lakshmi, Gail Simmons and a rotation of guest chefs.  They and the guest chefs are all rock stars in the culinary world.

The Real Hunger Games

This isn’t your cook me something yummy and may the best dish win. This is, make me a Michelin meal out of ingredients you find in a gasoline station mini-mart or the office vending machine.

My favorite episode is restaurant wars.  They divide into teams, come up with a concept, build a dining space to match the concept and menu, and boom make it happen on a limited budget of both time and money.  Needless to say, it’s quite entertaining.

One of my all-time favorite contestants is Sheldon Simeon from Hawaii. Sheldon is the classic island boy, laid back, and cooks straight from the heart. His grandmother served as his inspiration. His food roots, Asian/Filipino/Hawaiian home cooking with a twist that elevates simple to sublime.  I jumped on Team Sheldon early and was totally bummed when he did not win. He went home to the islands back to  Star Noodle on Maui.

So, of course, it became my mission on this trip to eat at there.

Put Star Noodle on your Maui bucket list.

The food is delicious, it is down-home comfort food that starts with impeccable ingredients and finishes with a contemporary flair.  The chicken wings were sweet, salty, spicy, crispy, and light. The garlic noodles are simple but packed with flavor.  If you like pork belly…get the Pinoy version of Bacon & Eggs, sizzling chunks of pure porky goodness with a perfectly cooked 6-minute egg that oozes over the pork, yum.  Elvis would be jealous.

The malasadas, come to the table as little pillowy bites of sweetness accompanied by chocolate and caramel sauces.  If Leonard’s malasadas had hipster kids, these would be it.  Ironically I thought the ramen was just ok, but then again I’m from Cali y’all where good ramen can be found everywhere.

Halfway between Kaanapali and the Maui Airport, sits Leoda’s Kitchen & Pie Shop. It’s across from the beach off of Honoapi’ilani Hwy (try to say that 10 times real fast) in an unassuming strip, if you blink, you will miss it.  On my way to a Henry Kapono and Friends concert, I made a pitstop at Leoda’s.  I chose the banana cream pie, Island Lime Pie, and 2 savory hand pies.

Bananas for Banana Cream Pie

The standout was the banana cream pie. Yum.  The hand pies had too much crust and not enough filling.  I LOVE crust so this was surprising me, wishing for a bit more filling.  I kept the banana cream pie to share with the birthday girl.

So there we were Pam, Randi, and me sitting on the lanai overlooking the beach, eating pie, fresh mangoes, and papayas, sipping on our morning coffee-paradise found.

Checked out Henry of Cecilio & Kapono.  One of the best-known musical duets from the islands, folk meets island music. While my friends were dining at Roy’s I was enjoying the music of Henry Kapono which immediately transported me back in time to my first visit to the islands.

On the way to the airport…because I can never get enough island grindz, we stopped at Tin Roof.  We were fifth in line before the joint opened.  Might have been first if we hadn’t stopped for gas..just sayin’.  Tin Roof is Sheldon’s casual eatery, actually, it’s strictly take-out.  There is a bench in front but that’s where everyone sits waiting to get in.  Life’s 1st world island problems…

The star of Tin Roof is the bowls.  Poke’, Pork Belly, Mochiko Chicken.  You can choose to have the mains with rice or garlic noodles.  I liked the poke bowl the best. The food here is fresh and flavorful, broke da mouth not the bank good.  He has these vegan-like dessert Pono Pies that for me were just meh.  I’d rather head out for shaved ice at Ululani’s instead.

All I can say is so many places to eat, so little time….my review of Sheldon’s eats was totally objective and professional…I am not at all starstruck and I offer proof.

HOLY JUMPING CATFISH, SHELDON WAS AT TIN ROOF!!!!  So I asked to take one photo, yeah..I’m a groupie.