Bangkok Express

1627 Nuuanu Ave
Honolulu, HI
(808) 585-8839

DMSC: Today I had to pick up my kids early so I parked my car in the building. To save on meter money, we decided to take a drive out vs. our usual walk to Chinatown. Because I'm planning a party for a co-worker and was thinking about having Thai food, we went to check out Bangkok Chef.
IG: APOO really wanted to eat in downtown today so that she could stop by Ross afterwards to buy some more stuff for her new house. But she was a good sport and came along with us to BC.
APOO: I really wanted to buy a gigantic basket for my indoor money tree but I keep finding other things so I end up getting everything else but the basket! Grrr! Oh and I had been here before, this exact location too...and I only found out after I had been sitting there for sometime. Getting old, memory loss. 

DMSC: This place is kinda cool. It's behind a big industrial aluminum roll up door like you'd see at a garage or something. The cashier was funny. When I took out a $100 bill, she called me the "sugar daddy". I told her I'm only the sugar daddy to my wife and kids. Later when APOO and I were talking back to each other, she asked if we were brother and sister. Finally, after we decided our food, she asked "is that going to be enough food for you three?" So we ordered spring rolls, much to APOO's request to order more food only if we were hungry.
IG: We did order a lot: spring rolls, mango salad, stir fry chicken, noodles and tapioca for dessert. But we wolfed everything down in such a hurry, and DMSC only remembered to take pics after we had eaten most of the food. There were no leftovers!
APOO: We DID have leftovers.  Nobody ate the raw veggies that came with the springs rolls and they are now sadly sitting in my refrigerator. And why did the guys listen to the waitress and ordered more food than we could eat? We were so stuffed!

DMSC: So here are the spring rolls. The funny thing is, APOO didn't want to order these but ended up eating the last ones.
IG: APOO ate TWO spring rolls (!) and wanted more of the chicken stir fry which we had finished off.
APOO: You guys finished that dish fast! I really wanted more but was a second too late. The chicken stir fry was delicious.

DMSC: This is the mango salad. It had a sweet chili dressing and cashews.
IG: The mango salad is similar to the Thai papaya salad but not as crunchy and not too spicy.
APOO: I love the dressing in this salad. It wasn't too spicy for a whimp like me and there were lots of mangoes. 

DMSC: This dish was called Pad Bliao Waan, which was chicken with pineapple and onions. It was served with sticky rice.
APOO: The sticky rice was good but I think coconut sticky rice would've been a better match for this dish.

DMSC: This dish was IG's choice - it was Rad Nah - a wide egg noodle with chicken and broccoli with sweet soy sauce.
IG: I thought the noodles were look fun (rice noodles) which were too sweet for me. I should have ordered a different noodle dish...

DMSC: We also had tapioca, but as usual, we were in such a rush to eat it that we forgot to take pictures.
IG: The tapioca was yummy but you had to stir in the warm, sweet, coconut milk to mix it with the sticky pearl tapioca underneath. It was worth the trouble, and I finished mine before the others. OINK! OINK!
APOO: IG, you so did not beat me in finishing the tapioca. Remember I saved the container and had asked you to do so when you finish yours? I so beat all of you! And DMSC was so full he couldn't finish his tapioca!

Pho Tau Bay

APOO: "What the heck!" I thought when we saw this great big yellow sign. We wanted the old pho restaurant where we enjoyed the broth exceedingly the last time we came. We didn't walk all the way here (the farthest we would walk with a 45 minute lunch hour) to go to a new restaurant and try new food. We wanted the comfort of sitting at the same place and eating the same food because of what was and is still happening with the State (i.e., furlough). Well, we had no choice (because we were hungry) but to go in.

APOO: The menu looks exactly the same as the one at the old restaurant.

APOO: We were excited to see if the pho were as delicious as the ones from the old place. We thought if the broth was crappy, we don't have to come back here ever again! It is a far walk you know. [drum roll]... the broth was......great! Darn it, we have to come back here again. Next time I wear sneakers instead of slippas.
DMSC: The only weird thing was that they pre-boil the beansprouts so they're soggy when you get em.

APOO: The topic of discussion at this luncheon was furlough and the possibility of layoffs. It was depressing. What's more depressing was DMSC didn't get a free soda when he actually wanted one (note: take a look at the great big yellow sign).
DMSC: Actually, the order of the pictures is misleading. I actually took the pic of the banner in the front after we walked out, and realized that you get a free soda with purchase. Dang!

Mei Sum

65 N Pauahi St
Honolulu, HI 96817
(808) 531-3268

APOO: Stupid DMSC was too lazy to take pictures of the food! You can check out our March 25th blog for our Mei Sum rating.The food is always tasty here, but a little on the costly side. Considering what happened 3 minutes before we walked in the door, we didn't mind paying a little extra to be treated equally. Here's the story and I believe DMSC tells a better one...
DMSC: Stupid? Oh man, that's mean. I did take pictures. I just accidentally deleted them when I was clearing out my phone. Man, some people don't appreciate how long it takes to upload pics from your phone, post em up on Photobucket, link them on the blog, resize them...... Well, I guess it's better to recognize the lack of photos, rather than ignore the blog altogether (cough cough IG cough cough)
APOO: We had originally wanted to go dim sum at Happy Garden. If you remember, our past reviews of Happy Garden were good, we loved the food and especially the prices. Cheapo dim sum is always great. We walked in Happy Garden and not surprisingly, it was crowded. About 3 minutes later, a group of three walked in the restaurant. DMSC, IG and I were anxiously waiting for one of the tables to be cleaned because we had to eat quickly and get back to work. When the waitress was about done cleaning the table, the guy in the group of three that walked in after us just sat down at the table and the other two followed. IG said, "Ey ey! We were first." The lady said, "We called in our food and it's now cold." DMSC was mad and gently stormed out of the restaurant. Outside the restaurant, he told the people that were waiting what just happened. I believe some people left because of what we told them. Well, good! We were loyal customers and for them to treat us this way was unforgivable. We ended up at Mei Sum, which was a much better choice with better service. We got a table right away.
DMSC: I wasn't so much mad.... more mildly indignant at the whole situation. Anyway, it's a bad economy, and spending money somewhere else is a better form of protest, which is why I suggested not waiting there for a table.

Rosarina

1111 Maunakea St
Honolulu, HI 96817
(808) 533-6634

DMSC: Another little gem in Chinatown is Rosarina Pizza.
APOO: Hmmm...pizza or dim sum. It was a hard choice but since we (AP and IG) have never tried Rosarina before, or at least in downtown Honolulu, we decided to go Italian.
IG: I had a craving for pizza since I hadn't eaten pizza in over a year. DMSC wanted vegetables as usual. APOO wanted garlic bread. Sooo, we ordered all three: large pizza, antipasta salad, and garlic bread!

APOO: This is the their signature salad. If you judge this dish only by its look, you ain't gonna like it because to be honest, this salad looked really plain and unappetizing. However, the first bite will blow you away. The dressing is just to-die-for. I am a total meat person but I could eat this all day! The picture is kinda' blurry as DMSC took this picture at the very tail end of our luncheon when only 1/10 of the salad was left.
IG: The salad look fine with assorted cold cuts, lots of shaved parmesan cheese, lettuce and a light oil and vinegar dressing.

APOO: Someone said we won't have enough food - IG! - so we ordered garlic bread. Actually, I take the blame for this because I walked into the restaurant craving for garlic bread. Rosarina makes a mean garlic bread. It was super light and not oily at all. I ate quite a bit.
DMSC: I agree, the garlic bread was awesome.
IG: I think the garlic bread was baked in the same oven as the pizza and came out crisp and crunchy on both the top and bottom. YUMM!

APOO: Lastly, we have the combo pizza. We had two slices leftover but the pizza was deliciously cheesy. Was this the day we learned about the furlough? Not too sure but we had a great meal.
DMSC: I liked this pizza. The crust was very good, not too thin and not thick and greasy. We asked the waitress what size would be appropriate for us, and she thought the large would be about right. It was too much! Stupid us, for asking a waitress who probably wants to sell you the biggest thing possible.
IG: The pizza crust was great : not too doughy with a great buttery flavor but it did get a bit soggy from the toppings. I can't eat too much cheese and ended up pulling/scraping off most of my cheese topping which my tablemates noticed and remarked. DMSC and I finished our share of the large pizza. APOO didn't finish her share because she was too full (from the garlic bread!) and took home two slices of pizza.