Favorite Banana Bread Recipe

2-3 bananas
1 cup sour cream
4 Tb butter or margarine
1 2/3 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
2-3 Tb flaxseed meal

Optional: chopped nuts or chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

Smash bananas in a bowl.  Melt butter and set aside.  Mix all dry ingredients and then add butter, sour cream and eggs.  Mix well. 

Bake in a loaf pan in the oven for 50-55 minutes. 

This is my favorite recipe.  I used a recipe from Allrecipes and modified it to make it a little bit healthier.  I tried to make the banana bread with all whole wheat flour, but it just didn't taste right, and so I gradually lowered the amount of whole wheat flour until it wasn't as noticeable.   It's moist and is so yummy.  Enjoy!

Bonchon

572 E. El Camino Real
Sunnyvale, CA
(408) 720-8689
http://www.bonchonbayarea.com/

Vitals:
Sunday/Monday: 11:30 a.m. - 9 p.m.
Tuesday - CLOSED
Wednesday/Thursday - 11:30 a.m. - 10 p.m.
Friday/Saturday - 11:30 a.m. - 10:30 p.m.
Visa/Mastercard accepted
Not really kid-friendly for the very young

This is my favorite fried chicken place.  I fell in love with Korean-style fried chicken wings while I was in New York and discovered this place recently, which definitely satisfies any cravings.  You can have a choice of either a soy-garlic sauce or spicy.  I prefer the soy-garlic sauce, but the spicy sauce is pretty good.  I think they make the wings when you order because it can take a while to get your order.  There is a choice to get just wings, a combination of wings and drumsticks or you can get boneless white meat.

The chicken is great - the skin is really crispy and the meat is flavorful and juicy.   When you order a set, you get a choice of sides.  Sides can be coleslaw, kimchi coleslaw, rice or biscuits.  Most of the sides are good, but the kimchi coleslaw, disappointingly, was not made with kimchi.  It looked like regular coleslaw with a bit of spicy sauce (and not that spicy to boot).  Some preserved diakon came with our order.  I generally don't touch this.  It wasn't very good, but it's an acquired taste.

I've only tried a few other things on the menu and they are good (potstickers and tofu/ginger salad).  Go here for the chicken and maybe balance it out with a few other healthier items, like a salad.

Pho Tri Vietnamese Restaurant

Pho Tri Vietnamese Restaurant
1307 Kalakaua Ave
Honolulu, HI 96826
(808) 953-2279

Good basic pho in a no frills place.  They are a bit skimpy on the bean sprouts and other herbs, which is not surprising considering how these things are not accessible (these items probably have to be imported). 

McDonald's

2476 Kalakaua Ave
Honolulu, HI 96815
(808) 971-1766

Vitals:
Open 5 days a week from 5:30 am to 12 am
kid-friendly
credit cards accepted

Sometimes, you just have to eat fast food and eat something that is quick and familiar. We wanted to hit the beach early and didn't want to go searching for a breakfast place so here we were at McDonald's. That said, it was clean, the service was quick and we were able to get in and out in under 10 minutes.

What's neat about this location was that in addition to their usual fare, they also offer more localized food options. Pictured here was the spam, rice and egg combo. It was actually pretty good! When you travel with a toddler sometimes you just have to get a few things and hope and pray they want to eat some of what you've offered. The spam and rice, while not my choice of meat, was a hit with the toddler (hurray!). I had my usual Egg McMuffin.

Ono Hawaiian Foods

Ono Hawaiian Foods

726 Kapahulu Ave
Honolulu, HI 96816

(808) 737-2275

Vitals:
M-F: 11 am - 8 pm
Cash only
small but can be kid-friendly

Talk about a salt overload. I guess I'm not used to that much salt. As long as you don't have high blood pressure and aren't necessarily worried about your cholesterol, this place was pretty good. There wasn't enough space inside and parking was a pain, so we opted to take food out and eat it at the condo. My only other complaint is the lack of veggies, but with that, on to the food.

What did we order? We ordered a combination with lau lau and kalua pig and the Salt Meat Watercress a la carte. The portions are quite generous. My favorite? The Salt Meat Watercress by far. It was basically a soup with a lot of soft and fatty meat with chopped watercress. The broth was amazing - it was salty and it had a certain richness that was nicely complemented by the slight bitterness of the watercress. I'm sure they used a lot of herbs in the broth, but I couldn't quite figure it out, probably a mixture of ginger and some other herbs. In any case, the meat and watercress mixed in with a bit of rice was so fulfilling. It seemed strange to have soup in such a hot place like Hawaii, but it was so good.

The combination plate was also pretty tasty. Even though the meat was rather salty, I just made sure to eat a lot of rice with the meat. There was a small sampling of some other things (like a lomi salmon (not a fan) and haupia (coconut dessert - nice but too small)).

Again, this place was cash only and with the combo plate at around $14.95 and the salt meat watercress at around $10, we were looking at a $30 lunch. Not bad considering we were eating more authentic Hawaiian food that actually tasted good, but still, it was a bit on the pricey side.

Alley Restaurant Bar and Grill

Alley Restaurant Bar & Grill

Aiea Bowl
99-115 Aiea Heights Dr, Ste 310
Aiea, HI 96701

(808) 486-3499
website

Vitals:
Sunday - Wednesday: 9:00AM - 9:30PM
Thursday - Saturday: 9:00AM - 10:00PM
** Breakfast served 7:00AM - 10:00AM **
kid-friendly


We went here because we had heard about the lemon crunch cake. From what we heard, it's a must try. It's out of the way from the regular places, a bit hard to find (and not in a great area), but it was an interesting place to have dinner. Who would have thought about going to a restaurant in a bowling alley?

We were not disappointed with the food here. We tried the mixed plate with Furikake Ahi, Alley Fried Noodles and salad (pictured above, around $14) and I tried the oxtail soup ($13.50). The fish was fresh and flavorful, the noodles and salad were typical.

The oxtail soup. It's an interesting dish and quite good but a bit on the salty side. The soup base was a bit heavy on the soy sauce, but it wasn't too overpowering. While there isn't much meat, it is very soft. The condiments it came with was nice, so that I could make it my own.

Now on to the dessert. We tried the lemon crunch cake and the pumpkin crunch cake (each, $4.75). The lemon crunch cake had a butterfinger type crunch topping with a whipped cream frosting. I couldn't really taste the lemon, but there was slight hint of it and the cake was was pretty light and not too dense. It was really good, but even better? The pumpkin crunch cake. It had a thick topping of whipped cream, a pecan type crust and a pumpkin pie like filling. It was sweet but not too sweet and decadent. You can't go wrong with either of these choices, but if I had to choose, I'd have to favor the pumpkin crunch cake.

Leonard's Bakery

933 Kapahulu Ave
Honolulu, HI 96816
(808) 737-5591
website

Vitals:
Sun-Thurs: 5:30 am - 9 pm
Fri-Sat: 6 am - 10 pm
$
****


On our way to Boots & Kimos, we decided to take a pit stop at Leonards (carbo loading, but loving it!). They just made these Portuguese doughnuts - we ordered the plain sugar and the cinnamon. They were warm, slightly crispy on the outside with a soft, slightly doughy but light and fluffy inside. Service is on the slow side (I was waiting behind a person who just couldn't decide what to order - they do have other pastries there). Awesome doughnuts - super yummy and bigger than I expected. There were pretty cheap too (around $0.8/doughnut, cheaper by the dozen).