Nadine Kam photos Pipeline Bakery & Creamery offers one more spot to shop for office goodies in the morning. Gayle Young's malasadas, scones and cake bombs have been an instant hit with pastry lovers.
Have malasadas become a thing? These humble Portuguese confections are popping up in more places these days, having found their way onto the upscale menus of the newly open Stripsteak and Eating House 1849 menus, and they are among the treats baked up by Gayle Young and her crew over at Pipeline Bakeshop & Creamery in Kaimuki. After a soft opening period, the new bakery and ice cream shop held its blessing ceremony this morning, in advance of its public grand opening at 6 p.m. today.
Young said she spent a year perfecting her malasada recipe, and its texture out of the oven is amazing, with a crisp shell and airy, pillowy, and slightly salty, center.
Young received a State Senate proclamation from legislator Calvin Say, recognizing Pipeline's opening day.
Pipeline features a lineup of treats baked from scratch, such as blueberry cream cheese and cherry cream cheese scones ($3.50 each), wicked triple chocolate brownies ($3.25 each) and cake bombs ($3.25 each) in flavors such as blueberry, lemon, matcha green tea, chocolate hazelnut and coconut. Back at the office, people who claimed not to like coconut, loved the coconut bomb.
A tray full of cherry cream cheese scones.
Classic white sugar-coated malasadas are $1. Add 10 cents more for li hing sugar, add 20 cents for cocoa, and add 30 cents for coffee flavor.
During grand opening weekend, there will be giveaways, contests and specials. Grand opening hours are 6 to 9 p.m. today, and specials such as $2 scoops of housemade ice cream will run 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sept. 9 to 11.
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Pipeline Bakery & Cafe is at 3632 Waialae Ave. (across from Coffee Talk). Call 738-8200.
Kimo Kahoano performed an oli before this morning's blessing.
Kahu Kelekona Bishaw blesses the hands of all employed by Pipeline.
Inside the shop.
Energy bars are $1.95 each.
————— Nadine Kam is Style Editor and staff restaurant critic at the Honolulu Star-Advertiser; her food coverage is in print in Wednesday's Crave section. Contact her via email at nkam@staradvertiser.com and follow her on Twitter, Instagram and Rebel Mouse.
Nadine Kam photos Magnolia Bakery celebrated the launch of its new rainbow-colored Aloha cupcake June 9.
A class in how to ice a cupcake at Magnolia Bakery Cafe turned into confirmation that I should never work at a bakery.
Coinciding with the bakery's launch of its Hawaii-only Aloha cupcake, a coconut cream-filled lilikoi confection topped with rainbow-colored meringue, a bunch of writers and photographers were tasked with recreating the signature buttercream swirl that tops the cupcake.
Pastry sous chef Alison Yokouchi led a session in how to ice a cupcake with an icing spatula she referred to as her "magic wand."
Our initial results were mostly disastrous, and pastry sous chef Alison Yokouchi assured it took her about 20 hours to perfect her skills.
Maybe golfers will appreciate that one also has to be pretty flexible and limber to perfect the swirl that calls for a nearly 360-degree flick of the wrists.
I ended up digging too deep in the icing and scalping my cupcake. Oh well, with Magnolia here, I have no reason to ever do such work myself.
For those who want to try their hand at the task, Magnolia is offering icing classes for private parties, with a minimum of six participants. Each participant will take home six cupcakes they have created, plus recipes for Magnolia’s best-selling vanilla cupcake and vanilla buttercream frosting. The cost per person is $75.
If you can't get a group together, public classes for set days and times are being planned. ———————
Magnolia Bakery Cafe is at Ala Moana Center. For more information on the classes, call 942-4132.
This is the swirl we were aiming for.
Yotaro Takenaka with his cupcake finished with candy sprinkles.
Emi Hart was pleased with her creation, after four tries.
————— Nadine Kam is Style Editor and staff restaurant critic at the Honolulu Star-Advertiser; her food coverage is in print in Wednesday's Crave section. Contact her via email at nkam@staradvertiser.com and follow her on Twitter, Instagram and Rebel Mouse.
Nadine Kam photo Magnolia Bakery's chocolate banana pudding debuts tomorrow, with free samples while supplies last at the Ala Moana Center shop, no foolin'.
Fans of Magnolia Bakery's classic banana pudding will find a new treat awaits on April Fool's Day. A new chocolate version features layers of chocolate pudding, OREO wafers, banana slices and chocolate shavings.
The chocolate banana pudding launched earlier this month at Magnolia Bakery locations in New York City, Los Angeles and Chicaco, and to mark its arrival in Hawaii, the Ala Moana Center Ewa Wing bakery kiosk will be offering free samples April 1 to 3, while supplies last.
Kiosk hours are 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Mondays to Saturdays, and 8:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday. Cafe hours are 8:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Mondays to Saturdays, and 9:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. Sunday.
Nadine Kam photos Magnolia Bakery will bring its renowned cakes, pastries and pies to its Honolulu bakery and cafe operation, set to open Nov. 12 at Ala Moana Center.
BY NADINE KAM
Magnolia Bakery's Chief Baking Officer Bobbie Lloyd was in town a few weeks ago, in the test kitchen at Y. Hata, to make sure recipes she created in New York, would work with Hawaii’s weather and humidity when the renowned bakery opens its first United States bakery and cafe operation at Ala Moana Center Nov. 12.
It’ll be a twofer as there will also be a standalone bakery operation as well, serving to-go clientele so that sit-down customers will be insulated from the crush of patrons lining up for cupcakes, pies and other confections.
“Everything’s turning out perfect,” Lloyd said, as she pulled out pies, brownies and cupcakes from the ovens.
A fan of vintage desserts, Lloyd inherited the baking gene from her mom. “I’m from the midwest suburbs of Chicago. My mom was a baker, and back in the 1950s and ’60s, you wouldn’t dream of showing up at someone’s home without a cake. My mom always had a cake, or cookies, or pie, ready to go.”
Magnolia Bakery's chief baking officer Bobbie Lloyd was in town a few weeks ago testing recipes to make sure they work in Hawaii's climate. She'll be back for the grand opening.
Lloyd received formal chef’s training at Boston’s Modern Gourmet Cooking School, and her passion for the kitchen arts led her to open her own restaurant, American Accent, in 1980s Boston.
“The concept was, if you saw it on the table, we made it. We made our own ketchup, pastas, breads, spice blends, jams and jellies. It was difficult to make money that way but it was such good idea that I had to do it.”
She went on to work as a private chef for Calvin Klein, then service manager at Union Square Cafe before joining Magnolia Bakery in 2007. It was a good fit. Magnolia Bakery had been founded in 1996 with the idea of serving classic American baked goods, opening in New York’s West Village. The little bakery grew a local following, but won international attention from appearances on “Sex and the City” and other New York-based TV programs and films. Magnolia has since expanded its business worldwide.
Locally, patrons will be able to choose from a variety of cafe menu items, including egg skillets, red velvet pancakes, pulled pork biscuit sandwiches and seasonal salads, as well as Magnolia’s renowned handmade desserts.
'Nolia pies will make their debut in Honolulu. Featured here are pear and vegetarian options.
The cafe brings Lloyd full circle to her chef’s roots, as she insists, “I’m not a pastry chef and never call myself that. I’m more of a home-style baker, but I approach my work like a pastry chef.”
Her title of Chief Baking Officer came from an encounter at London’s Heathrow Airport, when an immigration official looking at her travel papers saw her title of President of Magnolia Bakery, and sniffed, “No one’s the president of a bakery.”
“And I thought, ‘She’s right!’ It’s way too serious, so I knew it was time to change that.”
In creating the menu, Lloyd transformed some of Magnolia’s most loved cakes and cupcakes into other forms. The Hummingbird, a Southern classic that seems to be made for Hawaii because of its combination of tropical pineapple and bananas, with pecans, will be available in pancake form. Its sweet cream cheese icing will become a thick syrup.
The company’s first United States bakery and cafe marks a homecoming for chef Jonas Low, who worked at Magnolia’s Lebanon location.
Lloyd had help getting to know the local palate from Magnolia Hawaii’s local born and raised executive chef Jonas Low, who’s returned home after working at Magnolia’s Lebanon location.
Low attended Leeward Community College before studying pastry at the Western Culinary Institute in Portland and going on to work at Gary Danko in San Francisco. Coming home “just worked out for me,” he said. “I’m like a lot of the generation of local chefs that have traveled out, seen what is out there, got the training, and are bringing it back home.
“My role is making sure that what goes out of our kitchen is consistent with the New York brand.”
Though with a few local twists. Lloyd said she was happy when she heard of Hawaii’s love of pork, which inspired two additions to the menu, a pulled pork skillet of creamy grits, jalapeno and cheddar with the pork on top, and a pulled pork biscuit sandwich.
She’s left wiggle room in the menu for Low to play with local and seasonally available ingredients to keep things interesting. A kale salad might incorporate asparagus and peaches in the summer, then switch to butternut squash in the fall.
She’d long desired to add breakfast and meal service at Magnolia, knowing that “People love breakfast and they like eggs all day.”
If they’re lucky, New York might follow in Honolulu’s footsteps next year.
———— Magnolia Bakery and Magnolia Bakery and Cafe will open Nov. 12 at Ala Moana Center. Hours will be 10 a.m. to 1o p.m. daily.
————— Nadine Kam is Style Editor and staff restaurant critic at the Honolulu Star-Advertiser; her coverage is in print on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Contact her via email at nkam@staradvertiser.com and follow her on Twitter, Instagram and Rebel Mouse.
Nadine Kam photos Baking together over the holidays rekindled the Hori family’s heritage and passion for pastry. Clockwise from right are Joel and wife Jan Hori, second-generation baker Richard Hori Sr., and Joel and Jan’s children Lindsey, Matthew and Andrew Chun-Hori.
It’s always sad to hear of another mom-and-pop kamaaina business closing its doors, often not for a lack of fans, but because of a lack of interest by succeeding generations.
There seemed to be no end to this rising tide of closures, but now comes some good news with the Dec. 18 opening of Hawaiian Pie Co., on Waiakamilo Road.
The Hori clan that owns the operation has roots on the Big Island, where patriarch Yoshio Hori opened the renowned Holy’s Bakery in the 1930s. His grandson Joel—who opened Hawaiian Pie Co., with wife Jan, and children Lindsey, Matt and Andrew Chun-Hori—said that the Holy’s name may have derived from a classic misunderstanding between the Japanese-speaking Yoshio and a Caucasian signmaker, who heard the rolled “r” of Hori as “l,” and created the sign accordingly.
Holy’s is still going on strong in Kapaau, where the family-run bakery sits on Holy Bakery Road.
Pies cooling after coming out of the oven.
Here on Oahu, Yoshio’s son Richard Sr., opened Holy’s Bakery Manoa in 1979, offering bread, cookies and other treats until it closed in the 1990s. Joel, who had grown up with the bakery took a job as an air traffic controller with the Federal Aviation Administration, but as he came closer to retirement and watched scores of other kamaaina companies being lost to time, he started thinking more about his own bakery heritage.
The family had always baked pies together over the holidays to give as gifts, and they knew the demand for the pies was there. But the real push came from his children, who acknowledged the difficulties of running a bakery, but still wanted to continue the family legacy.
In spite of its family heritage, Hawaiian Pie Co. is a startup that is not affiliated with the original Holy’s. Their recipes are unique, and taking input from friends, family, and now customers, the crust and pies have evolved into deep-dish, three pounders.
The exterior of Hawaiian Pie Co. at 508 Waiakamilo Road.
Pies named in honor of “Grandpa Yoshio” include such classics as apple and coconut, but the family has come up with new combinations such as passion-pear and peach-pineapple, with a mix of expected classics and new flavors available daily.
Pies are available whole or by the slice, at $20 to $22 for whole pies. Other treats, such as shortbread cookies, turnovers and manju will also be available as time permits. Visit www.hawaiianpieco.com or www.facebook.com/HawaiianPieCo to stay up to date on daily offerings. —————
At 508 Waiakamilo Road. Call 988-7828. They will be open until 3 p.m. today, Christmas Eve.
Human-scale mixer.
Pie samples help customers make decisions.
Lindsey Doi slices into a pie, available by the slice as well as whole.
