Yo quieres Coquito's, en Waianae

Nadine Kam photos
Mofongo is one of the specialties available at Coquito's Latin Cuisine in Waianae. This one is topped with a veggie sauté, but diners also have a choice of proteins.

BY NADINE KAM

It's not often that I visit Waianae because I have no reason to be there. One of the last times I was there was to drop off a ring-neck parakeet that flew into my life and needed a good home with a couple who love and care for hundreds of birds, from chickens to macaws.

Farrington Highway from Nanakuli to Waianae is an arid stretch and the sights include all the usual suspects popular in any local community—burger joints, poke and seafood stops, drive-ins and bake shops.

Honolulu is large enough to accommodate other outliers such as the occasion Jamaican jerk, Peruvian and Middle Eastern specialists, but in the relatively insular Waianae community, Coquito’s Latin Cuisine stands out as the one restaurant that doesn’t belong.

The setting was simply a matter of convenience for Stevina Kiyabu, who hails from Puerto Rico but married local. Trained as a pastry chef at the Culinary Institute of America in New York, cooking was in her blood, and in looking at the demographics of Waianae, she saw there is a sizable population of Puerto Ricans. So, she opened Coquito’s in 2012. Since then, it’s become a popular stop for a military personnel from her native country in search of a homey taste of the Mother Land, as well as locals from all parts of the island eager to try authentic Latin cuisine. Last year, she opened Valentina's Ristorante, serving up Italian fare about a block away from Coquito's. I'll be checking that out some other time.

The restaurant is in a charming plantation-style house along Farrington Highway. If west-bound, look for it on the left side of the road.

The menu is manageable for a small kitchen, yet manages to pay homage to specialties of Cuba, the Caribbean and Argentina. Dishes tend to be heavy, so you would have to make several return trips to fully explore the menu.

The most novel of the dishes is mofongo, an African-influenced dish of mashed fried plantains studded with bits of bacon and garlic for extra flavor. (It's their equivalent to American mashed potatoes.) Atop this mini plantain “platter” sits your choice of entrée options such as sautéed shrimp ($16), grilled steak ($14), pernil (roasted pork shoulder, $14), or stir-fried vegetables ($12) that add juiciness to the dish. The mofongo dries out quickly and is best eaten when hot and the exterior is more crispy than spongy.

Each entrée comes with a choice of two sides. These are habichuelas, a mild stew of kidney beans; tostones; white rice; gandule rice; fried yucca; sweet plantains; and potato salad or mixed green salad.

The gandule rice is one of the dishes that differentiates Kiyabu’s cooking with that of locals who grew up with black olives in their rice.

“Local Puerto Rican food is very different from food at home,” Kiyabu said. “One old lady told me that when they immigrated here, it was hard to find certain ingredients, so used what they could find. To this day, they add black olives, but I use green, the Spanish olives.”
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Coquito’s Latin Cuisine is at 85-773 Farrington Highway, Waianae. Open 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesdays to Sundays. Call (808) 888-4082. Costs about $25 to $40 for two for lunch or dinner; BYOB.

Camarones al Ajillo, shrimp sautéed with garlic and cilantro, is served over tostones, or double-fried plantains. The shrimp is yummy, but as an appetizer, it is so very very filling because of the deep-fry component. Recently, $14.

I'm not a big fan of carbs, so even though the beef-and-potato Colombian empanadas are also delicious, they leave me too full to enjoy the entrées. It's lightened with a side of tomato salsa.

A juicy pork-filled pastele comes with two choices of sides. Here, it's gandule rice and sweet plantains.

Organic oasis

Delicious, healthful fare is the reward for those who journey to Waianae's Kahumana Cafe

By Nadine Kam 

POSTED: 01:30 a.m. HST, Sep 29, 2010

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CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARADVERTISER.COM

Chef Ranjith Ramanakumar plates Ginger Garlic Mahimahi at Kahumana Cafe. Behind him is café director and manager Robert Zuckerman.

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Last year, a ringed-neck parakeet flew into my life, and, long story short, I found him an excellent home in Waianae where he now lives with his new mate in a large outdoor flight aviary. On visiting with him, I asked his new family if they had heard of an organic restaurant nearby.

They looked at me as if I were crazy. I was going a little crazy trying to find it myself. "Organic, here?" was their response; the subtext being, "Good luck with that."

Waianae is not the first place people usually think of when it comes to progressive food movements, but that is what has been going on at Kahumana Farms for more than 30 years.

The farm is rooted in the philosophy of Waldorf Schools founder Rudolf Steiner. He grew up in the aftermath of the Industrial Revolution, when the rural lifestyle that had sustained people for generations lost ground to technology and urban centers, the result being the displacement of human beings and a feeling of disconnect from nature.

Steiner looked to the farm and agriculture as the route back to well-being, considering the farm not only as a place of physical sustenance but a place that encourages personal growth and community consciousness.

With Steiner's ideas in mind, Father Philip Harmon and the late Frances Sydow co-founded the Kahumana organization in 1974, providing outreach services for the needy in Waikiki and Makiki. Their aim was to establish a farm for biodynamic agriculture that would help feed people, provide economic activities and become a center for holistic healing.

Today, in addition to raising crops on 14 acres, the Kahumana organization also manages transitional housing at Ohana Ola O Kahumana and Ulu Ke Kukui.

The cafe is the newest development, having opened its doors late last fall with the aim of serving as a job training site, as well as a model for sustainability, healthy living and eating.

"We had no idea who would come," said cafe director and manager Robert Zuckerman. "We were hoping to reach the local community because there's so many in this area who don't eat well and have so many health issues."

Food served at the cafe offers an alternative to a high-cholesterol, refined-sugar diet, and Zuckerman said, "Some try it and come back; others are like, 'It's not my style.'"

Almost a year later, the cafe is also welcoming visitors from across the island and fielding many requests to open a second branch in Honolulu. That day may come, but for now, they're trying to remain true to the farm's initial vision, while striking a balance with the foodies showing up for what Zuckerman calls "whole-food cooking" and agricultural ambience. The big-picture vision is admirable, but townies faced with a 60-plus-mile two-way drive also want to know, is the food worthwhile?

Let's just say many a visitor has left Waianae wishing the restaurant could be transplanted to Honolulu due to dishes that are both healthful and delicious, from the humblest beet and pea soups, to plates accompanied by greens fresh from the farm.

The menu is small but well-balanced. Salads are to be expected, but you'll also find daily specials that might include burgundy beef, Hungarian goulash, teriyaki beef or chicken curry.

When I visited, there was a delicious meatloaf of grass-fed Maui beef, with a generous amount of chopped Swiss chard and herbs mixed in with the beef. As the daily special ($10 to $12), it came with a choice of soup or salad.

Start with homemade hummus and pita bread ($5) or a huge caprese ($10) with farm greens. Quesadillas ($8) comprise whole wheat tortillas topped with cheddar-jack cheese and avocado to which you could add grilled chicken for an extra $3.

Whole-wheat pasta stirred with macadamia nut pesto ($10) was another of my favorite dishes, served with stir-fried farm greens (on that day, chopped kale), and a choice of salad or soup. Add grilled ahi, chicken or garlic butter shrimp for $3.

Other light offerings are a Greek or Mexican veggie wrap ($8 each). Add grilled ahi or shrimp for $3. Both start with tomato, cucumber, olive tapenade and mixed greens. The difference is the cheese -- feta on the Greek, cheddar on the Mexican -- and avocado on the latter. The Greek tastes Greek; the Mexican could have used a salsa assist.

For dessert there is cheesecake ($3), often with seasonal fruit toppings, carrot cake, banana bread and dense chocolate brownie that's almost like fudge.

Tip well, as cafe proceeds and tips serve as donations supporting Kahumana Farms endeavors.