Hawaii Trip

Whole Foods on Maui in Kahului (near the airport) will be your best bet for beer.

 

I don't know much about Maui except for Maui Brewpub and their great canned beers but as far as Honolulu is concerned your best bet for bottles are at the various Tamura's Fine Wines and Liquors (Kaimuki, Aiea & Kailua), The Liquor Collection in Ward (pricey though), and Whole Foods in Kahala and Kailua. The Wine Stop in Honolulu, Shiroma's Wine and More in Pearl City are good for wine but only okay for beer. Hawaii gets very limited distribution of craft from the mainland, you'll find Ballast Point, Deschutes to your interest in addition to the locals but not much else but do keep your eyes peeled for some nice international bottles that the non-BA locals (who love their heineken and macros) will often pass up on.

As for food Chef Mavro, La Mer, Alan Wong's, Roy's and Mama Le seem to be tops for foodees but I would recommend Town in Kaimuki (limited menu but lot's of local ingredients). Yelp is actually a pretty decent indicator of Hawaii restaurants for those that run more expensive.

As far as getting around and enjoying yourself, a local's advice would be to get out of Waikiki and while it's part of the experience don't spend too much time at those touristy spots, enjoy the beaches and nature (especially in Maui; go and see the sunrise atop the Haleakala volcano and the road to Hana). Hope this helps. Cheers!

 

I really enjoyed the Maui brewing company tap room and bar. They also had a good list of beers from other breweries.

 

Monkeypod Kitchen & Bar on Maui was very good for beer and food...its down Wailea way and has about 36 taps, with stuff from Maui, Kona, Deschutes, Lost Coast plus quite a few imports and seasonals. The taplist is on their website :

http://monkeypodkitchen.com/beer-list

 

good food at roys on oahu. kona brew pub outside town on oahu may be worth a look as they sometimes have beers on offer that are not bottled and are quite good.

tamura's is your beer store. multiple locations on oahu. you'll be surprised at the quality of the selection. probably cantillon waiting for you.

to the extent there are any beer stores in maui they will be stupid expensive. cheers.

 

I was in Oahu last week. Not much really when it comes to bars with great tap selection but I can tell you one pleasant surprise was that Cantillion was abundant. I ended up bring a lot of bottles back, so much so that my wife and I had to rearrange our luggage to even out the weight distribution because the airlines charge $50 extra if your luggage is over 50lbs.

Anyways, in Oahu check out the following places for bottles:
http://www.liquorcollection.com/ This place had some Classic Gueuze, talk to the dude behind the counter, he had some good recommendations for bars with decent taps.
http://swamwine.com/ This place had LP Kriek 2009 bottles. They're also right around the corner from http://www.chunwahkam.com/ known for their manapuas (Hawaiian pork buns but more flavors than just pork, check the link for more info)
Whole Foods in Kailua has a cool cafe that serves craft beer on tap, I think Sculpin was flowing when I was there and they had a bunch of RdG and Kriek 100% Lambic. Plus they're right down the street from Boots and Kimo (check them out on yelp to see their menu), an awesome place to go for breakfast.

Food suggestions while in honolulu hit up:
Leonards for malasadas (hawaiian cream puffs)
Rainbow Drive In for some good local grub.
Sansei for some spectacular Japanese/Hawaiian fusion cuisine.
Side Street Inn for local comfort food.
Bubbies for mochi ice cream

Also, if you want to break away from the crowds of Waikiki hit up the lagoons in Kapolei, they're all public access. One of the lagoons is in front of Aulani, the new Disney resort, you can walk right into the place. It's a pretty incredible site to see.

 

Piggy-backing on this thread, anywhere to go for beer in Kauai? I'll be down there back-packing for a couple weeks later this summer. Plan to fit at least a few cans of Maui beer in for the trails and beach. Any help tracking down some Cantillon would be appreciated!

 

Going to be in Kona tomorrow for a week and then Maui for a few days. Ill be staying very close to maui brewing co., and roamin around the BI, most likely going to kona brewing for most part. Any other brewpubs around other then what was mentioned? Mahalo hijack brah.

 

If your going to be on the big island, you've got to hit up the Big Island Brewhaus in Waimea...well worth the trek.

 

All the above suggestions for Oahu are pretty spot on. However, by the time you get there, The Real a Gastropub will be open and the owner and people working there really know their stuff. Here's there FB page if your interested: https://www.facebook.com/pages/REAL-a-gastropub/344867905534467. If you look to the far right under the menu you'll find what's going to be on tap when they open up. They're getting a bunch of their beers through the Shelton Bros, so it should be right down your alley. When you get into town let me know and we'll get a pint or two.

 

Here is a link to my post I wrote in March when I got back from 2 weeks in Maui
http://markfaviell.com/craft-beer-drinking-in-maui/

 

Not much for help on beers or restaurants that haven't been already mentioned but when my wife I were there 3 years we were driving back from the North Shore on Oahu and stopped at this roadside shrimp truck. Without a doubt it was the best meal of our honeymoon. Give the food trucks a chance, some killer garlic shrimp exists out there.

 

whoa I live on Maui and had no idea Cantillon made it to HI, might have to go to Oahu sometime...

 

Glad to see that truck still is putting out great food. I echo ny & all sentiments about getting Waikiki. I was lucky enough to be stationed there (oahu) for five years & still miss it

 

BI and Maui were fantastic. Checked out Kona brew, i was meh in the normal selection but did taste some old blowhole 2012 BW. They did a vertical the next day of '08-'12 but went to Volcano National Park instead.

After the drive and visiting the park, we found on our phones a brewery in Hilo called Mahena Brewing & Hawaii Nui brewing. Nice little tasting room there, cant drink full pours there but you can sample most of there line up and one offs and get a growler filled. Their Hapa Brown & Southern Cross was really nice. The only family owned brewery in the State I believe.

We left pretty buzzed and went to the place next door to eat called Hilo Drive Inn, one of my favorite mixed plates by fa from this vacation.

Heading up north to the Hamakua coast, we hit up Akaka falls and Waipio valley and headed out to find the alehouse (from what I was told) from the beertender at Mehana to go and check out. We couldnt find it on google but it did came up as Taco tako and checked it out anyway and found it to be now called BI Brewhaus. Their Paniolo Pale was my favorite, and the white mountain porter as well.

Went back twice to the Brewhaus and also found a local bottle shop/liquor store carrying Old Rasp. Anniversary XI in Waimea stacked in the fridge for 19.99. They had some great Belgium beer for what I remember. I never would of thought seeing anything good like this in Hawaii.

Hawi had another bottle shop called Lighthouse liquors is worth to check out as well. Found boxes of Sierra Nevada XXX Grandcru for 8.99 and full selection of Rouge beers.

Maui Brewing was dope and hung around there 4 days in a row. We were staying at a resort in Ka'anapali beach and had the best sunsets with some fresh coconut porter. The Pueo Pale, Liquid Breadfruit and Overhead DIPA were another favorites.

Brought back a Stainless steel growler from Maui filled with fresh coconut porter and had the crew and some regulars at Beer Revolution drink it yesterday. Glad everyone that was there got to try it fresh. The coconut is so muted when we get in canned in NorCal.

Anyway lots to mention but that's a brief of it. Just got an invite to my friends wedding back in Kona. Looks like I'll be back sooner then I thought. Shoooooooots.