Flavors pop at Maile’s Thai Bistro

(Credit: Advertiser library photo)

Photos:

So the thing is, for a place that pops up in the middle of a global economic crisis, Maile’s Thai Bistro is slamming. It’s been open at Hawaii Kai Towne Center for four months, long enough for initial buzz to die down, and yet two out of the three times we showed up, we’re relegated to the bar — on Sunday nights. What gives?

“You know people in Hawaii Kai, once they get home, they don’t want to drive back to town for dinner,” owner Maile Sayarath said. “Saturday and Sunday especially, those are lazy days: people go to Costco, they don’t want to go home and cook, so they come here.”

She’s modest. Savvy, too. She grew up in the business, from waiting tables at age 16 to cooking to running operations. Twenty years later, two generations of her family own five Assaggio and two Paesano restaurants around Oahu. So when it came to opening her own namesake in Hawaii Kai — not exactly a hotbed of culinary adventure — Sayarath tweaked a winning recipe.

The food is solid, let’s settle that right here, and even addictive. One friend still can’t pronounce the dishes; she’s been back five times in two months. She invited a friend from Aiea for her birthday dinner, and the next day, that woman drove back for lunch.

For what? Outstanding menu item No. 1: stuffed chicken wings ($9.90). Most resort to the top-selling Thai fried chicken ($9.90), which is good, yet entry level for people who are either afraid of Thai or get excited about fried chicken. The stuffed wings, on the other hand, come with loads of seasoned chicken, glass noodles, carrots and mushrooms stuffed and steamed in a deboned wing and then, at the last minute, panko-fried to a golden crisp. Peanuty satay sauce comes on the side.

Outstanding dish No. 2: pad khi mao ($9.90). Scary-sounding, but really just the other side of familiar: wok-sauteed floppy-soft fun noodles, beef, egg, bean sprouts and chives, tossed in a shoyu sauce with fresh basil leaves and flecks of chili. Off the menu, but there for the asking.

Which brings us to pad thai. Pad thai needs an anchoring sweetness, a briny shrimpiness, the sharpness of chives barely wilted and the nuttiness of crushed peanuts, all livened by the tangy-salty-zing of the chili-fish sauce and lime juice you drizzle over. The noodles are almost an afterthought — in a perfect pad thai they’re chewy-thin and bounce back against your teeth. All of which is a pretty tall order.

The only complaint about Maile’s shrimp pad thai ($10.90) is it’s too sweet. No problem: we ask for lime wedges and chili fish sauce, and Justin our super server — who answers every question about every dish, even if he has to go into the kitchen and write the answers on a pad — comes back with little dishes of these plus a crushed chili paste and tamarind cooked with garlic and chilies. We drizzle to our heart’s content.

Other musts: the tom yum goong or spicy lemongrass soup, which hits the mouth with a perfect triad of tangy-spicy-sweet ($6.90 with chicken); the signature Maile rolls ($9.90), which one-up summer rolls with the rich addition of minced pork; and any cheesecake made by Sandy the dessert lady ($4.50), which are light enough to inhale even when we’re stuffed (our running tally: four cheesecakes in three visits).

Pretty good: seafood mixed vegetables ($15.90) — very fresh oyster sauce stir-fry of exactly that, and it’s good, just everyday compared to all the other happy, zingy flavors around us. And the banana tapioca ($4.50), which is a meal-size bowl of perfectly cooked warm coconut tapioca topped with caramelized apple banana. We know people who go into raptures over this.

Our only pass is on the beef masaman curry ($9.90), which would have risen to OK if the potatoes (crunchy) and beef (bland) had been left to simmer longer.

The reason Maile’s works? The secret’s in the cheesecake — and the fried chicken, and the steaks on the back of the menu. There’s no hardcore Thai theme running through the place: not in the food, in the décor or the wait staff. No silk skirts edged in gold thread. No glittering Buddha statues, bamboo plants or blue-and-white bowls.

An all-local, all-American wait staff (which got much more professional over successive visits) exudes a mellow energy even when the place is slammed. Last time we were relegated to the bar, there was a line outside and the bar was full; the eagle-eyed hostess saw a table vacating and called us in to take the two spots that opened up at the bar, and then smoothly rotated us to another vacating table 10 minutes later.

Maile’s is Thai light — exotic, but in a still-in-my-backyard kind of way. The flavors suit local tastes. And with an amenable staff in the front of the house and Southeast Asian cooks in the kitchen, they’ll hit the hard-core notes if you ask, like when we ask for “real” green papaya salad and then find we can’t handle the actual gamey fish sauce, which puts us in our place in two seconds.

We’d go back. Come to think of it, we do go back — just like that woman from Aiea.

Maile’s Thai Bistro
Hawaii Kai Towne Center
808-394-2488
Hours: 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Sundays-Thursdays; 11 a.m.-midnight Saturdays
Prices: Appetizers $7.90-$13.90, most entrees $8.90-$15.90, specials $23.90-$32.90
Other details: Reservations recommended, especially for dinner; good selection of vegetarian dishes; healthy choices including your choice of vegetables to be steamed or sautéed in olive oil, and lean proteins that can be steamed, poached or grilled; full bar; takeout available.

Add a comment