Mari Taketa

Dining Editor

Dining Editor Mari Taketa spearheads coverage of the city’s dining scene for HONOLULU Magazine and its digital food blog, Frolic Hawai‘i. A 10-year veteran of traditional journalism, she traded in a career at The Associated Press in Tokyo and Hawai‘i Business Magazine for nonprofit adoption work in Ho Chi Minh City. Food brought her back to journalism, starting with Metromix Honolulu, The Honolulu Advertiser, Hana Hou and now HONOLULU. She is also excited by travel and periodically attempts to learn new languages.

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Articles

ETS chocolate: A sweet peek

Holy mole! Death by chocolate? S’more, please: It’s not us being this punny. All these are names of real chocolate dishes you’ll find this Friday at Eat the Street: Chocolate. To help you pace yourself through the inevitable cacao overload,…

Love bar food? Free for dinner on 2/28?

When a bar opens boasting of good eats, I don’t care who’s throwing darts or who’s checking out the draft beers. I realize these diversions make people happy, but I’m happily planted at a table, ordering plate after plate and…

Eating Kalihi, old-style

Eating Kalihi, part 2 ◄ Back Next ► Picture 1 of 25 It's on a golden street of faded low-rises, light industrial and old-time good eats, and until this year I never knew Chun Wah Kam was among them. That's…

What to eat at the Punahou Carnival

Punahou Carnival is today and tomorrow, people, THE most buzzed-about carnival of the year, and for those non-veterans who haven’t mapped out their food priorities, we’ve got you covered. Just scroll down to the photo gallery below for best eats…

New eats: Yakitori Glad

Cluck, yeah! Ten eaters help me power through most of the dishes on a chicken-centric menu. Yakitori Glad ◄ Back Next ► Picture 1 of 25 When I saw this place, I almost canceled this review.I'd jumped too fast. Giddy…

If you care about food, see this movie

I didn’t know what to expect when I previewed “Ingredients Hawaii,” Bob Bates’ new documentary about taking control of the food we eat. I knew it would be quality: Bates wrote and directed “Ingredients,” a look at eat-local efforts across…

ETS debut: Da Falafel King

One of five newcomers to tonight’s Eat the Street brings the most ancient of foods and a new twist on the luau theme. When you visit Da Falafel King, look for a side dish called luau pita chips. We have…

ETS debut: Five-O Hawaiian Style Smoked Ribs

The year’s first Eat the Street happens tonight, with 41 food trucks and street food vendors slinging all kinds of good eats. This month’s theme is a luau (ETS is one year old!), so leave room for variations on kalua…

VIDEO: Top 5 moments of Eat the Street

One year, already? Thirteen times we’ve eaten the street since that first gathering on a Friday night on Kapiolani. That was just three months after Melt and Gogi Korean Tacos, the first of the new breed of tweeting, Facebooking trucks,…

Calling chicken lovers: Let’s go eat!

Q: How many yakitori shops does this town have?A: How many wings on a chicken?Hence my bursting excitement about the latest, Yakitori Glad, open on Kapahulu as of yesterday — and why I’m putting it out there as Nonstop’s latest…

Eating Kalihi, old-style

Eating Kalihi, old-style ◄ Back Next ► Picture 1 of 22 Down on the makai side of Nimitz, surrounded by industrial shops and cinder-block walkups, Alicia's Market is as old-school as they come. The neighborhood store opened in 1949, a…

Top 5 food trends of 2011

No. 5: Shrinking portions. Chicken wings cut in half to make the plate look fuller. Shabushabu platters with only one shiitake mushroom. Four years into our shrunken economy, portion sizes have shrunk to match as restaurants struggle to keep cost-conscious…

News alert: Fresh durian crisis

I’ll just say it: Chances of scoring fresh durian on Oahu this winter are as remote as the Southeast Asian jungles they come from.It breaks my heart to drop this bombshell on you. It literally knocked the breath out of…

New eats: Sakura Terrace

The first intel comes from an acquaintance I run into at a rum-tasting. I don’t really trust it: The only other time I’ve seen him is at a sake-tasting, and both times he’s been very, uh, happy.“Did you try the…

First look: New Safeway Beretania

Eight a.m. Saturday morning? Brave the surging multitudes of grand-opening shoppers with their hundreds of cars, hundreds of shopping carts and thousands of fingers reaching for free samples?! No way!We choose the route of the sane: We pay a first…

ETS debut: Momo Burger

The year’s final Eat the Street happens tomorrow, Friday night, at new digs at 805 Ala Moana Blvd. Why the temporary move? Ice skating, people, on faux ice, with accompanying skate rentals plus 37 food trucks and street food vendors!In…

Party pics: Joy of Sake Aftertaste

Forty sake last night — slightly less than the 326 featured at September’s Joy of Sake — because after all, isn’t that the nature of an Aftertaste?Parties for people who don’t want the party to end: Joy of Sake schedules…

New eats: Yuzu

Finally! A new izakaya opens in town, and it’s one with deep cred. Yuzu is owned by Isamu and Moco Kubota, owners of Kaiwa at Waikiki Beach Walk and the former Okonomiyaki Kai and Hale Macrobiotic on Makaloa. One’s artistic…

Eat the Street: Black Saturday

Eat the Street: Black Saturday went live in Kakaako Saturday night despite forecasts of strong winds. Twenty-nine trucks and street food vendors were out with $5 pupu samplers, making this the first ETS built specifically for mega-grazing. Also tonight: Retail…

Did this: Islandwide Christmas Crafts and Food Expo

If you like concise shopping, 400 vendors in one room is a good thing — especially when 70 are selling food gifts. Islandwide Christmas Expo ◄ Back Next ► Picture 1 of 20 What: Islandwide Christmas Crafts and Food ExpoWhen:…

ETS debut: India Cafe

Chicken tikka masala, vegetable curry, spicy eggplant: Exotic flavors of India make their debut at Eat the Street, courtesy of Kailua’s India Cafe. And just in case you’re still full from tomorrow’s Thanksgiving feasting, in keeping with this month’s ETS…

Free on the 30th? Open call for eaters

New izakaya, people! I’m excited about this one — when am I not? — but especially this one because its previous incarnations in this town have been solid and interesting.Yuzu opened in the bowels of the Ala Moana Hotel lobby…

Post-APEC eats: Restaurant Week deals

To all held hostage by APEC:I know you’re out there. You who took care of all your Waikiki and Ala Moana errands last week, you who get on H-1 and pray no dignitary has just landed, you who are still…

Dear APEC, Here’s where you should eat

Dear APEC,Aloha!The 15,000 to 20,000 of you who are descending on Waikiki as I type will leave an estimated $120 million in our economy, much of it in our restaurants. I know that just like me, you work for your…

FYI, five more days

I haven’t been out Kaneohe way in a while, so I’m a little late to the party, but I found out yesterday what’s going on with all the pink at Heeia Pier.It’s cancer, discovered three months ago in the breast…

Emotions: A story about lunch

First there was wonder, then came rage. I’m talking about my first taste of broth from today’s ramen at Shokudo.So round, the flavors, so deep. I filled my spoon for another taste. There was a pork bone base, obviously, and…

HIFF review: ’18 Meals’

A father collapses and dies after a dinner of Chinese takeout. Two old friends tentatively, fearfully try to rekindle an affair that never was. An actor pours his soul into preparing breakfast, lunch and dinner for an alluring love interest…

If you love unagi

When I was growing up, I got to spend a few summers on homestays in Japan. Once this happened while my family was hosting an exchange student from Saitama, so one day her mom arrived to take me to lunch.It…

Where the food trucks are

I stopped by Tacoako Tuesday a couple days ago. If the name’s not familiar, it’s a lunchtime gathering of food trucks launched earlier this year by Flipt Out Eats, the Filipino fusion taco truck that started out by itself on…

M&M eats: Prima

M&M eats: Prima ◄ Back Next ► Picture 1 of 13 Crash, rumblerumbleMari: Where are we?Melissa: We're between Baskin-Robbins and Foodland and R. Field, so there's shopping carts going by in front of us. You didn't want to sit inside?Mari:…

Scoops: Shirokiya ramen fest

Seriously, have you been to Shirokiya lately? I was late to the ongoing ramen festival, finally getting there for a mid-September tweetup, and whoa! On a Wednesday night the entire second floor was packed, every seat taken and many tables…

ETS Kakaako debut: All Kine Ice Cream Truck

Eat the Street: Eat Local will bring a record 39 food trucks and street food vendors to Kakaako tonight, the last night of Hawaii’s Eat Local month, and that means good things for our taste buds and our islands. Every…

Where to eat local

Two weeks into Eat Local month, I was in the midst of my own First World, middle-class pity party: “eating local is really hard when ur favorite food in the whole world is spaghetti,” I tweeted to no one in…

Snout to tail 2: Sept. 26, 27, 28

It’s ba-ack! As promised, the menu for Snout to Tail 2 went up on Plancha’s blog in the wee hours of the morning, and here it is:Liver pate with Hobbs bacon and Maui onionsOrechiette pasta with shaved spleen, lemon and…

First dinner at new pop-up

I love pop-up restaurants: They ride the edge, put full focus on food, hold down costs. I’ve been to three of Honolulu’s four*. But for me the thrillers are the ones that take the gamble to the extreme, regularly switching…

Did this: Joy of Sake

It’s maddening, squeezing sake out of tiny plastic pipettes, but it’s like chewing your food slowly — it forces you to slow down and savor. And with 326 premium sake to taste, there was plenty of savoring at the 11th…

Joy of Sake: The how-to guide

Moonlight steeped in spring rain;blossoms of wisdom —all from one little cup — JoroIt’s the biggest sake celebration outside Japan: 326 of the best junmai, ginjo and daiginjo in the world, judged head to head to choose the best among…

Snout to tail: Pigfest in Manoa

Hello, pig.I’m feeling very close to you tonight. Meeting you face to face, in a sense, reminded me of how much we’ve lost in how far we’ve come. When I lived in a Third World country, I ate your intestines,…

Eat the Street debut: Puffettes Egg Puff

ETS Spicy loads our favorite Kaka’ako block with 38 food trucks and street food vendors tonight, people, and in addition to the expected stars of the Scoville scale — jalapenos, wasabi, Thai spice, Korean spice, Indian spice and the like…

Beyond gyros and baklava: Greek Fest menu preview

Greek Festival ◄ Back Next ► Picture 1 of 11 The 31st Greek Festival happens at Ala Moana Park's McCoy Pavilion this weekend, promising major eating, drinking and dancing. Organizers expect 10,000 people per day for the two-day fest.Co-chair Eres…