OMG The SPICY Shrimp! Oahu Hawaii Food Tour

Hey guys, what's up? It's Mike Chen. As you can tell from the last few videos on this channel and my vlog channel, I just got back from an amazing, amazing trip to Hawaii. I wasn't there for that long, only about four days, so just stayed on the island of Oahu. And like every trip I take, I wanted to scope out the local food scene and make some videos. Before I got to Hawaii, I did some research and I knew I wanted to film at Halena's, I knew I wanted to film at Marukame Udon, and I wanted to do a food video at a luau, but that didn't really work out because the food there really wasn't all that good. And as with every trip, once I actually got to Hawaii, once I started talking to the locals, I started getting more recommendations on food spots. So during my short stay on the island, I ended up going to a lot of random food spots, and most of these were absolutely fantastic. So I wanted to share them with all of you guys. So this is the absolutely, completely random food tour of Oahu, Hawaii. Take a look. I'm at this charming little cafe on my way to Kailua Beach, and they have what looks like amazing, amazing pancakes, and a local specialty called Loco Moco. I'm going to show you guys because the way it was described on the menu, it's insane. What I really love about this place is their size, what they consider breakfast size. I love it that their breakfast size includes a T-bone, 10-ounce T-bone steak, and a prime rib. I love that. This is my kind of place. Also, you can get a fresh guava here. I'm trying to be more healthy and fruity since I am in Hawaii. My eyes are really fresh. Guys, feast your eyes on the most beautiful pancake ever. Look how red and guava-y it looks. Sticker than my iPhone. This is crazy. And this is the Loco Moco here. So it's an egg, and there's hamburgers, onions, mushrooms inside over white rice. Cut this in half. What in creation is this? Look. Holy crap. This is, it's a massive hamburger. It's not even like a bunch of small chunks of hamburger. It's a massive hamburger patty. And what you're supposed to do is take some egg, some hamburger, some rice, and there is the bite. The Loco Moco. Next destination, my mouth. That is such a beautiful dish. The hamburger is crunchy a little bit, a little bit charred on the outside. The egg, I like it over hard, and it tastes like beef gravy. The egg kind of cuts down on the spiciness of the hamburger patty and the gravy. That is such a beautifully balanced dish. I don't think it would work as well without the eggs. You need something to kind of counteract that saltiness. You need some eggs where you need some guacamole or something. But definitely eggs work so well here. Holy crap, this is good. I'm going to pass out from the goodness of this dish. I'm going to add some Tabasco. Love the Tabasco ring. Praise to the Tabasco ring gods. Spicy Loco Moco. That's awesome-er now. I want to try a piece of this guava pancake. This is the sorta of pancakes, the fluffy mattress of pancakes. Wow. Such a nice guava-y flavor, if that's a word. This is so good. I saw this, right? And they usually serve this in stacks of two or four. I was thinking, they look so big, I can't eat two. Now I'm thinking I can eat ten. That taste should never go away. Forget regular maple syrup, forget that. That guava syrup, that is insane. And that pancake, that is light. That thing, if I hold on to it, throw it up in the air, that thing is not going to fall back onto earth. It's going to float away. Seriously, if you're in this area, come down here. I'm going to put the information for you guys in my description box. This place knocks it out of the park. Knocks it out of the park, knocks it off the island. I gotta come back to this place. Awesome. Hawaii day three. Just filming my udon noodle video, and I ate five bowls of udon. Now, I gotta head over to the North Shore. Out here at the North Shore, you can watch some awesome surfing, you can do some snorkeling, and, supposedly, they got these bomb shrimp trucks, which, I'll admit, that's the real reason I'm going there. I really want to see some tropical fish, so I'm going to go into the scuba store and see if I can get some good snorkeling gear. When I was in the surf shop, the lady, Courtney, so awesome, so nice, a couple of advice. She said, never to buy anything, just rent. And, also, she says, you have to, you must, must come eat here at Kono's. And, if a local tells me I must eat somewhere, then I must eat somewhere. And, if you're wondering, yes, I just ate five orders of udon, and that was only about two hours ago. But, I mean, I cannot help myself. This is my kryptonite. Good food is my kryptonite. When I see it, I gotta have it. Plus, this place closes at 2.30, so it's probably my only chance to try this on this trip, so I gotta do it. I heard the kalua pig here is absolutely insane, so I'm going to get that triple crown sandwich with ham, bacon, kalua pig, kalua pork, cheese, coleslaw, guava, and guava barbecue sauce. That, if that's a monster, I heard that's awesome, I'm going with that. This looks insane. Look at this. Mango pineapple hot sauce. Chipotle hot sauce. Habanero. Yes. Yes, thank you. I would like some. This is gonna be awesome. Heard my name. Let's, uh, see what we got here. Hey, how long did you guys cook your kalua pig for? Twelve hours. Where is it, out back? Okay. And there's an oven underground. Like an emu? No. Just a regular oven? Regular oven. Okay. But still, twelve hours. Twelve hours. Look at this, guys. This is a beauty between a couple slices of bread. I mean, what, what other meats do you, do you need here? It's got pulled pork, ham, bacon. Here we go. Bon appétit. I forgot there's coleslaw in here. That ham is really pronounced. And the kalua pig. Oh, that's juicy. Twelve, thirteen hours of roasting this pig. Oh, you can tell. Oh my god, my sandwich is dripping. It's like a saucy pig waterfall. There's some sweet barbecue sauce in here. Again, I love what they did with the ham. I feel like the ham is really necessary on the bottom to kinda, to kinda catch all that sauce. Otherwise, it would just soak through the bread. You see, it's all, this is a tender, tender sandwich. You know what I need to do, though? I need to take a piece of the kalua pig. And I just wanna try it on its own. The smoky flavor of that thing is off the charts. Perfectly salted, perfectly seasoned. This is like a stark contrast to last night when I went to the Luau and I ate their basically dried pork. This is night and day, night and day. But it definitely needs some heat. So I'm gonna dip it in my habanero sauce. I really wanna try this. This is the pineapple sauce. Nice. Nice tropical flavors in that sauce. This is the guava barbecue sauce. The sweetness from my sandwich is coming from this barbecue sauce right here. Dip my sandwich in here. Let's get some more. That guava flavor is really pronounced. Not spicy at all. Very smoky. I love it that they put guava in everything. Because before this, I really didn't appreciate guava that much. Which, I'm sorry guava. Now I do understand your potential. And I love you. My insane food day continues. So right down the road, I come across this sign here. I saw this sign where they said something about a travel channel and all that. And this is supposed to be some kind of crazy hot dog. And this is what you do. This is the hula dog. They pick polar sausage or veggie. Of course, polar sausage. Which garlic lemon secret sauce. Let's go hot, hot, hot. And then unique tropical relish. I don't even know. This is crazy. Papaya, mango. I'm gonna see what they recommend. And then this is like a little mecca of food. Because then you see like this Thai place over there. That claims to have the number one spicy shrimp. Then you got that place over there. Which seems to have like fresh fruit juice. Then you see that place over there. Who also says, well they said they're the original garlic shrimp. So I don't even know. There's just so many food options in this little area. Start off with my bread. Like bread, white wheat. White wheat and bacon taro. Bacon taro. What is bacon taro? I'll show you. Yeah, let's take a look. So this is our bacon taro. It's purple. Yeah, that looks awesome. Do you recommend that? This is our most popular. So all of our bread are sealed on both sides. They stick this side of the bread onto this peg back here. And it toasts your bread from the inside, not the out. An inverted toasting. Yes. That's breaking scientific news here. Then I fill it up with whatever hotdog. The polish is made out of chicken, beef and pork. The veggie is the soy base. Okay, can I just do this? Can I get one? Whatever you think is the best. I'm gonna trust you. Okay. But I love spicy. The spicier the better for me. That's my only thing. So it was recommended to me that I come to this shrimp shop and try their shrimp. How's your spicy shrimp? The spicy one is my favorite. Yeah? Yeah. I'm gonna try your spicy shrimp. But I'm gonna try that first. And I'm gonna come try this. So what did you do with this hotdog? I put the hot habanero. Then I put the liliquid mustard and the papaya relish. Okay, so this is as spicy as you got? Yes. Alright. I can see a lot of mustard on here. The purple taro bun. If you guys can see, the papaya relish right here is kind of dripping from the bun right now. I need to take a bite. Here we go. First bite. I haven't been able to reach. Oh my god. That mustard is sweet. Oh, that's a relish. Mmm. It's really creamy and sweet. It's almost like a mix between mustard and just cream. Finally, I'm getting to the hotdog. That sausage is nice and smoky. The mustard and the sweet papaya relish. That's such a nice, harmonious, sweet, and savory combination. The bread is so light. And it is toasted on the inside. I don't feel like it's that spicy, but it is absolutely addictive. Because usually when you eat a sausage or a hotdog, you taste a lot of the ketchup. Or you taste a lot of the mustard. But this, this is like a 10 hit karate combo. It's got all sorts of things happening here. Sweet, savory, a little bit of spicy, some smokiness, tropical flavors. Although it's got a ton of different flavor, it's very, very harmonious. This is like the ultimate tai chi of hotdogs. I gotta say, the most colorful dish I've had so far in Hawaii. It comes with a beautiful flower and a slice of pineapple. That's awesome. Salad and then the shrimp is what I hear is not like the typical spicy shrimp. It's got some white cream sauce on it. Let's try these. Wow. First thing I noticed, this shrimp is tender as heck. And it's spicy. It's got a nice kick, chili flakes, and it's garlicky. It's got whole slices of garlic here. I actually have to get out of here because it's so windy here. And there's so many bugs going around. But this is delicious. Come try this place out. Wow. I mean, I know this is not the video for this. But that's a dang good piece of pineapple. Final food spot of the day. Hopefully. I'm at Ted's Bakery here in the North Shore. And people say, you gotta come here for a couple of things. One is the spicy shrimp. And two is the hapia, hapoa, something, coconutty pie. So I'm gonna definitely get those two and see what else they got. This is what Ted's is known for. Hapia pie. Hapia is a coconut milk tasting thing. I think that's what it is. I'm not really familiar. Look at this thing of food. It's kind of missing a little bit of crust though. I mean, a little bit of crust broke off. But that's okay. You're still beautiful. I still love you just the way you are. Look at that. Oh, that is so soft. My plastic fork is just falling in. I can see the, I think that's the hapia in the middle, that white part. And then you got the chocolate on the bottom. You do not need to chew this pie. It just breaks apart. Which I'm really happy about. That means when I'm 90, I can still come here without teeth. And still be able to enjoy this. It's a little custardy in the hapia. Oh, tastes like wonderful, beautiful, smooth, soft, floaty coconut cloud. Oh, this is so good. I'm going to hold off on the rest of this until I get the rest of my food. My food has arrived. I'm going to try to put, give it some light here. This is the spicy garlic shrimp. Looks like it's covered in a little bit of cheese. This definitely still has the shell on there. Contrary to the one I had before. I got some Hawaiian barbecue. So here are some beef short ribs. And on the bottom are barbecue chicken. That's what they recommended to me. So let's, wow, look how spicy. This thing is like doused in hot oil right here. Check out the barbecue short ribs. This is like, whenever I go see Hawaiian barbecue, this is always part of it. Barbecue chicken, obviously it is. And this one looks nice and charred. First of all, the spicy garlic shrimp. This is insane. This is it. This is what I've been looking for my whole life when it comes to shrimp. This is how you eat shrimp. This is going to be forever what every single shrimp I eat is going to get compared to. Because this is the best shrimp I've ever had in my life. Holy, what? North shore of Hawaii is where I found my perfect shrimp. My shrimp soulmate. The epiphany of what perfect shrimp should be is right here at Tid's Bakery. And it's this thing right here. Holy Jesus, that's good. Sorry, I had to switch seats because there's better lighting here. What was I? Oh yeah, I was gushing about the shrimp. Okay, it's lightly breaded. Very cheesy because they put a bunch of parmesan cheese on top. And this shrimp is spicy. It's knock your socks off spicy. At the same time, it's not overwhelming. The spiciness is not all you taste. You taste this fantastic flavor. And I'll tell you what. This shrimp goes perfectly with rice because it is salty and it is saucy. This is perfection. My problem with shrimp is a lot of times it's not flavorful enough. This is the granddaddy of all flavor. This is the most flavorful shrimp on the planet. When you bite into it, every flavor hits you at the same time. The spice, the garlic, the cheesiness, the saltiness, the umami. Everything. Well guys, do yourselves a favor and come here and try this shrimp. I'm going to try the barbecue chicken. That is charred to perfection. I love chicken with a nice char, nice smoky flavor, nice barbecue flavor. This chicken, I think they put a teriyaki glaze on this. This chicken is awesome. Next, let's just take a bite of this. I don't know the best way to eat this. I'm sorry guys. Excuse my animal-ness. Whoa, that was surprisingly tender. That is really tender. Whenever I eat Galbi, my recollection is I'm gnawing on this thing. Like I'm gnawing on it. Trying to tear the meat off the bones like some sort of prehistoric animal. But this meat just comes off so easily. And I've had quite a bit of Hawaiian barbecue. And I feel like this is a very signature taste. Teriyaki with a bit of char and sweet and savory. And this place definitely does that very well. But still, the star of the show. The star of every show. The highlight. The main event. The Taylor Swift of foods is the spicy garlic shrimp. Gotta come and get some. It is just mind-blowingly awesome. Afterwards, get a piece of pie. Now, I talk a lot about great tasting foods on this show, okay? Rarely, I mean, okay, I do it all the time. I say something that's the best is the best. The shrimp, officially anointed best spicy shrimp. Best shrimp I've ever had. Here, right here. This is unbelievable. One bite, your first bite, your eyeballs will almost pop out of your socket from how awesome and delicious it is. So if you're in Honolulu, if you're in Hawaii, I don't care which island you're from. Go take a boat, fly a plane, whatever you need to do. Come here and eat this shrimp. And as always, guys, all the places I went to, all their location info is in my description box. And this meal, what I got today was a triple mix. This whole plate was around $14, $15. Everything is very economical here. You get a plate of shrimp, I think it's only about $10 for like a big plate of shrimp and rice. And you'll need that rice. And that is a beautiful marriage. And you're going to really enjoy it. Alright, guys, I hope you enjoyed this food tour. Thank you all so much for watching. See ya.