Monkeypod Kitchen: Farm to table bar in Maui

On my recent cruise to Hawaii, we had a 2 day stop in Maui. On our first night in Maui, we had dinner with our friends at Monkeypod, a farm to table eatery and bar located in Whalers Village, an outdoor shopping complex.

It was actually kind of hard to find a restaurant to eat in Maui because our ship arrived on a Friday or Saturday night, and a lot of the popular restaurants were already booked. Luckily, Monkeypod doesn’t take reservations and only does a first come first serve basis. We waited around 30-40 minutes for our table of 6 adults.

Note: all prices in this blog post are in USD.

Patio

We are seated in the patio but the whole restaurant has this indoor-outdoor thing going on where there aren’t really any walls or windows, so it doesn’t make a big difference. After the sun sets, the temperature is not hot and there is a nice little breeze.

The overall feel is rustic with a lot of wooden beams on the ceiling. The bar looks pretty cool too. My only complaint is that the chairs weren’t the comfiest.

Drinks

My boyfriend and I each order a cocktail.

Monkeypod mai tai ($16)

The waitress recommends the mai tai as one of their signature drinks (I feel like every place in Hawaii says the mai tai is their signature drink lol). Monkeypod’s mai tai uses kula organic silver and dark rums, house-made macadamia nut orgeat (what is that??), lime, bols orange curacao, and a honey-lilikoi foam.

I thought the foam was actually a pretty neat touch and it tasted a little sweet. The drink itself tasted a little strong, but I prefer my cocktails this way. The mai tai had a nice spice to it and it was still fruity.

The white walker ($16)

My boyfriend orders the white walker cocktail, which uses fid street Hawaiin gin, crème of coconut, lime,
lemongrass-cardamom syrup, and kaffir lime.

We liked the tiki glass that it came in. The drink itself tasted very coconut and fruity – yummy and refreshing!

Food

Here is everything our table ordered!

Kalua pork & pineapple pizza ($21)

All of the pizzas at Monkeypod are hand tossed with scratch made crust. I chose the Kalua pork one because it was the most unique out of their list – it contains kalua pork, macnut pesto, roasted pineapple, jalapeño and green onion.

Overall, the pizza was tasty but I did need to remove most of the jalapenos because they were too spicy for me. The amount of kalua pork on the pizza is acceptable, but I didn’t get to taste how tender it is when it is on a pizza with all these other toppings. Loved the crust and the pesto.

The pizza is small enough for 1 hungry person to finish but I couldn’t finish it when sharing with my boyfriend. We only had 1 slice leftover though!

Saimin ($21)

A few of my friends ordered the saimin because we’ve been on a cruise for 8 days now and we are actually all craving Asian food like noodles, rice, etc. The saimin seemed the be the closest thing to this.

We were surprised at the appearance when it arrived at our table. It looks like a bowl of pho noodles, but actually it has locally-made iwamoto family noodles, served with natural pork, broccoli, bean sprouts, red onion, peanuts, cilantro and mint. The cilantro actually reminded us of pho, but the soup base and the tender pork did satisfy our cravings for something soupy.

Fish tacos ($25)

My friend orders the fish tacos and the fish of the day is mahi mahi so that is the fish they use in the tacos. On top of the battered fish, they put on chipotle mole (contains peanuts), salsa fresca, sour cream, cilantro and cabbage.

My friend actually found the mahi mahi to be quite dry and she said it tasted more like a chicken taco than a fish taco.

Pete’s fish and chips ($25)

My boyfriend and I share the fish and chips (along with my pizza). I am pleasantly surprised it comes in 3 pieces because I find most places only give you 2 pieces usually. The fish is battered and fried tempura style and served with fries, ketchup, and a vinegar aioli.

I found the fish to be flaky inside so it met my expectations. Fries were a little soft though, so that was too bad.

Final thoughts

Loewe’s rating: ⭐⭐⭐

We found the dinner to be pretty enjoyable at Monkeypod. My boyfriend and I really liked our cocktails and the mai tai may have been one of the best I’ve tried in Hawaii. I think any of the pizzas would have been a pretty good choice, and the saimin noodles and fish and chips were not bad. The only item we wouldn’t order again are the mahi mahi fish tacos, but that may also depend on the fish of the day.

Prices were reasonable for Hawaii – around $25 for an entree. They have more expensive options like ahi tuna steak for $45 as well so the $20 entree mark is for their cheaper entrees.

Again, the most convenient part about Monkeypod is that they don’t take reservations so we were able to get a table without much hassle (but a longish wait). Luckily, it’s inside a shopping complex so you can do some shopping while you wait and the first 2 hours of parking will be reimbursed to you via Monkeypod.

Sincerely, Loewe