KILAUEA — When heading to the North Shore be sure to stop by the Kilauea Bakery & Pau Hana Pizza for a quick bite to eat and some great coffee. After you order your food and get settled in you
KILAUEA — When heading to the North Shore be sure to stop by the Kilauea Bakery & Pau Hana Pizza for a quick bite to eat and some great coffee. After you order your food and get settled in you may want to kick off your slippers and stay awhile.
Nestled in the Kong Lung Shopping center off Kilauea Lighthouse Road, this unique little spot has outdoor garden seating complete with flowers, trees and even little ponds with water lilies peaking out. It’s a ‘sweet’ hangout that offers bike parking and free wireless internet.
Although the outdoor seating has a canopy to keep the rain off, indoor seating is also available and the walls are adorned with the latest creations from Kaua‘i artists. There are some interesting books and magazines as well as Chess boards and Konane, a Hawaiian board game, available to keep customers entertained.
“Although we are active on the social networks; Facebook, Trip Advisor, Four Square etcetera, we are emphasizing that The Kilauea Bakery & Pau Hana Pizza is part of the original social network,” said bakery Owner, Tom Picket. “A public place where people sit and share stories and simple questions about the weather or sit for hours and solve important global/political problems …”
Founded in 1991, The Kilauea Bakery & Pau Hana Pizza will soon celebrate its 20-year anniversary on July 5th.
The bakery has an array of fresh-made goodies from pastries, bagels, muffins and macaroons (my favorite) to locally-roasted coffee (my other favorite), espresso drinks, smoothies, soups, salads and pizza. Bread and cakes are also available including many gluten-free and vegan options. By the way, this is the only place I know of that makes a gluten-free pizza crust. And, as if all that wasn’t enough, they also make their own cured, smoked meats for pizza toppings including ham, sausages, salmon and ono.
Picket, who says he is on the rebound after a sickness he suffered last year, is not letting any of his energy go to waste. He is seeking out more and more local sources for the bakery’s ingredients including taro (a Hawaiian root vegetable), salad greens, cherry tomatoes, Japanese cucumbers and North Shore coconut. The taro is now used in place of potatoes in the soups and for homemade poi, which is used to make the bakery’s hearty poi walnut and poi ciabatta breads.
No part of the locally-harvested coconuts go to waste. First the sweet coconut water is used in smoothies, then the meat is ground up to make coconut milk used in soups, haupia and creme filling for éclair pastries . The left-over pulp is used to make their marvelous macaroons (my favorite). And finally the husks, an excellent growing medium, are composted back into soil. Did I mention that the macaroons are my favorite?
Kilauea Bakery is refreshingly eco-saavy with biodegradable to-go containers and accessible recycling bins for customers. In addition to their support of local agriculture, Picket says all the organic matter is composted and whenever there is a surplus of food it is donated to the food bank.
The Kilauea Bakery & Pau Hana Pizza is open 7 days a week from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. Pizza is available from 10:30 a.m. on. Call 828-2020 for orders and questions.
The Kilauea Bakery & Pau Hana Pizza is open 7 days a weekfrom 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Pizza is available from 10:30 a.m. on.
Call 828-2020 for orders and questions.
Cost: $ (5-15 per person)
Green: 3 leaves
(Recycles, biodegradable to-go, local ingredients.)
