Memorial Day 2004

At times like this, the sacrifices made by soldiers in service to our country is certainly felt more deeply than during times of peace. Protecting our freedom and civil liberties is (supposed to be) one of the key reasons our nation puts its soldiers at risk. Well, as this photo demonstrates, freedom of expression is alive and well and driving around the streets of Maui.

The slightly hard to read black and yellow sticker says: “We can bomb the world to pieces, but we can’t bomb it into peace.”

As we first approached the island of Maui I was reminded of what a lush, luxuriously green paradise we were about to visit. In some ways, returning to Maui feels a little like returning home after a long absence.

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Here’s another aerial view, this time looking south, towards Kihei.

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We’ve rented a condo with a relatively decent ocean view. It’s located in the Kahana area, between Kaanapali and Napili, home of many budget priced, ocean view accomodations. The place is a one bedroom unit with a full kitchen, which is very convenient.

 
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Here’s a picture of some Protea flowers and a couple of Birds of Paradise. We got the flowers while upcountry, on the road to Haleakala. On the way back down we saw them growing wild along side the road. The bushes were quite striking, reaching 15 to 20 feet in height.

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Of course, Maui is famous for its rainbows:

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The view from Mama’s are as good as the food. We each had the stuffed mahi-mahi and split a Black Pearl for dessert. The mahi-mahi was stuffed with crab, lobster, Maui onion and macadamia nuts. It was accompanied by grilled asparagus and lemon rice. Very, very good. Very, very much the most expensive lunch I’ve ever eaten, but well worth every dollar. The pearl part of dessert was made of chocolate mousse, with a shiny chocolate glaze and the shell was baked using almond flour.

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One of our absolutely favorite things to do while visiting Maui is snorkeling. We think the best place to snorkel is at Honolua Bay, so that’s where we went first. The water was warmer than I remembered, with pretty good clarity, especially the further out one went. Even so, runoff from the recent rains left a slightly red haze lingering near the top of the water. The usual wide variety of fish, along with some corals were there, just as we remembered. We did see a very large eel, but I was already out of film by then. Here are a few pictures that came out reasonably OK:

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No real dramatic sunsets yet, but this one wasn’t bad at all:

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We’re leaving for Maui in the morning, so posting will be sparse for the next few days. I do hope to have some images to share in the near future; I’ve already scouted out possible wifi hotspots!

Worth noting is that the Best Western Grosvenor hotel, very close to SFO, provides a great park and fly deal, where for just a bit more than the price of a room you get to leave your car in their parking lot until you return. They provide a free shuttle to the airport as well. The best deal is that they provide free in-room wifi access; hence this last minute post.

Aloha!

Having extra buttermilk on hand and being in the mood to bake, I quickly found a suitable recipe and got started. The resulting sesame seed rolls turned out great; they were very light and had a unique tang from the buttermilk and honey.

Honey Buttermilk Bread

2 tsp yeast
3 C bread flour
1 1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup buttermilk
1 Tbs butter
3 Tbs honey
1/2 C water

Put all ingredients in bread machine and push start.

For Rolls: Use the dough cycle, then knead again adding some flour if the dough is sticky. Shape into rolls and allow to rise until doubled in bulk. Bake at 375

After we received our Penzey’s order we realized we had ordered a bit too much of both cinnamon and poppy seeds. A quick google search presented the following recipe, which we found to be quite delicious.

Cinnamon Poppy Seed Cake

Recipe By : Bon Appetit
Serving Size : 12

2 C sugar
1 Tbs ground cinnamon
2 1/2 C all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 C unsalted butter — room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
4 large eggs — separated
1 C buttermilk
6 Tbs poppy seeds

Preheat oven to 350. Generously butter 12 cup Bundt pan. Combine 1/2 cup
sugar and cinnamon in small bowl. Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda
and salt into medium bowl.

Using electric mixer, beat butter and vanilla in large bowl until fluffy.
Gradually add 1 cup sugar, beating until mixture is smooth. Beat in egg
yolks 1 at a time. Mix in flour mixture alternately with buttermilk in 3
additions each. Fold in poppy seeds.

In medium bowl, whisk egg whites until foamy. Gradually add remaining 1/2
cup sugar, beating. Fold whites into batter in 2 additions.

Spoon half of cake batter into prepared pan. Sprinkle with half of cinnamon
sugar. Spoon remaining batter over. Sprinkle with remaining cinnamon sugar.

Bake cake until tester inserted near center comes out clean, about 50
minutes. Cool cake in pan on rack 10 minutes. Turn cake out onto rack and
cool completely.

Reformatted from original.