This post will be all about the delicious food we ate in Maui. You can find our Maui travel guide HERE, and all of our wedding blogs HERE. Check back tomorrow for our Road to Hana guide, and come back Friday for our Maui Vlogs
We quickly found that food can be expensive on Maui. I mean Maui is a big tourist destination, and an island, so I expect nothing less. If you have been around long, or know us, you know that one of our favorite parts of traveling is THE FOOD (NY food, Boston food, Austin food, PDX food). So, the trick is finding the deals and saving your splurge on really good food (this is hard because it’s all so so good!).
Don’t eat at hotels for every meal – the food is considerably more expensive this way and the food is, for the most part, not going to be anything mind blowing. Look for restaurants that have happy hours to score some great deals on food and drinks (I’ve listed a few favorites below). We also made a trip to the grocery store to stock up on some essentials and ate a few meals in. For part of our trip we stayed at the Marriott that came with a small kitchen and outdoor grills for guests to use that we took advantage of.
Here are the places we ate at, and highly recommend! I highlighted some with great happy hours too! Scroll to the bottom to see our favorite breakfast, lunch, dinner, and happy hour!
Ululani’s Hawaiian Shave Ice
After we landed, got our car and drove the 45+ minutes to our hotel, and checked in, we were hungry (probably on the verge of hangry). We grabbed a quick bite to eat at one of the restaurants in our hotel, and then headed straight for some shave ice. Solid choice if you ask me – the shave ice, not the way over priced dinner at our hotel. For the shave ice, I highly recommend ice cream on the bottom and a snow cap on top- it’s the right thing to do.
Island Vintage Coffee
With the time change coming from the mainland to Maui we found ourselves wide awake at 5AM. We took a stroll along the beach in search of coffee and a quick bite to eat, and wound up at Island Vintage Coffee in Whaler’s Village. We came back multiple times for Acai bowls and our morning drinks (coffee for me and hot chocolate for Trav). They also have local coffee and honey to purchase and take back home with you.
Da’Kitchen
This was recommend to us by our Wedding Planner (who lives on and is from Maui)! If you’re looking for delicious, traditional Hawaiian food this is your go to place. Trav and I ordered the Katsu Moco, shared it and couldn’t finish it. Bella went with the Teriyaki Chicken, and we all shared an order of the crab wantons. They have two locations on Maui (Kahului and Kihei). We went to both. Their location in Kahului is more of a sit down place with an extensive menu, and their Kihei location is more of a grab and go place with a limited menu. Their Kahului location would be a great first stop after landing in Maui!
Three’s Bar and Grill
This is who catered our wedding and we heard nothing but great reviews of the food from our guests. We wouldn’t know because all we had time for was a couple bites. We did visit their location during Happy Hour and sampled appetizers and drinks when we were making our finial decisions on our food, and it was delicious then! Highly recommend the Kalua pork quesadilla and the hurricane fries, but you really can’t go wrong with any of it. They have a great happy hour and are located in the downtown area of Kihei.
Hyatt Regency Spa Maui
Like I said earlier, try not to eat at the hotels for every meal just because it’s very over priced, you can find better quality food at local restaurants, and you can support the local businesses. Our first meal in Maui was at the Hyatt just because we were too exhausted to go anywhere, and I think we paid $25 for a simple caesar salad at the pool side restaurant. But with that said, it’s always fun to have a cocktail or two while you’re lounging by the pool. Yes, they will be an arm and a leg, but pro tip – order one cocktail and ask them to put it in two cups (shoutout to the older couple hanging out next to us that told us about this)!
Paia Bay Coffee Bar
Paia is a cute little beach town that I could spend an afternoon at just walking up and down the main street looking in all the cute little shops. But! We just made a quick pit stop here before we started on our Road to Hana trip. Paia Bay Coffee Bar is a coffee shop that had an extensive breakfast! They serve organic, locally sourced food and I learned that they are a certified ocean friendly restaurant (translation: eco friendly)! How cool is that. Highly recommend the quick pit stop if you’re doing Road to Hana.
Cool Cat Cafe
After our Road to Hana adventure, we wanted / needed a hearty dinner. We ventured into downtown Lahaina and ended up in this open air cafe. It’s your average diner type place with some delicious burger options (yep, Travis did in fact get a cheeseburger topped with fried macaroni. . . ). The service and location were both great!
Andaz Maui BumBye Beach Bar
Since we reserved a pool side cabana for the day during our stay at the Andaz, it came with a $50 credit to their pool side restaurant and bar. Granted, your dollar doesn’t go very far at the resorts. But to make the most of it, we ordered a mezze platter, the lobster grilled cheese (recommended to us by our caterer and SO GOOD), and we both got a drink. The total was more than $50 but it was all delicious, and we didn’t have to leave our cabana or the pool area to go get food.
Malasadas
I couldn’t tell you how we ended up here or where we came across this place (most likely Yelp), but this was the definition of a hole in the wall place, and it screamed “locals only.” If you are looking for some delicious pastries and authentic malasadas this is your place. It’s not too far from downtown Lahaina, but it was a little hard to find because it was in an industrial park. I included a picture of the front / entry for reference because it’s easy to miss. If you didn’t catch the sign above, this is a cash only place.
Down The Hatch
We met up with some of our guests and wedding party for a happy hour here (supposedly it’s supposed to have the longest happy hour on Maui). Love the location of this place in downtown Lahaina, and the open air, relaxed feeling to it. It was a good place to meet up with everyone because it was a seat your self, order food at the counter kind of place so guests could come and go as they please and there was no splitting checks. Plus they have Adult Shave Ice during happy hour! Wins all around.
Monkeypod Kitchen
My maid of honor, and Trav’s best man made reservations here for us to all meet up after a day of bachelor / bachelorette festivities. This was the perfect ended to the day. The food is beyond amazing, and the atmosphere was so fun! Love that they support Maui’s local farms, fisheries and ranchers too. They have a couple locations on Maui, but we ended up in their Ka’anapali location. Highly recommend getting their Mai Tai (as seen above) and making reservations.
Mala Ocean Tavern
This is where we had our ‘Rehearsal Brunch’. It’s situated right off the beach; like so close you can hear the waves crashing, and depending on where you sit you will have a great view of the ocean. The food was fresh and delicious, and the service was excellent. I think everyone in our party enjoyed their food and there were no complaints! You can read more about the troubles of landing a rehearsal brunch location in this post.
Ka’ana Kitchen Brunch
This restaurant is located inside the Andaz Maui and let me tell you, some of the best food I had all trip came out of this kitchen (or maybe that was the lack of food we had on our wedding day talking..). But really, I try to stay far away from buffets, but this place gets 5 stars in my book. So much fresh food, and we loved the variety of options. There was an omelette bar, a variety of breads (hello nutella stuffed brioche bread), crepes stuffed with passionfruit, an assortment of cheeses, asian inspired dishes, and the typical American breakfast items as well. My personal favorite was the fresh squeezed juice bar. It’s a bit pricy at $48 / person, but I think it’s well worth it for the variety of fresh food that is offered.
Ka’ana Kitchen Dinner
We made reservations at the Ka’ana kitchen for dinner to celebrate our first night as a married couple. I don’t think reservations were completely necessary, but I guess it doesn’t hurt. We were debating on doing the chef’s tasting they offer, but decided against it (maybe next time!). I ordered the seared scallop risotto and Trav got their take on fried chicken and waffles (recommend by our waiter), and we split the seared ahi appetizer. They provided us with complementary champagne and dessert as a way to congratulate us on our wedding. Couldn’t have asked for a better dinner.
Nibble + Nourish Maui
Originally our plan for a post rehearsal meal was to go back to a rental house and my family make food, and in anticipation for that I reached out to Nibble and Nourish Maui for a cheese board. Well, plans changed and we went out to brunch instead, but I had still put my order in for this grazing board. We decided to still get it and it was great to have while we got ready the morning of the wedding. They even do small boxes that would be perfect for a beach day!
ORDER FROM NIBBLE AND NOURISH MAUI
Best Breakfast: (handsdown) Ka’ana Kitchen at the Andaz
Best Lunch: Da’Kitchen
Best Dinner: Monkeypod
Best Dessert: Ululanis Shave Ice
Best Happy Hour: Three’s Bar and Grill
So there you have it – where we ate in Maui! Something tells me we will be back sooner rather than later, which just means more time to try more places and venture back to some of our favorites! Some places that are still on my list to try: Mama’s Fish house, Tin Roof Maui, Moku Roots, The Mill House, Leoda’s pie shop, 808 Grindz Cafe.
Have you been to Maui? What’s your favorite place to eat?
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