I am not done with my Alaska trip report, but because that will take some time to complete, I thought I'd share my experience at
Stage and Amuse in the interim. A couple of my girlfriends and I recently started a tradition that we'd just have a nice dinner together in celebration of the holidays. We dined there on Friday, November 30, and we had a 6 p.m. reservation.
Stage is a restaurant that is located in the Honolulu Design Center, the bright orange furniture store on Kapiolani, between Pensacola and Piikoi. I had read some pretty good reviews of it, and it sounded to me like this was the up-and-coming "it" restaurant in Honolulu, akin to Alan Wong's, Roy's, 3660 on the Rise, and Chef Mavro. So it's no surprise that the chef is Jon Matsubara, formerly of Alan Wong's. Apparently, many other servers and kitchen staff were also former Alan Wong employees.
Before I get to the details of the dinner, I have to talk about the other details of the Honolulu Design Center. First of all, parking there is great! You can enter from either Pensacola or Piikoi, and right now, even though there is a booth and an arm gate, it seems to be unmanned. There are tons of parking stalls in a covered lot that leads you straight to the entrance of the store.
As soon as you walk into the store, there is a coffee bar straight ahead. To the right there are escalators which will lead you to the upper floors (I can't remember if there were 3 or 4 floors, but I think it's 3). Because we had some time before our 6 p.m. reservation, we decided to check out the furniture. What I expected was very different from what it really was. When the store first opened, there were television interviews touting the designer and very expensive furniture at the Design Center. What I saw was fairly reasonably priced, very nice looking, furniture! I can't imagine what they were thinking talking about all their expensive furniture (none of which I saw, by the way -- unless it was in one of the areas we didn't explore)! My guess is that they scared people away, seeing as how we felt almost like we had the entire store to ourselves. Personally, if I were looking for furniture before I walked in there, I wouldn't have even bothered. I would have just assumed it was out of my league. But now that I know they have nice stuff at a decent price, I would go there!
Anyway, enough ranting about their marketing. After we explored quite a bit, we still had time before our reservation, so we decided to check out Amuse, the wine bar. I had read about this place...it's like a self-service wine tasting bar, where they have machines that provide one ounce pours of wine. I thought this was a really cool concept, and I saw it someplace else -- I think it may have been in Napa.
Amuse is located right before the entrance to Stage (I think on the 2nd floor). Interestingly, Stage has it's own bar, and there is also bar seating at Amuse. We approached the bartender and asked him how the wine dispensing machines worked. We each gave him a credit card, which he linked to what I'll call a "wine card," which looks like an ATM or credit card. Basically, you stick your card in the machine, and it keeps track of all of your charges. When you're done, you "close out the tab" and they charge your credit card, or you can pay cash if you'd like.
My friend overheard a couple ordering a cheese plate, so she ordered one for us too. They put it on her wine card. Then, we went around tasting a few wines. The wine bottles are attached to the machines, so you're able to look at the actual bottle and read the label. Above the bottle, there is a digital reading of the cost of a one ounce serving of that particular wine. I think the lowest price may have been about 90 cents. I'm not sure what the highest was, but I'm sure it was over $10.
A lot of them were in the $2-$3 range. During our first round, we weren't quite sure how to use the machine right. I tried using it like the machine at the gas station, putting the card in and sliding it out right away, before pushing the button to dispense the wine -- but, the proper way to do it was to leave the card in the slot, push the button, then pulling the card out after. One of my friends made a boo-boo on her first try and ended up hitting the button twice, resulting in a $10, 2 ounce serving of wine! At least it was a really good wine though!
The three of us each tried about 3 or 4 different wines and nibbled on our cheese platter (brie, cheddar, some kind of white cheese, grapes, apples, and crackers) and a basket of bread (which was really good!) before heading into the restaurant for dinner. On the way in, we noticed a private room to the left right before the entrance, where it looked like they were setting up for a private party.
Being a designer furniture store, the decor in the restaurant was quite eclectic. What I liked about it was that it was kind of fun and whimsical, and not overly stuffy as some restaurants in this price range are. My favorite feature was the different lighting fixtures, particularly the giant Japanese-style lanterns hanging from the ceiling, although the one that was above our table was deflated.
We were also right next to the window facing the street, and also in front of the open kitchen. Some people find open kitchens a turn-off and a distraction, but I like them. Strangely enough, I didn't even really notice any noise coming from the kitchen, even though it was right there. We got to see Chef Matsubara himself, in the middle of all the action.
I loved the service here. We had two people constantly checking on us. The servers were friendly and unpretentious, just how I like them. I felt comfortable here and did not feel as though it was stuffy at all, something that bugs me at other comparably priced restaurants.
The menu at Stage is fairly simple and uncomplicated (although the wine list is a slightly different story!). It seems as though they change their menu often based on seasonal items, and when we were ordering dessert, the server apologized that he couldn't really describe most of the items since many of them were new to the menu that very day.
I ordered a glass of wine, one of my friends went back outside to get that $5/ounce wine at Amuse, and my other friend ordered a vodka collins. We started with two appetizers, the crab cakes and Caesar salad rolls. There are two crab cakes, but our server asked the kitchen to cut them each in half so we could each have one half, and fight for the last remaining half. There were 3 of the Caesar salad rolls (which seemed to be really popular -- we saw a lot of them coming out of the kitchen), which was kind of like Caesar salad wrapped up in clear rice paper (like the summer rolls you see at Bale with the shrimp in them).
I thought the restaurant was very smart about the way they distribute bread. Rather than leaving a bread basket on the table, someone comes around offering several different types of bread. I asked for one type (the same one I was eating outside at Amuse), and the server said, "that's all?" So I also chose a foccacia. He came around at least two more times asking if we wanted to try other breads, but I held back. We noticed that the selection changed throughout the evening, as people who were seated later than us were offered a couple of different options.
For entrees, my vodka collins friend ordered the seared ahi. My expensive wine friend and I both ordered the rib eye with foie gras (duck liver). This entree was $49, I believe the most expensive item on the menu. We were given the option to forego the foie gras, which would have reduced the price to $35, but we both wanted to try it, and I know I did not regret that decision!
The rib eye was served on a bed of roasted Kahuku corn and mushrooms, which was SSSOOOOO good! There was also a side of garlic potato puree, basically pulverized garlic mashed potatoes, also very good, and very garlicky. And the rib eye was cooked to perfection. It had a wonderfully smoky aroma and taste, and it was quite a huge portion. And the foie gras...I don't think I would eat the foie gras by itself, but I would cut small pieces of it to eat with a piece of rib eye, and it was just like butter! (By the way, to all of my animal rights friends, I'm sorry...I know what they do to those poor ducks to make the foie gras -- and I'm sorry to my friends who never knew what they did or what foie gras is, but are probably looking it up right now because I mentioned it.)
I think my friend with the seared ahi ended up finishing most of her food, but the two of us with the rib eye could not finish. We ended up having our leftovers boxes up. However, we still saved a little room for dessert! They had a sampler platter that sounded interesting, so we ordered one to share. Two of us also ordered coffee, which was worth it just for the presentation! We each received our own French press, which was good for about two full cups of coffee. So good! The dessert platter was excellent as well, although I think we all agreed that the creme brulee was the best item on the plate. I believe it was a cinnamon creme brulee. There was also a truffle, an espresso with ice cream in it, and one other item that I can't remember at the moment.
I don't know if there was a mistake or what, but our bill only came up to $200! I swear it should have been at least $250, and I was actually expecting it to be closer to $300, considering there was a glass of wine, a vodka collins, two appetizers, 3 entrees, a dessert, and 2 cups of coffee. For what we got, I thought this was a very good value, and I would not hesitate to return again or to recommend it to others. And I would definitely make time to have a few sips at Amuse first! If Stage is not in your budget, just go to Amuse -- they have some reasonably priced appetizers and simpler meals like sandwiches and burgers.
There were a lot of wraps and sandwiches, including boxed lunches for us to take with us one day when we took a bus to go on a "photo safari."
skan king crab. I also had a salad to start (I think it was the blue cheese salad). I'm not sure if the crab was any different than the crab we can get here at Costco or Sam's Club, but somehow it just tasted better eating it IN Alaska! The Glacier Brewhouse is known for their prime rib, but by the time we got there, they had run out (I think we waited about 45 minutes before we got a table, that's how popular it is!).
