$1,000 per person

If your idea of dinner out is Rainbow Drive-In, what happened Friday night at the Halekulani is not going to make much sense.

The "Master Chefs Gala Series: Around the World with Seven Chefs" was the showcase event of the Hawaii Food & Wine Festival. Its hefty price tag: $1,000 a seat, for eight courses with wine pairings — $125 per course.

What some 200 diners got for that investment were conceptual dishes delivered with creativity and artistry from seven premier chefs.

Grant Achatz’s Quail Plate Lunch, for instance, was a sophisticated riff on its humble inspiration.

Following research at Alicia’s Market and —aha! — Rainbow Drive-In, "I decided to go whimsical with a quail ‘spam,’" said Achatz, chef of Alinea in Chicago, regarded as one of the top restaurants in the world.

"I like Spam," Achatz said with a grin.

He was introduced to the canned meat by his mentor, local chef Hank Adaniya, owner of Hank’s Haute Dogs.

Achatz’s version of Spam was a roulade, spiked with pork and spices and enhanced with Kona coffee- and salt-seasoned truffle.

Dominique Crenn of Atelier Crenn in San Francisco created a dish that symbolized Hawaii, with elements arranged in a lobster-shrimp broth. She titled the dish "Land and Sea."

"I’m all about nature and very visual, so I’m paying homage to what Hawaii is," she said.