Ube desserts, seafood towers and more

Chart House Waikiki is known for its brunch, happy hour and late-night menus. The Waikiki eatery recently introduced several new menu items, including a seafood tower ($250), petite tower ($175), bison burger ($27), whole tai snapper (market price), crab cake dinner ($42) and ube cheesecake ($11).

Seafood towers are designed to feed four to six people and include ahi poke, ahi and salmon sashimi, seared scallops, shrimp cocktail, fresh oysters on the half shell and Alaskan king crab. Petite towers are designed to serve two to three people. The crab cake dinner entrée — three crab cakes with a creamy lobster sauce over linguine — debuted following the success of the crab cake Benedict on the brunch menu. Save room for dessert, because the purple-hued ube cheesecake with shredded coconut on top is to die for.

Call 808-941-6669 or visit charthousewaikiki.com.

A new bake shop

New dessert shop Bake N Break recently opened within McCully Test Kitchen (second floor of McCully Shopping Center).

The biz features desserts like Japanese-style soufflé cheesecakes in flavors like matcha, ube, vanilla and hojicha ($7 per slice), cupcakes ($3.25-$3.75) and cream puffs ($3). Most notable are its King puffs, a collaboration with Alii Coffee Co. King puffs feature pâte à choux soaked in King cold brew and filled with coffee-flavored pastry cream. It’s topped off with a dairy-free King-flavored cream and dark chocolate disc.

The bakery is currently open noon-4 p.m. and 6-10 p.m. Wednesdays-Sundays. Follow the biz on Instagram (@bake.n.break.hi) to learn more.

‘Eat Pono’

Business women, philanthropist, recording artist and former Miss Hawaii (1999) Candes Gentry — together, with her 9-year-old son, Poet — released EAT PONO, a cookbook with healthy tips and easy-to-follow recipes.

“As parents, we do our best to raise our children with nourishment, but it’s inevitable that we default into rushed multitasking, often at the expense of our health,” Gentry states. “EAT PONO was inspired by the relentless questions of my 9-yearold son, Poet, who encouraged me to slow down and, with the help of Google and Alexa (let’s be real), start questioning where our food comes from and what provides the necessary nutrients needed or us to optimally function at all ages.”

With the motto “source local, eat nutritiously and live sustainably,” EAT PONO was written last year. Gentry and Poet’s favorite recipes to make together include overnight oats (page 22), empanadas (page 84) and Poet’s famous healthy chocolate mousse (page 109).

“Poet and I are now lifelong (foodie) learners of Mother Nature,” Gentry states. “We are excited to share this conversation with our community, so as to broaden sustainable lifestyle practices. After all, a core value of our culture is anchored in the shared love of food and stewardship of the land. Our hope is that EAT PONO will inspire others to question their own food choices and experiment with these yummy and ‘pono’ ways to flourish as a healthy ohana.”

The book is available for purchase online — Amazon, Apple Books, Kindle and Barnes & Noble — and also locally at SoHa Living, Magnolia Hawaii, Red Pineapple and Kahala Market. To learn more, visit eatpono. org and follow the brand on social media (@eatpono).