Chinese New Year comes early this year: January 23 starts the Year of the Dragon (black water dragon, to be precise), a year in which almost everyone is supposed to prosper. After a rough 2011 — or Year of the Rabbit, whichever way you look at it — I’m more than ready to embrace this new beginning and everything that comes with it.
I just started working with Panya (@PanyaHawaii), and found out they put a contemporary spin on traditional new year’s treats. Gau, the brown sugar mochi that everyone loves, is available in single-serve pans, and in different flavors, to boot. Their jai, or monk’s food, is slightly more gourmet; they have all the ingredients of traditional jai, but have added snow peas and ginkgo nuts for color. They’ve also iced shortbread cookies with Chinese characters to look like tiles, so you can give these out instead of regular lisee, or red envelopes. And finally, they have sesame balls that I call faux gin dui, because the outside is a baked bread, not the fried mochi balls.
I visited with Alice and Annie Yeung and Kiana Huang at Panya, so they could show me the Chinese New Year goodies.
What else is going on at Panya these days? My interview actually overlapped into their happy hour, so we tried some of their cocktails and some of their popular dishes, like the peanut butter French toast at breakfast. Breakfast, really? Check it out at HawaiiIRL.com!
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It's MY year and I'm a fire dragon! So I guess I'll listen to Melissa this year and try more of her recommended restaurants! Heehee
Can't wait to try Panya!
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