I found out about this place pretty recently and I’m really sorry I didn’t know about this before.
Maui has a few Thai restaurants and several Thai food trucks. Of all of these, I think Nutcharee is easily the best. Not that the others are bad at all – in fact I really like the Thai food truck at South Maui Gardens in Kihei.
The menu here is decently extensive, but I do feel that it lack enough good vegetarian options.
My highlights are: the Ahi Laab (basicaly a laab or larb salad made out of raw ahi – really an excellent adaption of a classic dish to local ingredients), the E-san sausage (which I think they even make in-house – it has a tiny bit of funk which I love about it, but if you’re looking for regular sweet Italian sausage, this is definitely not it), and the Panang curry. I’d say we get those three dishes almost every time we eat here, and then we add a few other things depending on the size of our party.
They do have some beer, but not a full liquor license. But no matter – this isn’t really a place to sit and relax for a long meal. Nutcharee’s is a full table-service restaurant but the ambiance isn’t really amazing. Remember how I said they adapter their larb to use local ingredients? Well, they haven’t adapted the dining room to embrace outdoor seating, which I consider a negative.
I personally haven’t tried take-out from Nutcharee, but I’m willing to bet it’s pretty great, especially if you avoid the fried items.
Since most readers of my blog are visitors to Maui, let me start this review by saying: this isn’t really in a part of Maui that tourists frequent. In fact, not too many years ago, this wasn’t such a great part of Maui.
But you should definitely come here now!
This is a Sheldon Simeon restaurant and the food is really excellent!
If you don’t know Sheldon Simeon, well, he’s a celebrity chef on Maui. Maybe THE celebrity chef on Maui. Or at least, the only one who people have heard of outside Maui. He has a great take-out place called Tin Roof that I also very highly recommend. And he wrote a pretty usable interesting cookbook that has great recipes and inspiration.
Anyway, Tiffany’s was an old-school, not amazing Chinese-ish restaurant for about 20 years until Sheldon and his wife came along and bought and revamped it. So it’s got some old-school charm and seasoned employees, but the food is really modern and delicious.
Tiffany’s is best with a larger group. There are so many items on the menu that you’ll want to try, that you’re better off with a crowd so you can really order up right. I won’t say the portions are huge, but they can be rich, so sharing is definitely the right move here.
Here are some recommended dishes to get started: the hamachi crudo (the sauce is unreal – save it to pour over rice later in your meal), the kale caesar (even just for the drenched croutons), any of the various fried chicken options (mochiko being the best), and the excellent fatty and crispy pork belly – especially if you basically like fried crispy fat, which I do. But literally not a single dish I’ve had here is something I wouldn’t order again.
Tiffany’s does not take reservations, but you can get in line for a table on your way over by going to their Yelp page and signing up on the waitlist. Worst case, though, you have to wait so you get a drink at the bar and hang out in the front either outside or being mesmerized by the aquarium. Neither option is a problem.
Yes, Wailea has a Wailea Beach. And yes, it’s a nice big beach – not huge, but sizable. But no, I don’t really recommend it. And here’s why: it’s effectively the beach for the Grand Wailea – the mega resort in the Hilton family that has almost 800 rooms.
So while it’s a nice beach, it’s just generally MUCH more crowded than other great beaches north and south of it.
On the other hand, if you like a crowded beach, this might be the place. You can rent equipment here, there are a coffee shop and plenty of restaurants open to the public right at the beach basically, and plenty more up in the enormous hotel complex.
But for my beach time, I generally avoid this beach. It’s just overrun.
One note: the snorkeling here can be pretty decent if you swim north toward Turtle Cove. Much more info about that area on my Ulua Beach page.
And finally, there is a cute little extra beach here I call The Pocket. It’s at the sound end, just over a few steps of rocks, with just a bit of sand (conditions and tides permitting) and a scenic bridge behind it from the Wailea Beach Trail.
If you can get The Pocket alone, well, then maybe it’s worth visiting Wailea Beach.
Here’s a quick little spot for a snack that actually has a small place in Hawaii history. It’s been around for over 100 years (clearly not in this mall anchored by Whole Foods) and they keep their recipe secret.
Cash only. VERY inexpensive. Basically two items.
And I’ll go even further to whittle that down and say I’m not a big fan of one of them.
But what they serve is a frozen treat that is something like ice cream or sorbet, but it’s definitely a bit different. It’s small and refreshing and worth a try.
They serve two flavors: pineapple and strawberry. I really think the pineapple is something – it just tastes like sweet pure pineapple frozen and whipped – but it’s clearly not. Somehow they amplify the pineapple to be even more pineapply than it is naturally – maybe they’re reducing down a syrup?
The other option is strawberry, and this one just doesn’t hit me the right way. I feel like it doesn’t taste like strawberry so much as it tastes like strawberry flavoring – like a strawberry Jolly Rancher does. You know how a watermelon Jolly Rancher has a unique flavor that basically isn’t watermelon? Same thing here.
Anyway, if you’re in Kahului looking for a very quick, very casual, very refreshing bite, this is the place.
Ulua Beach is really one of those beaches that has almost everything – except waves. If you’re looking for boogie boarding, surfing, or body surfing, this usually won’t be the right beach.
What Ulua does have is nice sand, really, really fantastic snorkeling, plus parking and bathrooms and even a shower to rinse off the salt at the end of your visit.
The reef between Ulua and Mokapu Beaches, seen from the Ulua side
Let me tell you about the reef at the north end of the beach since that’s really what I think of when I think of this beach. The reef is fantastic for a few reasons. One is that it’s close to the parking lot, so you’ll see a lot of scuba divers here early in the morning on a good day. They like that they can drop off their equipment at the turn-around and then get right down to the water without having to carry everything too far.
Another feature that I love about this reef is that it’s relatively safe and easy to swim all of the way around it to Mokapu Beach. It’s a reef that basically sticks almost straight out from Maui, which means that you get two full sides to view. This is pretty important – often one side will be far better than the other either due to the clarity of the water (one side will be more sheltered from the current) and the angle of the sun will work differently when you are swimming on the north or south sides. So if one side doesn’t seem to have great visibility, soldier on! The other side could easily be better.
But enough about the geography – it’s the sea life! I almost always see multiple turtles here and probably half the time I see one or more eels. One day I saw two eels entwined together – fighting? Or making baby eels? They just kept winding around each other for at least 10 minutes. And then of course there is the whole panoply of Maui fish on display on the reef, and also just off the reef where you’ll see full schools of fish.
At the westernmost tip of the reef, a wall drops off. That’s where the scuba divers tend to congregate. But you can also free-dive down there for a few seconds to get some good views. Worth it.
And if you swim all the way around to the other end of the reef, you can walk back along the Wailea Beach Trail if you don’t want to swim back. Very, very short walk. And sometimes there’s enough sand to just walk back along the beach between the two under the shade trees.
Update! – I was recently back at Ulua beach to check out the rocky shoreline to the south end of the beach. And it was a great snorkeling success! A lot of kayakers and SUPers end up over here looking for turtles for good reason: there are lots of turtles. And of course you’ll see them much better when snorkeling. Further, there is a great and relatively undisturbed ecosystem down there full of fish and other wildlife too. And there are even two underwater arches for the adventures to free-dive through. I also feel like this is turning out to be a good octopus spotting area. I don’t know why, but I always feel like I won a prize when I find an octopus hiding in the depths, and I’ve had great luck here watching a brown blog slyly expose that magnificent eye and give me a wink.
I should note that there’s basically no easy way to get out of the water here other than swimming back to Ulua beach or continuing on to the beach at the Grand Wailea. It’s a rocky shoreline. So if there’s a current going south, just be careful to turn around at the appropriate time. Yes, worst case, you could swim down to Wailea Beach at the Grand Wailea and walk back along the beach path, but just keep within your swimming abilities here, especially if there’s a current. Maybe set your watch timer for 15 minutes, and at that point, turn around and work your way back. But any decent swimmer should be able to handle this, at least on days without too much swell or current.
After a few snorkels on this end of the beach, I whole-heartedly recommend it. It’s like the undisturbed relative of the reef at the other end of the beach. So plan a day here – and take a nice long snorkel at each!
