PO’IPU – Maui restaurateurs Roy Dunn and Mike Hooks recently completed purchase
of The Beach House restaurant along Lawa’i Road here, and have already lowered
prices and made other changes to the menu at the dinner-only
landmark.
Executive Chef Linda Yamada and General Manager Dana Higa, as
well as the experienced kitchen crew which previously worked for Jean-Marie
Josselin, remain on staff.
The restaurant, which seats 240, becomes the
sixth restaurant owned and operated by Dunn and Hooks. They operate four
restaurants on Maui: Koho Bar & Grill, with locations in Kahului and
Napili; Plantation House Restaurant at Kapalua; and SeaWatch Restaurant at
Wailea.
They opened The Big Water Grille in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, one year
ago. All of those restaurants serve breakfast, lunch and dinner.
“The Beach
House concept (dinner only) allows us to move to another culinary level, and,
we hope, will open new doors for the development of our business in the
islands,” said Dunn.
The partners purchased outright the one-acre
commercial, oceanfront property from Metropolitan Mortgage, a privately-owned
company based in Spokane, Wash. Metropolitan owned the property for almost 50
years. Josselin operated the restaurant from 1995 to 1999.
The Beach House
dining room has undergone a “floor-to-ceiling” remodel, said Dunn. “We wanted
very much to use a Kaua’i designer, and Mary Wheatley is whom we selected for
the interior work,” he said.
Dunn and Hooks pride themselves on, and are
well-known on Maui for, “keeping it all as Hawai’i-based as possible in all our
business dealings,” Dunn explained.
Jan Kasprzycki, one of Maui’s premier
colorists and whose works are displayed at the SeaWatch restaurant in Wailea,
has 24 large works on exhibit at the Beach House.
The Beach House’s menu
has been completely revised by the new owners and the kitchen staff, with new,
creative regional cuisine offerings including diver sea scallop and green
papaya salad with white truffle vinaigrette and cranberry essence; Kaua’i
Asparagus, vine-ripened tomato, sweet onion and Puna goat cheese salad with soy
sherry vinaigrette; roasted mint coriander marinated lamb chops with grilled
vegetable strudel; lemongrass-crusted sea scallops with chili aioli; local boy
paella; coconut butter mochi “sundae;” and sorbetto martini of pineapple,
lychee and guava sorbetto splashed with passion fruit vodka.
The new owners
are active in community affairs on Maui, and plan on bringing that same spirit
to Kaua’i, they said.
“Having been a part of The Beach House restaurant for
four years, I’m excited a the prospect of the continuation of quality cuisine
and service under the direction of the new owners,” Yamada said.
“We’re all
looking forward to serving the community with great food and good fun in the
year 2000 and beyond,” she said.
“For the past four years, we’ve built a
concrete team at The Beach House with great enthusiasm for its work,” said
Higa.
“Roy Dunn and Mike Hooks empower us to integrate the old with the new
in order to provide the community with a dining experience which strives for
the best in food and service,” Higa said.
