Maui 2016 - O'o Farms Tour and Maui Winery

Our first activity in Maui was a farm tour at O'o Farms, the dedicated farm for the popular restaurant Pacific'O.

The farm is set in the picturesque mountainside. They practice sustainable and organic farming methods including maintaining a balance of flora that attracts predatory bugs to feed on insects that could harm the crop. They also spray with something called organicide which is made of a blend of oils rather than from chemicals.

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For a video version of this post, you can watch this Youtube video

Baby's wet suit in this video is from Amazon - link here

As we toured, we picked ingredients for our salad for the lunch. We were also allowed to sample as we picked and Phil and I snacked heavily on these super sweet and juicy sugar snap peas.

The coffee program at O'o is fairly new but going strong with rows of coffee trees on the farm and a new roasting room. The roasting room is made from a eucalyptus tree on the farm. 

Our lunch was cooked in this wood fired oven made from wood that was found on the farm. Nothing used in the food or building is found more than 100 miles radius of the farm.

The tour concluded with lunch under this shaded area.

Roasted veggies with a specially seasoned tofu.

Chicken breast that was so tender and juicy.

Catch of the day, Ono fish on a bed of daikon radishes and dill.

Here's the garden salad we picked. There was a lot left over so I periodically snacked on more beans.

For $58 per person, we got a 2 hour hands-on tour and sampling to our heart's content. Then a huge delicious buffet lunch with chocolates and coffee grown, harvest, and roasted on premise. Everything is organic, local, and sustainable. I think it's absolutely worth it. I would highly recommend a tour at O'o Farm.

A quick stop at Maui Winery to try their pineapple wines

Lokelani Rose on the left and the Maui Blanc on the right

We thought the wines were good but not spectacular enough to buy a bottle and definitely not to pay for shipping back home. I really appreciated that the tasting was free and did not require a reservation.

Colin says til tomorrow!

Napa Trip 2015 - AirBnB, Madonna Estate Winery, Artesa Winery, The Model Bakery, Bouchon Bakery

Do you feel like you need a vacation from your vacation?

Last weekend, we took a group trip to Napa for the weekend. The AirBnB house our group stayed at had 5 bedrooms and 3 full baths in a great suburban neighborhood with lots of space. In the bathroom hung this picture which I felt is so fitting to my new life as a full time corporate employee, part time food writer, and now full time mother...But if you were here to read about motherhood rants, there's plenty of mommy blogs for your reading. Let's get to travel, food, and wine.

We went to the Oxbow Public Market in the morning to grab breakfast which included this very popular breakfast sandwich from The Model Bakery. The line to place the order was not long but it took a while to receive the sandwich. This is their signature regular breakfast sandwich on their fresh made English muffin. Quite possibly the best English muffin I've ever had - soft and with melty cheese and eggs. I think this sandwich is $6.95.

($7.95) chipotle breakfast sandwich on multigrain. It has eggs, cheese, avocado, and bacon. There's more flavor in this sandwich than the regular but the bread isn't as great. I should have stuck with the English muffin.

Our group was large and the only winery near us with the most affordable tasting fee and allowed us to bring outside food for a picnic was Madonna Estates. The tasting fee is $15 per person and we had a private tasting with just our group in a large room. We tasted 5 great wines. I bought a bottle of their crisp sweet Gewurztraminer although the Dolcetto was nice too.

We stopped by Frati Gelato Cafe by the riverwalk and I had an affogato with vanilla gelato. Refreshing!

And of course no trip to Napa is complete without a stop for Bouchon Bakery's famous gigantic macarons. I bought a box of all 8 flavors at $3.50 each. Fig was the seasonal flavor but Raspberry was my favorite.

Artesa Winery is really beautiful and scenic and crowded as heck. We managed to take a few shots by this gorgeous waterfall though.

Up next: Lunch at Morimoto Napa and dinner at Ad Hoc