Kookie’s Thai Kitchen

The new restaurant name is Phở-​Pad Thai. It’s excellent! Bold flavors, fresh ingredients, beautifully presented. I recommend without hesitation the Crispy Noodle appetizer (which was mostly vegies, fresh and flavorful) and the Shu Shee Pla (basa fish served with Thai eggplant in red curry, coconut milk, and basil). The Seafood Tom Yum soup is robust and generous. I will definitely go back to try more dishes soon!

After a couple more recent visits, I have sadly accepted the fact that the quality of the food has slid some. They still have the nice staff and decent prices but the food is just average now.

RIP Kookie’s Thai Kitchen… apparently there was another change of ownership & name.
The food under the new owners is mediocre /​average.

I love the food there…
This past week when I went there we ordered
Beef Salad: I just love the dressing they use, something about it makes it so yummy. It’s almost like they use chili pepper sauce with citrus flavors.
Green Curry: I really am a fan of there curry, and I like it real spicy! It wasn’t spicy enough so the waiter gave me chili peppers which really got to my taste buds.
Thai Garlic Chicken: I think I am just a really big fan of garlic, but this was really delicious.

Kookie used to be my favorite thai restaurant in honolulu. I told everyone about it because I wanted Kookie to survive. I went there last week because I was craving her yummy curries.
When I first went it, I didn’t see the waitress that’s normally there. Then the menu looked different. I thought they just changed the menu because the old menu was not very organized. I asked the waitress about the beef salad that I normally get, and she didn’t know what I was talking about.
Then, she finally admitted that the CHEF HAS CHANGED! The menu is different. Even though it’s still called Kookie’s Thai kitchen, it’s no longer Kookie cooking.
Finally, I decided on a penang curry, a green curry, and the crying tiger. It was just okay. When Kookie was cooking, the curries had so much flavor and depth, like nothing I have ever had before in another thai restaurant. But this curry was just the same as any other you would find. I’m so disappointed!!! Where are you Kookie?!! Does anyone know?!!

We decided to give this place a try for lunch based on the favorable reviews from other Unilocalers, and I must say the ratings are generous at best. The location is poor w/​only street parking on a rather busy thoroughfare, and the restaurant’s open air windows and french-​style screen doors allow all the accompanying road and vehicle noise to pour in uninsulated.
Inside, while the laminate floors and light décor are not unpleasant, the stiff wood chairs are very uncomfortable.
But the real draw is supposed to be the food, and unfortunately, things do not improve in this area. First off, the dine-​in menu we were given was quite possibly the worst I’ve ever seen. Food items were simply listed with no rhyme or reason and it was a terrible chore to pick out the things we wanted. The waitress was also pushing the more expensive seafood dishes, which was also a turn-​off. After we placed our orders, we perused the take out menus and found that the take out menu was fully organized and had different items listed on it that weren’t on the dine-​in menu! What the-​?? Why weren’t we given this menu in the first place? Unbelievable!
We ended up ordering the Pad Thai w/​chicken and the Thai Basil Chicken (Gai Pud Kra Prow), and while the food was tasty enough and they were open to preparing the dishes with low oil/​no MSG on request, the portions were noticably small (especially considering the price – $ 7.99 per dish). The two of us have been to many Thai restaurants where two dishes were more than enough to feed the both of us, but here, we were barely satisfied. They did give us a free bowl of rice, which in hindsight was probably the only reason I didn’t end up going to the Korean BBQ place next door for a snack afterwards. Another oddity is that the spice condiments were only of the dry variety with no sambal or similar sauces.
Overall, this place has a lot going against it. The food simply does not offset the poor atmosphere, and poor value offered. To anyone looking for a good Thai restaurant on Oahu, I definitely would not recommend going out of your way to find this place as there are far better choices around. Even Kalihi residents would do well to look elsewhere for their Thai food fix.
Verdict: Not recommended.

We sampled the pad ki mao (I think), with beef, pad siew, spring rolls, shrimp fried rice, and iced coffee. The staff was friendly and helpful in assisting us choose something a little outside of our usual orders.
It was refreshing to receive an order of spring rolls that consisted of more than just two rolls cut in half. I think there were five or six rolls provided. They were flavorful, well cooked, and not too greasy.
The fried rice was also pretty good: sort of delicately flavored and not too oily. I didn’t have any of the shrimp, but it was reported that they were kind of bland.
The pad dishes were sort of similar in some ways in terms of ingredients beyond the noodles in the pad siew. The pad ki mao seemed the drier of the two in terms of sauce. We ordered both of them «spicy», and it was interesting to note the resulting differences. In the pad siew, the heat seemed much brighter and up front, whereas in the pad ki mao it was still there, but a slower burn arising from the depths.
The iced coffee offered a welcome respite from the painful pleasure, but I still had a good sweat going on the scalp and under the eyes by the end of the meal.
I would have given them another star, but in both of the pad dishes, our eggplant was very dry, fibrous, and tough. That couldn’t have been considered normal or good, so I’m willing to give them a pass on that once on the chance we just got a bad eggplant or something.

Worth a trip to Kalihi, indeed!
The boy says 5 stars– it’s his new favorite Thai restaurant. I’m a little more cautious throwing five stars around, especially when everything wasn’t perfect (we had some inedible raw eggplant in our noodle dish… not exactly the best location either…) BUT– this place is really good!
We had a bit of trouble finding the place. I never go to Kalihi. For anything. Once we found it I was a little scared to get out of the car (joking). But once inside the clean, well-​lit oasis that is Kookie’s, all was well. The menu was a bit strange. They just listed all the dishes in one long list, it wasn’t divided up into «appetizers,» «seafood» or anything like that. I think there were two meatless items listed (green papaya salad and an eggplant dish), but when we asked, server said they can make pretty much anything and just leave the meat out. They also said they usually have tofu, but they just happened to run out that night. Oh well.
We had the green papaya salad, and it was perfect! Very flavorful, spicy, and balanced (no fishy taste). Lots of peanuts, string beans and tomatoes.
The tom kha soup was probably the best we ever had. It was served in a large bowl that they set over a flame on the table. It was a bit too hot for me (spicy and temperature-​wise), but it was delicious.
Finally, we had a fried noodle and vegetable dish (forgot to take note of the name). The noodles were huge! They were extra-​extra wide ribbons, and they were really good. The veggies were a little too al dente, closer to raw, really. Raw eggplant is pretty gross, but I could handle the red bell pepper and gai lan (I think it was gai lan/​chinese broccoli). Just the right amount of sauce and good flavor.
Our servers were nice and helpful (two young local guys. Maybe Kookie’s sons or something?) And finally, the price was right– I opened the bill to see $ 24.08 for all the above. What a deal! We’ll definitely be back!

great Thai worth a trip to Kalihi

It’s been a long time coming, but Kookie is back in Honolulu! She used to be the chef/​cook at Pattaya and then Club Bangkok, but went back to Thailand for a while before returning to Honolulu.
This is now officially my favorite Thai restaurant. Read on…
This brand-​new place is cool and clean; very pleasing aesthetically, with wood floors and easy-​on-​the-​eyes décor.
Kookie is making some great food, and her daughter Nam is serving it up with a friendly, smiling attitude.
We began with the spring rolls ($ 6.99) for a huge portion of crunchy, meaty and delicious rolls, served with the ubiquitous sweet chili dipping sauce. The satay ($ 7.99; either chicken or pork) also was a very generous serving, with a creamy, rich, spicy peanut satay sauce. (When I was in Indonesia I used to order a gado-​gado salad with this same style of peanut sauce as my dressing… wowee!).
Anyway, this menu is quite extensive; we had the single best panang shrimp curry ($ 9.99) I have ever tasted. It was creamy and spicy, in an orangey-​brown sauce, drizzled with snow-​white coconut cream on top. There were shreds of kaffir lime leaves and slivers of sweet red bell pepper that added to the lovely presentation and contrast of flavors and texture. The shrimp were fairly large (²⁰⁄₂₄) and there were about 10 of these babies arranged in a nice pattern on the plate. Don’t miss this dish.
The chicken green curry ($ 7.99) offered up a bit of heat, with the chunks of chicken swimming in a great big bowl of sauce, with eggplant, green beans, Thai basil, and bamboo shoots. This dish is almost like a soup and main course combined into one bowl.
The pud Thai noodles ($ 7.99) were great, always an indicator as to how good a Thai place they really are. But the pud see lew (chow fun; $ 7.99) were even better, chewy, a bit sweet, with crunchy broccoli florets.
I loved my Thai iced coffee ($ 2.50 for a large mug) and Keira loved her iced coffee (also $ 2.50).
We’ll be back over & over. Give Kookie’s a try… I know you’ll love it.
Review By
Matthew Gray
Owner and CFG (Chief Food Guy)
Hawaii Food Tours
808.926.FOOD (3663)