QUICK BITES
Wine bar getting ready for sippers

By Wanda A. Adams
Advertiser Food Editor

Lyle Fujioka is watching builders place the final touches on Formaggio, the wine bar he's building next-door to his wine shop in the rear of Market City Shopping Center. He's watching with both delight and trepidation. Delight because this is something he and his staff have long wanted to do. Trepidation because it's a pretty new concept for Honolulu, and he wonders if people will understand.

"It's really an experiment," said Fujioka, who is still pondering the menu and other matters, though opening day is not far off (perhaps the first week of November).

The idea is to create a place that is neither a bar nor a restaurant in the conventional sense, but something with elements of both. He is thinking especially of women friends and customers who have remarked that there aren't many places where you can meet someone for conversation and a glass of wine after work — unless you don't mind noise, pickup lines or a hovering maitre d' miffed that you haven't ordered dinner.

Formaggio (Italian for cheese) will feature a limited menu of light dishes — panini (Italian-style grilled sandwiches), cheese plates, pates and crusty breads, salads, and, of course, cheesecake — and a wide-ranging sampling of wines, mostly in flights of four, so that diners can taste four two-ounce servings of wine for less than $10 a flight.

The L-shaped space, part of which used to make up the diamondhead side of Fujioka's large and well-stocked store, is being outfitted with creamy tile floors, stucco-like wall arches, ceiling tiles that resemble natural stone and a wood-paneled bar. That, coupled with the cellar-like location (rare in Hawai'i) is meant to give it an Italian feel.

"I'm salivating to see how this will look at night," he said.

There will be muted music. Sixteen to 20 tables will be scattered about. Customers will order at the bar, then settle into comfortable chairs to be served. The plan is to stay open until midnight, and the hope is that the tastes of the various wines in the bar will lure some customers over to buy the same wines in the store (which is open until 8 p.m.).

Kemoo Farm will mail Happy Cakes

Dick Rodby writes to remind us that "it's almost that time." Time, that is, for Kemoo Farm's Hawaiian Happy Cakes — the island-style pineapple cakes that have been changing people's minds about fruitcake for almost a century. The cakes are available at Kemoo Farm, of course, but also by mail-order to send to friends. Prices range from $24.95 plus shipping and handling for a single Maui Pineapple Cake to $149.95 for a six-pack of various cakes.

Phone (800) 735-2253 (5 a.m. to 3 p.m.); fax orders to (808) 621-4752; e-mail kemoofarm@aol.com or take a look at www.happycake.com.

O'ahu restaurant highlights, events

• La Mer at the Halekulani hotel is among 74 restaurants participating in the fifth annual James Beard Foundation and Louis XIII de Rémy Martin Ultimate Dinner program. A $150 tasting menu, culminating in a glass of Louis XIII de Rémy Martin, benefits the foundation. The progression includes a choice of a number of chef Yves Garnier's signature creations. Reservations: La Mer, 923-2311.
• Brew Moon Restaurant & Microbrewery has Black Hole Lager on tap for a limited time in celebration of the gold medal the microbrewery received at the 2002 World Beer Cup International Competition. Black Hole Lager is a dark, rich and malty German-style beer with a medium body. Brew Moon won two gold medals — one for Black Hole Lager in the German Schwarzbier category and one for Southern Cross Export in the Australian/Tropical Light Lager category.
• Kaka'ako Kitchen is celebrating Halloween through October by offering some of Henry Weinhard's premium sodas for a reduced price — 25 cents with the purchase of an entrée, while supplies last. The three choices are Spooktacular Orange Cream, Screaming Vanilla Cream and Rowdy Root Beer.

Quick Bites is published every Wednesday in The Advertiser's Taste section. Food editor Wanda A. Adams welcomes tidbits of food news. Write to her at The Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802, phone: 525-8069 or you can send e-mail to taste@honoluluadvertisercom.