WOK STAR Another Dig That Got Burried

Through social networking I found out that WOK STAR in Kihei was closing its doors for good, so before they did close its doors, I had to go check them out before it was R.I.P. What led me to get down the south end of Maui on Thursday night, the twenty-seventh of October 2011? Well, I tell you what, it's all about lives, you see, a restaurant is all about lives, all about feeding people for a profit of course. But when the economy, or bad management or whatever takes it down, it is sad for the community that it serves, and the employees that it employs. Wok Star was a small business, and was in service for three years.


Anyone driving towards Wailea or heading north on lower Kihei road, would have noticed that WOK STAR sign right off the road, in the Kalama Village, next to Foodland. It was a real local kind of place with a beach town feel. You walked inside and ordered your food, and waited outside until it was cooked, on wooden tables and benches. Well, WOK STAR is now gone.


So far in this past year, we've witnessed several restaurants go down into the pits of hell, Tiajuana in Kaanapali, dead! The Village Cafe and Sweet Shoppe, dead! And many other small restaurants went down, pretty good ones that had good employees. 

It is the sign of the times, if you want to open up a restaurant, you better be damned good, in fact excellent in managing quality of your food, managing your people, and keeping all the numbers in check. But sometimes even if you do all these things to perfection, the Devil lurks and kills it.


Photo:Ron Sambrano