Tiki Farm Warehouse Sale – San Clemente, CA

Posted by The Tiki Chick in Events and tagged with , , , , ,

Tiki mug producer and purveyor Tiki Farm is moving out of their San Clemente digs so this week they’re having a warehouse sale to help lighten the load. (This also happens to coincide with Tiki Oasis in nearby San Diego.)

They set up a few tables out front with all the mugs, scorpion bowls and shot glasses labeled with numbers, and handed out ordering forms for buyers to specify which ones they wanted and how many. This strategy kept things running in an orderly and polite fashion.

It was billed as the biggest sale ever in company history, so I’d honestly expected a bit more. There were definitely some good finds though. Many of their currently offered items were discounted, and I was excited to find some sold-out promotional mugs (like Fender’s Marcus Carcass, $15) and locale specific ones such as The Beachcomber Cafe‘s scorpion bowl ($20) and Big Kahuna mug ($10) which have been out of stock the last couple times I’ve visited the restaurant. Bigger spenders could nab the Vitua’s Vessel mug & Hot Wheels set by Shag for $150 or a United Airlines female menehune reproduction for $175.

A couple items were also making their debut for this event, including “The Happy Cannibals” mug and these cute little “Oi’ Pona” bottle toppers ($5) and salt and pepper shakers ($10). Mr. Baseball said the Marquesan tikis looked like Magneto… (He does have a point.)

Also available were SoCal Tiki dvds ($5), a few different styles of Tiki Farm t-shirts (above, $10), the new Tiki Farm quarterly magazine ($5), posters (see second photo) and a couple racks of sarongs and aloha shirts (below).

They’re also sweetening the deal with free Samoan War Club swizzle sticks with any purchase, plus a free Hot Lava Java volcano sugar and creamer set for folks spending more than $75. The sale continues today until 3 p.m., Sunday 11 a.m.-3 p.m. and Monday 9 a.m.-3 p.m.

Tiki Farm Warehouse Sale
1305 Calle Avanzado
San Clemente, CA 92673
949-940-1006

Kowloon Restaurant – Saugus, MA (near Boston)

Posted by The Tiki Chick in Bar & Restaurant Reviews and tagged with , , , , ,

Kowloon in Saugus, Massachusetts, is both a restaurant and roadside attraction. Its giant A-frame, pagodas and Ku tiki entice hungry motorists from route 1 north of Boston, and its fellow conspicuous neighbors include the Leaning Tower of Pizza and the huge neon cactus sign of the Hilltop Steak House.

The Wong family started Kowloon as a small Chinese restaurant in the 1950s, and later expanded it into this behemoth that seats up to 1,200 people (twice as many as Bob Chinn’s Crab House). Patriarch William Wong was inspired to give it a Polynesian-esque feel after traveling to Hawaii during the mid-century craze for the South Seas.

The restaurant is divided up into various themed rooms, like the Thai Grille with a beachscape mural and the Tiki Lagoon with thatched huts against the walls and a not-very-tiki-looking statue looking over the central fountain.

There seemed to be a different hostess for each dining room, and they can be quite assertive about seating, so you might want to already have an idea where you want to eat. I insisted upon the Volcano Bay Room. I loved the lifeboats hanging overhead, ship’s rigging, nautical lanterns, and especially the illusion of the erupting volcano.

The drinks aren’t of the highest caliber compared to some of the best tiki bars, but I award bonus points for customized glassware. They had several cocktails “for two” that arrive in a souvenir glass and I chose the Mai Tai ($16.95). It should go without saying that this isn’t a purist recipe.

Kowloon has a very extensive menu offering Cantonese, Szechuan and Thai food, plus sushi. Each cuisine is prepared in its own kitchen. One of their signatures is the Saugus Wings ($8.75), which are covered in a sweet, garlicky sauce that’s pretty addictive. For appetizers we also ordered the boneless pork spareribs ($8.50) and crab rangoon ($6.25), but these were the favorite.

The Flaming Ambrosia ($14.95) is another famous dish. This retro-style delicacy consists of half of a pineapple filled with sweet and sour chicken (or shrimp) and set on fire!

We rounded out our feast with still more sweet and sour chicken ($9.50, which we would have skipped if I’d realized it was basically the same as the Flaming Ambrosia), General Gau chicken ($11.75, fried chicken with spicy ginger sauce), pork lo mein ($8.75), and beef fried rice ($7.75).

We also ordered the kung pao chicken ($10.95) and beef and mushroom chow yoke ($12.25); the latter I would definitely get again. The portions were quite large and between seven (and a half) of us we still had leftovers for days, though there wasn’t any General Gau chicken left so that must have been pretty decent too.

A display case near the entrance had a bunch of souvenir mugs for sale, both generic ones and signature mugs produced by Tiki Farm. I picked up these first two here — the fogcutter and the mug recreating the tiki found on their vintage mugs. The stock was running pretty low though at the time, so I hope they’ve gotten some more.

Tiki spots are few and far between in Massachusetts — even more so now with the recent closing of Pago-Pago in Milford — and this is one of the best and most beloved. Nowadays, you can get a carefully made tiki-inspired drink at bars like Drink in Boston, but I think you have to give old-school places like the Kowloon their due.

Kowloon
948 Broadway
Saugus, MA 01906
781-233-0077

Hand Pulled: The Complete Shag Print Collection

Posted by The Tiki Chick in Shag and tagged with , , , , ,

I’ve been a fan of the artist Shag (Josh Agle) for a solid decade now, so I was excited to hear that the Grand Central Art Center in Santa Ana was hosting Hand Pulled: The Complete Shag Print Collection.

This retrospective features all the prints Shag has released from 1999-2011, including every serigraph, etching, giclée and off-set print—more than 250 in all.

So much Shag, as far as the eye could see! The bright colors really popped against the simple black frames and white walls.

For me it was a bit of a trip down memory lane as I got to see in person some of the images that first turned me on to Shag, like the Paul Frank partnership “Sylvie and Jules” which dates back to 2000.

The space off to the right housed Shag’s collaborations with Disney. In 2003, he was commissioned to do a series for The Enchanted Tiki Room‘s 40th anniversary and it proved so popular that he’s also produced designs for Disneyland’s 50th anniversary, Haunted Mansion’s 40th anniversary, the Disney Cruise Line and just recently, Disney World’s 40th anniversary.

Some highlights from the exhibit included this promotional poster for Madame Guignol’s Macabre Theatre on the left. So often there’s something sinister lurking in the tableau, but here it takes center stage (literally).

I also loved seeing the details in the Villain Suite, a series of four etchings from 2001. Here we have “Kitty Q” and her cohorts.

Special for this show’s opening, Shag and Harveys produced two styles of seatbelt bags that apparently sold out instantly.

Be sure to browse through the gift shop, because that’s where you’ll find this special piece. Besides being one of Shag’s earliest paintings (his 6th or 7th), “Ray’s Mistake” from 1996 pays tribute to Ray Buhen and his signature drink from the Tiki-Ti. Shag even touched up the originally gold frame to make it look more like bamboo. (You can even buy it if you have a spare sixteen grand.)

These are the last few weeks to catch the exhibit as it ends on August 14. Shag will be making an appearance and signing merchandise at the closing reception on Saturday, August 6 at 6 p.m. The gallery is located in a lovely courtyard in the Arts District, which has an Old Town feel and merits a visit on its own.