The Tasty Island Retrospective 2009

My, my, my how time flies when we’re having fun. Before we know it, we’ll all be retired and passing each day by feeding the birds and playing Ukulele at Ala Moana Beach Park. lol

It was a pretty good 2009 for me. No major drama and all good both personally and professionally. Hope it was the same or even better for you.

Let’s take a look back at some of the “happenings” here at The Tasty Island in 2009, going over posts, polls, comments and everything else that makes a food blog such as this tick.

By far the biggest thing that happened was the movement of The Tasty Island in October from being a subdomain under .WordPress.com, to my own domain at www.TastyIslandHawaii.com. That proved to have its share of challenges, both technically and statistically, as I temporarily lost a lot of readership in the process. Thankfully this site has gained most of the readership back, so big mahalo to all of you for keepin’ the faith!

As for The Tasty Island posts of 2009, for me, I’d have to say one of my favorites, and one I put a lot of effort into, is the entry “Let’s Talk Chopsticks“….

That article blew The Tasty Island’s statistical hit  counter through the roof, while also catching the attention of an editor for a major, nationally-circulated travel magazine, who emailed me with a pat on the back for a  job well done. Not that I have a Ph.D in Chopsticks, but hey, I did my best in research and truly had a passion for the topic.  To note, I still “challenge myself” to this day, occasionally using the odd, flat, slippery stainless steel Korean Chopsticks. Lotta’ fun. He he.

Interestingly yet not surprising, the very recent post on Macadamia Nuts with SPAM Classic Flavor also garnered plenty of interest, again blowing the hit counter through the roof…

If you’ve been following the news in Hawaii lately, than you’re probably aware of Honolulu Chinatown’s rat infestation problem. While I was innocently writing about a can of Chinese fish I bought from there, it turned out there’s a lot more going on than just rats in Chinatown, as it proved in comments in what turned out to be a dramatic story behind closed doors of a small Chinatown market where I bought Fried Dace with Salted Black Beans…

Hopefully by now everyone’s kissed and made up. lol

Speaking of comments, for the most part all of the readers here have been very positive and good-spirited; not just this year, but every year, ever since this blog started. I feel very blessed for that, and thank you all very much for the kindness. One by one we’re making the world a better place! I think it’s the food that does it. Seriously.

The Tasty Island has held a few polls throughout the year, so now let’s go over some of the current results. Most recent was the poll on the Macadamia Nuts with SPAM Classic Flavor…

Where as of today, January 2, 2010, there’s a total of 36 votes (there would have probably been a lot more had I put the poll up the day of the post). Out of that, 39% hasn’t tried it, yet thought Macadamia Nuts with SPAM Classic Flavor sounded and/or looked ono, while 19% didn’t think it sounded and/or looked good at all. In contrary, 14% tried it and thought it was really ono! I thought so. As Diner A pointed out, they’re “Crazy Tasty!”

Then there was the entry on Aiea Manapua Shop…

where we took a poll on your favorite Oahu Manapua Shop…

As of today, there’s a total of 49 votes, with Char Hung Sut the clear favorite, garnering 35% of the votes. Chun Wah Kam is in second place with 22% and Libby Manapua Shop in a distant third with 12%. Must be the bad customer service and “manju” charsiu filling they’ve been serving lately that’s hurting them. I still say Libby’s has the best Manapua bun (the bun part). Surprisingly (yeah, “surprisingly), no love was shown for 7-Eleven’s Manapua. lol

Then after checking out Costco Food Court’s new Beef Bake featuring Korean Bulgogi…

we wanted to know what your favorite menu item is from there…

That was a multiple-choice poll, hence the high total current vote count at 232. Out of that, Costco’s Polish Hot Dog and Drink $1.50 combo leads the pack  with 58 votes. That’s my fave’ as well. In second place is the Beef Hot Dog and Drink $1.50 combo with 34 votes. After that, who wants to spend any more $$ on a hot dog? lol

Through this blog, I’ve had a number of opportunities thrown my way, from being on KGMB’s morning news program, which I got camera-shy and passed on it, to being a guest host on a PBS foodie show produced by Zero Point Zero, the same folks who produce Anthony Bourdain’s hit Travel Channel show, ‘No Reservations’. That didn’t go through because the eatery they were going to feature — Bunmeido Bakery — didn’t want to be on TV. Ha! Just like me!

Perhaps I’ll consider that kind of exposure in 2010. We’ll see.

The Tasty Island was also referenced by a journalist from Conde Nast Traveler Magazine, as well as being included in the Hawaii food blog-turned-book ‘Island Flavors‘ from the site akueats.com.

for functionality of this site, a few new features were added in an effort to make life easier here. Best of all was the addition of the Index Page. Here you can easily find every post listed in alphabetical order under several parent categories, and also sublisted in chronological order where multiple posts on the same subject takes place.

You can also now edit or delete your comments up to 1 hour after posting it. If you miss that 1 hour window, feel free to eMail me and I’ll be happy to fix it or chuck it for ya’.

The great thing about WordPress blog software when hosted independently like I’m doing now, is the wide assortment of cool plugins. If there’s any particular feature or function you’d like to see added here, let me know in a comment.

There’s still plenty of restaurants I have to visit that were recommended, suggested or requested by readers, and I plan on eating out more than ever in 2010, so it should be an exciting year here.

With that, here’s a new poll where you can vote on what you’d like to see more of in 2010 on the Tasty Island!…