© Ocean County register
Reprinted for interview subject's archival purposes
Sunday, March 20, 2005
By GARY A. WARNER
Register Travel Editor
On the tiki trail
Visit Polynesia in Pittsburgh or Palm Springs
Like latter-day giant stone heads of Easter Island, the chipped idols, faded driftwood signs and smog-dusted palm trees stick out along the pothole-pitted avenues of American cities and suburbs. Strange and beautiful remnants of a once vast but now largely vanquished culture.
Exotic places with names like Mai Kai and Bahooka, Trader Vic’s and Omni Hut, Royal Hawaiian and Tiki Ti.
Urban oases where the thirsty and stressed can still step out of the light of day into another world. A dark, tropical space filled with lava-rock walls, bubbling aquariums, flickering tiki torches and angry-faced carved idols.
Outside you might be in Modesto or Pittsburgh. Inside, the bamboo-rimmed bar, rattan chairs and glass balls in fishing nets feel more like Bora Bora or Pago Pago. Especially after a shrunken skull, scorpion bowl or ubiquitous mai tai warms your belly and floats your head.
Once sinking under a wave of redevelopment, the world of Polynesian pop is resurfacing. Dozens of classics survive, and “neo-tiki” nightspots are opening across the country. Come to the islands of your mind as we drink in tales of tiki.
TIKI'S BALI HAI
If there is a mystical, magical place in the world of tiki, it's Mai-Kai in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Stuck amid the suburban sprawl is a place where sarong-clad "maidens" serve the signature "barrel o'rum," aided by unseen "mixologists" who guard the restaurant's legendary rum concoctions.
"You have to sign in blood not to give away the recipes," said manager Kern Mattei.
Order "the mystery drink," delivered by a young woman who does a seductive wiggle at your table. On some Sundays, kids in the audience can get on stage with the hip-swinging dancers (though they'd best take a seat for the fire dancer). Check out the real shrunken heads, and in the rear garden, the tiki god supposedly neutered at the behest of local 1950s bluenoses.
SLEEPING WITH THE GODS
Caliente Tropics in Palm Springs has been rescued with a $2.2 million makeover that has restored it to its mid-century heyday. The best remaining example of Ken Kimes' five 1960s Polynesian-theme motels in California. The lobby is a riot of tikis and Easter Island stone heads. Anothertiki with its tongue sticking out sits by the pool, flanked by tiki torches. The Reef Bar serves powerful punches. It's still a motel – the walls are thin and the bathrooms are small. Caliente Tropics is the scene of the annual Tiki Oasis party.
ZOMBIE TIME
Here is a recipe for the Zombie, the original tiki drink created in 1934 at Don the Beachcomber in Hollywood:
Ingredients:
Juice of one large lime
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
1 ounce dark Jamaican rum
2 ounces gold Barbados rum
1 ounce white Puerto Rican rum
1/2 ounce apricot brandy
3/4 ounce papaya nectar
3/4 ounce unsweetened pineapple juice
1 ounce carbonated water
Dash of 151-proof Demerara rum
For garnish:
Mint sprig
Pineapple cube skewered between 1 red and 1 green cocktail cherry
Powdered sugar
Procedure:
1. In cocktail shaker, dissolve sugar in lime juice. Add other cocktail ingredients except carbonated water, 151 rum and garnish. Add cracked ice. Shake well and strain into 14-ounce frosted glass.
2. Add carbonated water and ice to fill glass. Float dash of 151 proof Demerara rum on top. Garnish with mint, pineapple skewered between cherries, and powdered sugar.
AMERICAN TIKI: RISE, FALL AND SEMI-REVIVAL
1934: Don the Beachcomber serves the first Zombie in Hollywood (see recipe).
1941: World War II sends millions of Americans to the South Pacific.
1944: Trader Vic's in Oakland serves the first mai tai (see recipe).
1948: Thor Heyerdahl's "Kon-Tiki" and James Michener's "Tales of the South Pacific" are published.
1959: Hawaii becomes a state.
1963: The Enchanted Tiki Room opens at Disneyland.
1960s: It's the tiki heyday, with hundreds of bars and restaurants popping up. Tiki eateries populate major hotel chains.
1979: Luau in Beverly Hills is bulldozed, an early victim of tiki's waning popularity.
1994: Trader Vic's in San Francisco closes. Tiki News, a revivalist magazine, begins publishing.
2000: Kahiki in Columbus, Ohio, closes, despite preservationists' pleas.
"Book of Tiki" is published, fueling a tiki revival.
2003: "Tiki Road Trip" is published.
Costa Mesa's Kona Lanes, built in 1958, is bulldozed.
2005: Disneyland's Enchanted Tiki Room makes a refreshed appearance March 12.
TROPICAL TEMPERANCE
Before a show at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, take a detour about an hour south to the Omni Hut in Smyrna, Tenn. The 12-table tiki outpost opened in 1960. Owner Polly Walls keeps it filled with tikis and masks, all bathed in soothing blue light. Kids love the 35-gallon aquarium. Families come for miles to down the famous volcano, a dessert concoction with a flaming top. This is barbecue country, and the sweet ribs are outstanding. A slack-key guitar version of "Little Grass Shack" is juxtaposed with Southern mommas telling their little ones to "hush up now." The only thing you can't get: a drink. But you can BYOB for a homemade mai tai.
THE MASTERS
The most prodigious tiki creators still happily toil away in an industrial park in Whittier. Through their company, Oceanic Arts, Leroy Schmaltz and Bob Van Oosting have created the look of Florida's Mai-Kai, Disney's Polynesian Resort and other tiki hot spots. They still draw their inspiration from an epic trip across the South Pacific they took in 1960. Today they are still at it, making tiki items for movies and the Islands restaurant chain.
"Last year was our best year ever," Van Oosting said.
While most of their work is sold wholesale, Oceanic Arts has also has a small retail shop and a rental agency to add a South Seas touch to backyard parties.
NEO-TIKI
Tastes have swung around, and a new generation is entranced with tiki bars.Places like the Tiki Lounge in Pittsburgh and Kahiki Moon in Burlington, Vt., are bringing colorful rum drinks, thatched-roof booths and bamboo-covered walls back to the bar scene. Purveyors like Tiki Farm are creating designs for the next generation of home tiki lounges. Hawaiian merchants Hilo Hattie and ABC Stores have beachheads on the mainland. The tiki revival isn't a sure thing, though: The much-ballyhooed Taboo Cove in Las Vegas lasted just four years at the Venetian Hotel before closing last year.
LOCAL LOCO
Orange County was once a center of tiki culture. Places like the Outrigger in Laguna Beach, Kim's Family Restaurant and the Holo Wai Miniature Golf Course in Orange, and Milan Guanko's carving shop at Gray's Nursery in Westminster are gone. But you can still immerse yourself in tiki at Sam's Seafood in Huntington Beach and the Royal Hawaiian in Laguna Beach. "Neo-tiki" spots like the House of Tiki store in Costa Mesa are sending locals home with tropical décor. In Los Angeles County, there's Trader Vic's in Beverly Hills, tiny Tiki Ti in Los Angeles and the great Bahooka Family Restaurant in Rosemead (look for the whitewashed World War II Navy gun outside).
MODESTO MECCA
The wrecker's ball has claimed tiki outposts less often outside big cities. The town where "American Graffiti" was filmed has three notably tiki spots: the Tiki Lounge has great South Pacific décor marred by Coors Light posters tacked on the walls. The Tropics Motel next door has sad-looking tikis and lacks the AAA seal of approval, but seems simple and clean. Best of all is Minnie's. Don't be put off by sharing parking with Suzie's Adult Video Rentals next door. Inside is a dark refuge with wahine paintings and lots of bamboo, marred only by a TV showing pro wrestling. Chef Paul Man serves dishes created by his father in the 1950s. The outdoor bar with a canoe, tikis and carved masks make you feel you are in Maui, not Modesto.
EXPERT PICKS:
James Teitelbaum, author of "Tiki Road Trip" on his favorite tiki bars:
Mai-Kai, Fort Lauderdale, Fla.: "Without question the best remaining tiki mecca. It's huge – several thousand square feet. Excellent food. Tremendously good drinks. A full floor show. The real thing – nothing corny or cheesy."
Hala Kahiki, River Grove, Ill. "About half-hour west out of downtown Chicago is the last and best example of a classic tiki bar. Hawaiian music. Wonderful tropical drinks. Waitresses in muumuus. Tikis everywhere you look."
Tiki-Ti, Los Angeles: "A similar vibe to Hala Kahiki, but smaller. The place is tiny. It's been owned by the same family since the 1960s. No food, just a bar. But the drinks are amazing."
Trader Vic's, Emeryville. "It's the best Trader Vic's left in the country. Drinks are as good as it gets. Refined, if you can use that word for a tiki place."
Honorable mentions: Jardin Tiki in Montreal, Tonga Room in the Fairmont Hotel, San Francisco, Omni Hut in Smyrna, Tenn., and The Alibi in Portland. Special mention should also go to La Mariana Sailing Club, a tiki classic in rapidly urbanizing Honolulu.
THE TRADER
Don the Beachcomber and Stephen Crane's Kon-Tiki restaurants had their fans. But the biggest name in tiki was - and is - Trader Vic's. The chain created by Victor "Trader Vic" Bergeron now has 23 restaurants – though only six in the United States. The flagship shop is one of the top tiki spots in the country. After a 10-year absence, Trader Vic's returned in 2004 to San Francisco. The Trader Vic's in the British capital was immortalized in Warren Zevon's hit song "Werewolves of London" ("I saw a werewolf drinkin a piña colada at Trader Vic's; and his hair was perfect.")
MAI TAI MEMORIES
Here is the original Mai Tai recipe created in 1944 by "Trader Vic" Bergeron at his original bar, then called Hinky Dinks, in Oakland:
Ingredients:
For cocktail:
2 ounces 17-year-old J. Wray Nephew Jamaican rum
1/2 ounce French Garnier Orgeat
1/2 ounce Holland DeKuyper Orange Curacao
1/4 ounce rock candy syrup
Juice from 1 fresh lime
For garnish:
Half a lime
Sprig of mint
Procedure:
1. Combine all ingredients (but garnish) in cocktail shaker. Shake well, pour into glass.
2. Garnish with half of lime shell inside the drink and float a sprig of fresh mint at the edge of the glass.
TOTEMIC TOMES
"Tales of the South Pacific" by James Michener. Mythical "Bali Hai" becomes prototypical enchanted South Seas isle.
"Kon-Tiki" by Thor Heyerdahl. Brings Polynesian culture to a mass audience.
"Book of Tiki" by Sven Kirsten. Fuels revival of tiki culture with its high-gloss look at the lost and lasting pop Polynesian spots around the country.
"Tiki Road Trip" by James Teitelbaum. Encyclopedic compendium of tiki bars and other spots. Parses the tiki mecca from the merely tamed tiki of renovated bars. Spots rated from one to five tikis.
Kewanee Star Courier
Thursday, January 26, 2006
'Tikiphiles' gather at Waunee Farm
By DAVE CLARKE Of The Star Courier
Updated: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 9:32 AM CST
Reprinted for interview subject's archival purposes
© 2006 Star Courrier
KEWANEE — Kewanee is known for many things but we didn’t know it’s also a dot on a national “map” of tiki bars.
While the aftermath of a January snow storm covered the fields outside Saturday night, the Chicago-based “Windy City Islanders,” a group advertised as the “Midwest’s only ukulele band,” filled the Andris Waunee Farm’s Aku Tiki Room with the sounds of the south seas.
Bars and restaurants featuring Hawaiian and Polynesian decor have apparently drawn a devoted following across the nation in the years since World War II of what are called “tikiphiles,” resulting in newsletters, web sites, merchandise outlets and covering all things bamboo.
Several years ago, a young author, tiki expert and urban archeologist from Cleveland named James Teitelbaum, traveled here and abroad tracking down tiki-related locations and published “Tiki Road Trip,” a book containing 400 reviews of tiki bars and other destinations, including a little restaurant in an out-of-the-way place called Kewanee.
“Before I wrote the book, I had a web site and someone e-mailed me about the Waunee Farm, so I checked it out,” said Teitelbaum, now of Chicago, who was in attendance at Saturday night’s “Islanders” shows at the restaurant south of town.
In his “Tiki Road Trip” review, Teitelbaum praised the Waunee Farm’s “friendly atmosphere,” and South Seas decor, which includes airbrushed murals depicting tropical scenes, black lava rock walls, and some rare carvings he had not seen elsewhere. “Given its location, it’s a miracle the bar has survived all these years,” Teitelbaum wrote. Owned by Glen Andris and managed by wife Carol, the Aku Tiki Room was added to the Waunee Farm in 1967 and expanded in 1984. “Glen got the idea from the restaurants and bars he visited while on vacation in Acapulco,” said Carol. Aku Tiki means “fish god.”
While surfing one of the tiki websites, Carol found the “Windy City Islanders,” a ukulele band featuring four Chicago area musicians who formed the group two years ago. Playing mostly at locations and functions in the Chicago and Wisconsin area, band members said this was the first time they had been “this far west.”
Members of the group include 30-year veteran Chris Carlson, on lead uke and vocals; George Klingehofer, lead vocals and ukulele; Craig Stenseth, bass and steel guitars and vocals; and Eric “Baron” Behrenfeld, vocals and percussion, including conga drums, maracas and something called a wave drum, a hand-held instrument which recreated the sound of waves crashing on the beach and was used in a Beach Boys-like number called “Surfin’ at Sandy Beach.”
Most of the music in the two one-hour sets was of Hawaiian and Polynesian origin, but also featured several original compositions. The foursome played “Tiny Bubbles” for Harry and Margaret Krause of Kewanee, enjoying a 50th anniversary dinner with a large group of family and friends.