Honolulu Weekly

Cassis / There’s a distinct duality in dining at Cassis by Chef Mavro. A disparity that, though unfortunate, is surely due to the restaurant’s newness rather than a result of apathy (or worse, arrogance) on the part of its owner, George Mavrothalassitis, a chef beloved in this city by anyone with half a brain and a full set of taste buds. No, Cassis, Chef Mavrothalassitis’s second restaurant, doesn’t suffer from neglect. It–in its earnest and barefaced attempt at being just right–merely hits sometimes and misses other times. Here, the hits pack a bigger punch though because we don’t see them coming. Perhaps it’s unfair to expect Mavrothalassitis to get it right from day one. But we do. We take every memory of every perfectly prepared bite from evenings spent at his flagship restaurant Chef Mavro with us to the third floor of the Harbour Court building where Cassis occupies the old home of Palomino. We dismiss the too-large space, the busy carpet, the distracting additions of designer Mary Philpotts’ hanging ornamented discs and clashing wall projections. Though all are early signs that the place suffers from a split personality: It’s brummagem, not bistro-chic like we’ve been promised. But we’re here for the food.

It’s tempting, and would indeed be fitting, to split this review into two separate accounts. One would herald the perfection of a fine evening of good service and great food. The other would speak of neither. Because like the ambience in the would-be bistro, the disconnect between the good and not so good in everything else is perplexing.

Mavro had the right idea with Cassis. He wanted to offer straightforward fare: Provence-inspired bistro food infused with the flavors of the Islands. His roots and our roots–a meeting of two worlds, different but good for one another.

The enchanted evening–a few hours on the first Saturday of the restaurant’s life–was pure perfection. From the tenderness of every kind of meat on the table (and we had all kinds: duck, chicken, pavette steak and pork shank) to the fullness of the wine selections to the cool finish of the house-made sorbet, there was hardly a misstep. We marveled at the simple brilliance of pairing Swiss chard with creamed Kahuku sweet corn and smoky, moist hulihuli-style chicken ($22). And at the rustic Crispy Pork Shank ($28), tender as a slow-cooked turkey leg and resting on a bed of polenta, cabbage, bacon and pineapple.

The fastidious attention to detail on that first visit stood in such stark contrast to every subsequent visit, that it was beginning to feel like an open-and-closed case of love at first sight–and everyone knows love’s tendency to blindness. But it turns out that wasn’t the case. It’s now clear that the first evening’s bliss was simply a matter of having picked all the right pieces at the right time. A fluke? Hardly. Mavro’s menu is mostly good. A blind pick would almost always yield a fine dish. Unless you happen to pick the Pork Kau Yuk ($25). The plate arrives with two strikes against it: It looks unappealing, with two chunks of fatty pork sitting in a pool of sauteed root vegetables that are all shades of brown, but even worse, it smells unappealing. The third strike comes–and hits hard–with the first bite, which teeters the line between savory and strange before the dish loses itself to unpalatable monotony. There’s a reason the Chinese roast the cuts of meat; two inches of unrendered fat is hard to stomach.

But that’s as bad it gets. No other dish even comes close to matching the kau yuk’s unattractiveness. It’s in the details–not the bold mistake of an entire dish–that Cassis blunders most consistently. And it’s in the details where it shines.

The bread and butter that start a meal is a detail most restaurants don’t care to pay much attention to. But at Cassis, only the freshest bread makes it to the table accompanied by a pale yellow chunk of butter–unsalted, of course. Minutia? Perhaps. But a well-minded detail nonetheless. But ask the server what makes the eggplant marmalade so special, and he can’t tell you. For $15 for a dollop of the addictive chutney-like condiment that comes with the goat cheese purse–one won-ton pi stuffed with tangy Big Island goat cheese–he should be able to rattle off the list of ingredients on cue. The Steak Frites ($28) comes with a cooked-to-pink-perfection piece of Black Angus bavette, but it shares a plate with a pile of unexciting lettuce. Sure, they’re the hip Manoa greens, but hip has never looked so pathetic. The house-made ketchup jumps with tart, sweet flavor, but dip the over-spiced, under-flavored curried fries in it and practically watch while the tomato sauce, so good on its own, wilts against the stronger (but not superior) flavor of the yellow curry powder.

The back and forth continues–there’s a little hitch for every three triumphs. But make no mistake: The triumphs are big ones. From start: Bacala Croquette ($12), fried nuggets of salt cod. To finish: full, round scoops of sorbet ($6) that taste like spoonfuls of pure liliko’i and guava. And the spaces between: Warm bowls of cassoulet brimming with Portuguese sausage and garlic ($25)–Cassis is already better than a lot of older places in town. It just needs time to work out the details.

Cassis by Chef Mavro

Hours: Mon.-Thu. 11am-2:30pm, 5-9:30pm; Fri. 11am-2:30pm, 5-10pm; Sat. 5-10pm Recommended: Bacala Croquette, Rotisserie Chicken Hulihuli Style, Crispy Pork Shank, Cassoulet, house-made sorbet Payment: AmEx, DC, JCB, MC, V.

Honolulu Weekly restaurant reviewers dine anonymously, editorial integrity being our first priority. Reviewers may visit the establishment more than once, and any interviews with restaurant staff are conducted after the visits. We do not run photos of the reviewers, and the Weekly pays the tab. The reviews are not influenced by the purchase of advertising or other incentives.