This past weekend, I celebrated yet another birthday. Hooray for old age! My wife planned the night for me and rounded my cousins (and their significant others) to join us in celebrating yet another event commemorating my “Old Fartiness” (Yes, I know thats not a word, but I thought it was rather fitting).
My wife booked our dinner reservations at the Mai Tai Bar in Downtown Long Beach. This is located right next to the Aquarium of the Pacific, right above the Club V2o (which by the way is where JA Rule will be performing on February 29th, 2008. Apparently, its his birthday).
We arrived at the Mai Tai Bar at around 7:30-8:00pm and we were promptly sat at our booth. Our booth was located next to the stage. Apparently, this was a very VIP location (which also means you had to spend a minimum of $250 in food and drinks) because there was a performer singing songs on stage at the time. Now I have to clarify, I categorize this place as “American” because this is a bar that serves bar food in a Hawaiian setting. You will, however, find Ahi Burgers which where pretty good. Other goodies we ordered were: Fried Calamari, Spinach Artichoke Dip (very Hawaiian indeed), Baby Back Ribs, Coconut/Popcorn Shrimp and Avocado Egg Rolls. Pretty much the same stuff they have at Bubba Gump’s next door.
My favorite dish was probably the Baby Back Ribs. They were so tender, they practically…err literally fell of the bone. The Calamari was a little odd…apparently they added some battered/fried chili peppers and pepperoncinis. It didn’t taste bad, it was just odd and misleading since half the time i reached out for piece of calamari, I ended up with a chili pepper or a pepperoncini. The coconut and popcorn shrimp went really fast, while the avocado egg rolls and Spin-Dip were rather ordinary.
The drinks were well presented. They put an orchid in every single drink pretty much. A real one too! Making it look very Hawaiian. I had drink called the Green Monkey (shown above), I don’t exactly remember what it had in it except for Midori sour.
After the food and drinks, we moved on to dessert…
ColdStone Ice Cream Cake. It has chocolate cake and mint and chip ice cream. I love mint and chip, so this was definitely a treat. This cake actually comes with a pretty interesting story. What happened was that my wife had ordered a custom cake for that evening, however, the cake designer at ColdStone couldn’t make it to work because he/she got into a pretty serious auto accident (hope he/she is ok). So, to make up for not having my cake ready, ColdStone offered my wife 2 cakes of her choice for FREE. They even delivered to the Mai Tai Bar (which is about a block away). That is customer service…granted they needed a bit of encouragement, but very cool of them to go out of their way for us. This the one located in Downtown Long Beach’s Pike, near the GameWorks for those who would like to pay them a visit.
As the evening went on, we headed down to the Club V2o to get some drinks and do a little dancing. They had Guitar Hero going on in a separate private room which was pretty neat. The music was loud but the DJ choice of music was rather lousy if you ask me. Lucky for them, they don’t use the same people every night. This is my second time there, the 1st time it was during the week of the 2004 Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, where the band Pepper was playing and there we girls in bikinis dancing in cages. This time around, there were scantily clad ladies dancing on 2 stages. Sorry no pics…didn’t want to get in trouble with the Mrs.
Overall, I had a great time, many thanks to my special lady for making it happen and also to my cousins and their S.O.s for coming to celebrate my birthday with me. I’m going to skip the Carrot-Rating on this one since this was not quite a “Restaurant Review” but more of a “Event Summary”. If you want to check out the place mentioned on this post, here are the websites and addresses.
Mai Tai Bar
97 Aquarium Way, Long Beach, CA 90802 MAP IT
Tel: 562-435-1200
ColdStone Creamery
25 Aquarium Way, Long Beach, CA 90802
Tel: 562-628-2343
Club V2o The Venue
81 Aquarium Way, Long Beach, CA 90802
Tel: 562 216-2060
1. Weirdest thing you have had for breakfast?
* Sushi & Sashimi
2. Most desperate meal you've ever had?
* Canned corn with a slice of American cheese, microwaved.
3. When you eat too much, you...
* Sit back on my chair and stare at the ceiling blankly...in pain. 
