One amazing thing about Rarotonga in the Cook Islands is the lack of chains. No Starbucks. No Subway. No McDonald’s. It’s enough to make a coffee-loving, fast food-devouring American feel dizzy. Fortunately, I don’t care for coffee and this also doesn’t mean Rarotonga doesn’t have fast food. Yes, even this slow-paced island that runs on even slower-paced “island time” is not without its fast food, but this fast food is local.

Our awesome bartender/sample-giver from the Cooks Lager Brewery, Wendy, recommended Palace Takeaways. Situated on the outskirts of Avarua, this little shack served burgers, fish and chips and not much else. Wendy told us they were the best burgers in town, so I had to find out for myself.

The burger options hovered between the 5-10 New Zealand Dollar range, which isn’t exactly cheap, but I suppose it isn’t too expensive either considering all the meat was imported from New Zealand. After a few moments of consideration, I ordered a cheeseburger with bacon and egg on top. Tiring of eating around vegetables, I finally gave in to my basest unvegan instincts and ordered without cole slaw, which came on all their burgers for some reason. Yes, I know it goes against my travel principles to order this was, but cole slaw is a bitch. I ordered a side of chips to join my burger and for those of you who don’t speak British, chips is just fancy word for fries.

Despite being called Palace Takeaways, there were some picnic tables around the shack with a view of Avatiu Harbor and we snagged one to eat at. The burger looked pretty snazzy for a fast food burger, with a great-looking bun and a whole heap of bacon. Unfortunately, the Maoris of Rarotonga seem to like their bacon streaky and this just isn’t my thing, so I spent a good portion of my eating time separating out the bacon that seemed edible to me. Sorry, I just like my bacon crisp. The egg was tasty, as always, but unlike the bacon was not runny at all. The white cheddar cheese was a great touch and then there was the heart and soul of the burger – the beef. While this beef was of a pretty good quality, it was a surprisingly small patty and I was surprised to find it a bit dry, especially considering that they had no qualms with greasy, fatty food. Nonetheless, it was a burger I could certainly get used to.

Finally, the chips were pretty awesome. Nicely fried without being well-done and well-salted. They made a great companion to the burger and offered a nice, salty alternative to the streaky bacon.

With time and a few more visits, I’m sure I could shape Palace Takeaways into a delicious burger joint to match my tastes. The locals sure love it and after one visit I can definitely see why.

When we first arrived in the Cook Islands, we asked our airport driver where we should go to get a good meal. Hoping to get some sort of local insight, he recommended Trader Jack’s to us. His sentiments agreed with the brief food research we had done before coming to Rarotonga – Trader Jack’s was a must-eat. It took us until day two to get there, but when we got there we found it nicely situated on the shore of the Pacific with a beautiful view of the mountains in the background. And after half a day of hiking those mountains with Pa, it seemed to be just what the doctor ordered.

Trader Jack’s is not simply a restaurant, though. It also has a bar and a pizza parlor, so when we arrived at 5:30, we grabbed a drink at the bar while waiting for the restaurant section to open at 6:00.

When it opened, our beer waitress told us we should get in as quickly as we can to ensure we got a good table. Good tables here meant by the window, which wasn’t actually a window but an open, glassless space overlooking the ocean. Sure, you could see the ocean from other tables, but these were prime and we snagged the last one.

The menu at Trader Jack’s was chock-full of seafood, but after a sandwich of fresh tuna on Pa’s trek, I was eager to see how Trader Jack’s could handle chicken. I ordered the Roast Chicken, but we started out by sharing an appetizer of cheesy pizza bread.

And let me be the first to tell you that the pizza bread was amazing. The cheese on top was melted down and nicely browned and had a flavor similar to how I remember saganaki (that Greek cheese that restaurants like to set on fire). Perhaps this was only due to the taste of the browning, but whatever the reason, it was awesome. Under the cheese was a nice layer of herbs and garlic, which were good, but did not overpower the taste of the cheese. Finally, under that layer was delicious, crispy flatbread. It was a great start to the meal.

But the real king of the meal came with my main course. My roast chicken was served on mash, with creamed rukau, stuffing and herb gravy. Okay, so the menu lied a little bit and stuffing was nowhere to be seen, but they more than made up for it with the size of the chicken and the deliciousness of the mash. And the rukau, for those of you wondering, turned out to be spinach. I avoided this and went to work on the meat and potatoes.

As mentioned before, the chicken was huge, but it also had some great flavor from the gravy. The mash, though, was the highlight. I don’t know the last time I’ve eaten such creamy, buttery mashed potatoes, but I do know that before this meal it had been way too long.

Trader Jack’s was so good, in fact, that it was the only restaurant that merited a return visit during our all-too-short vacation. Sure, the real reason for the return was to meet up with some new friends, but if the food wasn’t good we certainly were ready to drop the friends like a bad habit and try a new place. Good thing this wasn’t the case. And all I will say from that return visit is that if you order pizza and don’t like mayonnaise, be sure to tell your server or you may end up with your weekly intake of condiments on your pizza. It will be pretty, but not so easy to scrape off. But I digress…Trader Jack’s is awesome.

In the Cook Islands, 90% percent of the beer consumed is imported. Sure, most of it just comes from New Zealand, a mere three hours and International Date Line away by flight, but it is still shame when you consider the small island of Rarotonga has not one, but two breweries. One of these is the Cooks Lager Brewery and it is nothing like any brewery you’ve seen before. It resides in an old supermarket in the town of Avarua and has only existed for less than two years (replacing a defunct Cooks Lager brewing company that had shut down years before). Yet, in those two years, the five-man operation of Cooks Lager has begun to make its dent in the local brew scene.

While the brewery makes a lager by the same name, it also brews two other beers. One is their “Cheeky Darkie” (as one of the owners of the brewery told me, they are not PC) and the other is their Blonde. During my time on the island, the Blonde wasn’t available, but I did get to try the other two.

The original Cooks Lager is a delicious, light (in flavor), refreshing beer. For a simple lager, it has some good body and the brewing process leaves the beer just a bit cloudy to give it a texture similar to that of a wheat beer. The brewery is now starting to get this brew out to some bars and restaurants, but it can also be found in 750 ml plastic bottles in various stores around the island. It’s great for kicking back on the beach, and by beach I only mean the beaches of the Cook Islands, because without preservatives, this beer isn’t gonna be shipped anywhere in the near future.

The potentially offensive Darkie beer can only be found in those plastic bottles outside of the brewery, but is definitely worth trying. Not a dark like a stout or a porter, the Darkie is more of an amber ale and is a nice companion to the Lager. This beer is much more suited for mealtime than for sitting out on the beach, as it is more of a flavor beer than a refreshing beer, but is also pretty good for lounging around a cabana after a rough afternoon of snorkeling.

The Cooks Lager Brewery is certainly on its way up in Rarotonga and I hope the time comes soon that 90% of the beer consumed in the Cook Islands are local and the other 10% are from people who are simply unwilling to try something new and refreshing.

Wandering the streets (err ummm street) of Rarotonga in the Cook Islands, waiting for our hotel to let us check in, we made our way to a part of the island called Avarua. Avarua is often referred to as “town” since it is the closest thing Rarotonga has to a town. As in any town, we got hungry and walked into the first place that looked delicious, called Cafe Salsa. Typically, a restaurant named as such would serve Mexican or some other Latin food, but this was not the case and the only thing remotely Mexican about the place was the name.

Instead, Cafe Salsa served up local Pacific foods and since clock was nowhere near noon yet, I kept my eyes glued to the breakfast and brunch part of the menu. Within a moment or two, my choice was made. This was the coconut pancakes with grilled banana and bacon, topped with maple syrup. It screamed awesome and unvegan at me, so I was excited to get involved with it and jump right into such a delicacy of the Pacific.

When it arrived, it was nothing short of beautiful and in no time I was deep in bacon, banana and pancakes. The pancakes were not light and fluffy, but were a little bit on the hearty side, which probably had something to do with the coconut cooked into them. Clearly, though, this was not intended to be a light and fluffy meal, as the bacon was piled onto the pancakes and added a nice salty balance to the otherwise incredibly sweet meal. And speaking of incredibly sweet, the bananas were some of the sweetest I had ever tasted.

The fruit smoothie I got to go with the meal probably overdid the whole sugar factor, but it was totally worth it to get some of their fresh fruit in me, even in liquid form.

Cafe Salsa was a great way to begin my culinary journey of Rarotonga and I have a feeling I would have been back for another morning meal or two if my hotel wasn’t offering free breakfast every morning. Perhaps not Mexican, but Cafe Salsa sure did the salsa name justice.