Little Oven

One of our favorite places, possibly in this world, is Little Oven, on King Street map. We've been visiting Joyce Harada and enjoying her homey, yummy and beautiful desserts for a couple of years now. Truly, as others have written, Little Oven IS little, and very easy to miss. Look for the shop with the warm orange glow and funky modern light fixture, just past the old Fro-yo bar and parking is in the back, turn right on Kaheka and right again. The hours are W-Sat 7pm-midnight, but you may want to go a little bit later, around 7:30 or 8, as they don't always open right on time. I've been meaning to do a post on Little Oven for so long, but never had the opportunity to take good pictures. We finally brought our camera the other night, expecting the usual casual and relaxed atmosphere probably seeing the same ol' people, but we were greeted by what seemed like a barage of patrons, most of whom we'd never seen before! Little Oven was recently featured in Metromix, a local entertainment guide, and so now the secret's out!

We had the Irish Apple Cake and Irish Tipsy Cake, both $6.50. The Apple cake was like an apple pie but with a biscuit-like crust. Joyce makes some of the most satisfying pastry, from tarts to cobblers to pies. Anything she does with fresh fruit is also lovely. The Tipsy cake was a strawberry layer cake with some sort of liquor between the cake, strawberries and cream, very light and tasty.

Irish Apple Cake, $6.50














Irish Tipsy Cake, $6.50













We can also attest to mostly all of Little Oven's homemade sorbets and ice milks. Strawberry sorbet and ice milk, and the banana ice milk are particularly good, bursting with fresh fruit flavor. In addition to the frozen desserts, we are also huge fans of the lilikoi pavlova, calamansi tart and the mixed berry and peach cobblers.

What is most compelling about Joyce's desserts is that she makes everything herself, you can almost taste the love that goes into it. Some of her desserts have become comfort food for us, they have a simplicity to them that just grows on you. On holidays and at different times of year, she creates special desserts and prix fixe menus. You really can't visit just once.

Little Oven had become such a special place for us that we asked Joyce to make our wedding cake. She created a beautiful cake for us, an amazing lilikoi cake! She is truly talented, and has a whole host of cakes at her website.

Our wedding cake: