Paia Fish Market Restaurant — Restaurant in Maui

The food was good, but everything else was bad. The blackened fish is well seasoned and cooked very well, and the calamari had the perfect amount of batter coating and tasted very fresh. I have some major issues with the waitress and some sanitation grievances.

1. See my calamari picture? It was served to me like that; i.e a piece of calamari that fell into the sauce and it made me think that someone else had touched my food prior to it being served. I almost returned it to the kitchen. The staff should handle the food with more care.

2. One of the waitresses was extremely rude. First, I asked her politely if she could help me clean a portion of the dirty table. I let her know my partner was in line. Her response was, "Where is your number? We don't hold seats here." She added the people in front of my partner will be served first and won't have seats, so she will ask if I need to get up and make room.

What in the hell? It is not my fault other people poorly plan their seating arrangement, especially if your restaurant has no written rule about this. So she decided not to use her new made up rule to be lazy, and then she brings a rag and a spray over and sprayed the table in front of me, getting her spray chemicals over my arms, wiping off the table and then leaving. Extremely rude!

3. Sanitation issue. There were two waitresses. One which serves most of the food, and the other bus and cleans the table with gloves on. However, the one who cleans the table would sometimes drop the rag and carry people's food over with her dirty gloves on. The one who normally serves food also sometimes picks up a rag and cleans the table with her bare hand and then continues to serve food without washing her hands or putting on gloves. Their sanitation system is poorly enforced.

I doubt I would ever come back here other than possibly for take out. Good food but bad at just about everything else from customer service...

Being the foodie pig that I am, I ordered food here for my lunch the next day while we were having dinner at Milagros across the street! LOL.

ATMOSPHERE: Like the majority of Paia eateries, they're open-air. Seating is communal, bleh. The vibe is sunburnt touristy.

FOOD: Fresh Catch Plate The dinner portion fish is two ounces larger (8 vs. 6) and pricier than the lunch variety. Why? Anyway, my favorite Opah fish wasn't available so Snapper it was. I got it Cajun style but received a blackened style instead, no biggie as I love both preparations. Even after nuking it the next day, the fish was insanely tender on the inside. Fear not as the Cajun or blackened styles are not spicy at all but rather herby. I opted for half Cajun rice and half home fries in which the portion seemed smaller than last time. The tartar sauce is out of this world!

Onion Rings You get a pretty big basket for the money. They're of the larger size, breaded and doesn't come with any dipping sauce.

Seafood Pasta Being the pasta fanatic I am, I will always opt for this over other dishes regardless of the restaurant's specialty. Because we did take out, the dish naturally coagulated by the time I received it, but nothing a little zap in the microwave couldn't help. This linguine dish is a big portion good enough for 2 to share, and was full of chunky boneless fish, a few shrimp, scallops, mushrooms, onions, and capers done in an alfredo sauce that was cheesy, not too heavy, and had the right amount of savoriness and creaminess. Wait, wait, wait... Cheese? In a seafood pasta dish? Yes, we're not in Italy so that big no-no is acceptable here. Two yums up!

SERVICE: I phoned in my order to a friendly gal and it was ready in 15 minutes. I'm pretty sure the cashier was the same gal on the phone, who was welcoming and quick.

OVERALL: I'll say it once and I'll say it again. Mama's Fish House quality at...

We had dinner at Paia Fish Market in Paia after doing the Road to Hana. There is a free parking lot nearby, making it pretty convenient. The staff was helpful and friendly. I wanted to try one of the fresh catch plates and asked for a recommendation on what to order since I’m not that picky and figured I’d order whatever she suggested.

Based on her recommendation, I got the snapper cajun-style with rice and home potatoes. First off, the portions are huge so that’s a plus if you have a big appetite. The plate also comes with coleslaw in addition to the selected sides.

Overall, I thought the food was ok. My fish was on the dry side, which was disappointing since she had raved about how juicy the snapper is compared to some of the other fishes I was considering. So I think it was just overcooked (bummer). I also personally didn’t love the fennel seeds in the cajun spice mix, but that’s just a personal presence and I didn’t know it would have fennel in it. So for me, despite the hefty portion, it was a bit of a miss. I hate wasting food so I ate what I could and called it a day.

My sister tried the seafood pasta. Overall she enjoyed it, but we noticed some of the shrimp wasn’t really deveined properly. Small detail, but kind of an important one. I’m sure with the volume of seafood they go through it’s easy to rush through cleaning the shrimp, but a bit more diligence in cleaning them would have been nice.

I really don’t want to leave a “bad” review, especially given the fallout after the Lahaina fires and businesses suffering, but I wanted to at least share some of these issues because perhaps the kitchen can take the feedback and, I dunno, do better? Given our one and only experience here, I’m not sure I’d rush to try it again. For both of us it served its purpose as a meal, but it wasn’t as delicious or memorable as I had hoped...