TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Kakao menu from Jeepers

Pictures courtesy of Jeepers

Thanks Jeepers and Carol for getting this. Holy smack! This menu has been expanded way beyond what I remember from Kakao and our last visit there in April, 2017. Maybe I just wasn't paying attention, but I truly don't remember all of those 'high-end' dishes. What a great selection of food and drink being offered here. Prices look to be a tad higher, but that's okay. From past visits we would typically eat a late lunch/early dinner here around 3 o-clock or so (followed by a shot of their latest specialty rum, of course). Then, they'd start packing things up around 4 as the cruise ship visitors departed the scene. With this menu I am curious to see if they are taking a different approach with expanded hours and possibly trying to draw-in more people from Orient Village, Grand Case, etc. Also curious to see if U.S. currency is accepted at matching prices to the Euro here. This was the case in the past. If these prices match for U.S. funds then better to pay in that manner at this time rather than bringing euros. I also noticed that the local 4% tax is included in the listed prices rather than being tacked-on afterwards. Thanks again for all your efforts with this!

Looks a little expensive for my kind of beach day.

It is a huge menu, I agree. I actually don't remember them ever taking 1 to 1 on the Euro, but it could be. Hopefully Jeepers will chime in on that.

We were there for over 3 weeks in December and they do not accept 1 for 1. They were charging 1.15 dollar per 1 euro.

Is Bikini Beach open ?

There is a different chef and menu has a Peruvian emphasis. I was there this past weekend and from a food standpoint, I wasn't impressed and the prices are more expensive too. They don't have a Pizza stove and I was told they have no intention of putting one in any time soon.

The fish and chips looks like a good choice for 10 Euro....

PMagistro--I saw that emphasis on Peruvian food, which is unusual for SXM. There doesn't seem to be much traditional French food there. I don't know what you mean about not having a pizza stove, as there are pizzas on the menu?

Bikini is open, yes. They were the first ones to reopen, other than Perch Lite.

Kontiki similar high prices. Bikini don't know as we didn't go back after they wouldn't acknowledge us at the bar after waiting about 15 minutes.

Agree. Most restaurants on French side do not have euro =$ but on Dutch side lots have service charge added. One restaurant on boardwalk something like Oualachi asked if we wanted to leave extra as tip to server.

Well you will not see any cruisers at these places, not with those prices.

jeepers--don't blame you. I would have left also. I don't GET not being acknowledged at the bar..

We wandered through the new KKO (that is how their name now appears on signage) when we did our drive around the island last week and talked briefly with the guy offering chairs. He was excited to tell us they have a new Peruvian chef which is the source for the emphasis for the menu. The new building looks very nice but it was too early for lunch and we weren't planning a beach day. I used to love their food so it will be interesting to see of the new menu has the same appeal.

Apparently the higher ticket, more upscale menu works ok for beach bars because we did stop for lunch at Anse Marcel and it was very busy with most tables filled.

With those menu prices and 30 for 2 chairs and umbrella I wont be going there very often if any.

Nothing like the old menu, all my favorites are gone except beef carpaccio. I'll still try it though, there's some intrigue in that menu and I don't think the prices are out of line. It's an upscale beach restaurant.

Believe it or not, it was very busy on a cruise day. They had many servers that were running everywhere. Like I said it was the same guy that I've seen running bikini beach that was telling people what to do. We had to wait for food & bill but had nowhere to be. Sebastian from Petit Bistro was eating lunch there.

Yes, Pizza in on the menu. When I sought to order a pizza, I was declined and they explained the reason was lack of a pizza oven.

Any chance they were doing a presold deal or special for cruise ship passengers?

That is always a great start!

Does that mean it's on the menu or not on? Wording is confusing to me.

Look at the menu pictures, one clearly indicates and lists pizzas. Six plus a mini pizza are listed.

Got it. Didn't see all the menu at first. Now i did.

I am not trying to be a smarta$$ but it is often beneficial to read the entire thread. You were the second comment so you just about had to see the pictures of the menu.

Oh I saw the menus. Just missed the pizza section after noticing the high price points of the rest of the menu items. I was mostly trying to figure out what PMagistro was trying to say that was confusing to me in his post.

OK, thanks. They have always had pizza there, in my experience. Maybe they don't want to offer it, as it seemed to be a lot cheaper than most everything else on the menu???

Hey carol, which one of the restaurants had the oooh sooo good salmon wrapped in puff pastry? My wife and me saw you and Eric in one of your trip reports with the photos. It inspired us so much we had to have it. One of our best lunches on orient beach! But never found it on the menu again, assuming we were going to the same restaurant, LOL! That was some of the best advice we received from MANY trip reports from EVERYONE, but that was the best.

I'm pretty sure that was at Kakao, but was a special.

No. We've been going there for years and spoke to Antoine.

A friend whose opinion I trust regarding food said the same thing about the food. We'll give it a try in November; Peruvian food is good, and I like the idea of something different. Odd though, to have pizza on the menu with no intention of serving it.

"Odd though, to have pizza on the menu with no intention of serving it."
They might have had a change of heart after menus were printed. Or plan on adding availability at a later time.

The issue is they simply don't have the proper oven to make pizza.

Perhaps they'll have a change of heart and buy an oven down the road, but Antoine (the owner) told me he wasn't going to get one.

Interesting, considering the pizza is one of the only really reasonably priced items on the menu. It appears that the burgers are 15E without ANY sides. People look at the menu, decide to have pizza and sit down and order drinks, then they don't have the pizza, when they go to actually order. Bait and switch?? I'm guessing they changed their minds after they printed the menus and don't want to pay to have them re-printed. A pizza oven is a large expense, but it's not like they didn't know that before they put the pizza on the menu? We ordered a pizza to share, usually along with a salad to share, several times there in the past. In general, I actually don't see much there on that menu that would cause me to want to eat there.

It would be mighty easy to cover the pizza section or print a new page without the pizzas listed. Pretty simple.

I really don't get the feeling they intended to purposely deceive anyone. I think this is really a case of printing the menu before they had all of the equipment and the financial reality of the cost to purchase the oven was more then they wanted to spend.

I would also say 19 Euros for a burger is a bit pricey for my pocketbook.

We seems to eat lunch that the Perch every day at 1:30pm. Between the happy hour 2 for 1 drinks and the $10 burger that made more sense to us.

An add a side of ff for 5.00€ to that burger and its right up there.

While it may not have been intentional, it would be very easy to change the menu to avoid any confusion about pizza. Not doing so just perpetuates the problem.

Think I might order the wife a Pornstar Martini. It sure can't hurt

Think it will change anything. Lol