The melting pot o[?]ulinary delight

Cuisine

By Dennis Richardson

HAWAII is without a doubt the ethnic melting pot of the Pacific islands where everyone belongs to a minority (and where, in the 1980 US Census Summary Tables, Hawaiians and other Polynesians do not even rate a mention!) . r , ... a popu ation o a most one mi ion, 26 per cent are haole (Caucasian me u mg ortugese), 24 per cent Japan ese, per cent rihpmo, five per cent mese, ess than one per cent (9000) P, ur f u awaiian t^e remainder div ided between the Korean, Vietnamese, i egro, Samoan, mixed race and miscel janeous . Moreover, the islands were originally settled by Polynesians from ™' P a ™ ° f , the Pac , lflc nommall y c a 1 V. 1 m . ora * ra ltlon means faraway . There is evidence of immi- Irvwr* r ° m . the . Mar quesas_as early as the UP t 0 At the time of James Cook’s discovery of Hawaii in 1778 and his death at Kealekekua Bay the following year there may have been some 300,000

people living in the island chain.

Within 100 years the number had been reduced (by disease and despair) to less than 60,000, and the frenetic recruitment of plantation labour launched the het erogeneous destiny of the 50th State of the Union.

It might be expected that so vari egated a settlement history would have given the Hawaiian Islands a diversity of food habits and cuisines. And indeed there is nowhere in the Pacific islands a greater diversity of eating houses than present-day Ohau. But this richness (and the economy) owe more to the $2-billion tourist industry and the $1 billion of federal inputs (largely military-related) than to Hawaii’s history of immigration.

In the early days, agriculture was relatively highly developed, and in cluded an ingenious irrigation system for the root staple, taro, which greatly impressed the English explorer George Vancouver in 1791, Yams, sugar, bread fruit, papaya, bananas, coconut, and other fruits (but not pineapple) were grown, while edible dogs and pigs and a variety of birds (including a domesti cated goose) and fish pre-date the

arrival of James Cook. Goats were introduced by Cook and sheep by Vancouver, but these were protein sources only for royalty. Commoners relied on the astonishing diversity of fish which many would argue is still the fmest feature of Hawaiian foods.

There are over 800 species of fish in Hawaiian waters, many of them edible, These include kihikihi (moorish Idols), (silver perch), Pacific Blue Marlin (which grows to over 1000 lbs), several other billfish, mahimahi (dorado or dol

phin), aku (skipjack), ahi (yellow fin),

and six other tuna species, sharks, limpets, oysters, crayfish, prawns and shrimps, squid and octopus, Despite the profusion of sea-fish there was also an ancient pond-fishing culture.

Fifteenth century fishponds can still be found on Ohau, Molokai and Kauai’i; and modern versions have since made Hawaii the pond-fishing capital of the Pacific.

The first western commercial contacts were by the notorious and rapacious European sandalwooders. When the sandalwood was exhausted, North Am erican whalers arrived to exploit the

acquired tastes of the chiefs for foreign goods. As many as 500 whaling ships a year have been reported as visit ing Honolulu and Lahaina one of which (in 1843)

carried a youthful Herman

Melville.

The development of in

dustrial petroleum in the

US spelled the end of whaling and widespread alienation and privatisation of land, re sulting from the Great Mahele in 1848, enabled

the development of plan

tation sugar and, later, pineapple. Then began the quest for cheap labour. It :ame from Kwangtung,

Mongolia, Korea, Japan, Puerto Rico, Madeira, the Azores, Portugal, Spain, [taly, Poland (Galicia), Australia, Ger nany, Norway, Russia, Siberia, Mocronesia, Polynesia, Melanesia and he Philippines.

Between 1852 and 1930, over 400,000 nen, women and children were trans ited to the plantations. Illiteracy was :onsidered an advantage (the labourers :ould not read their contracts and were :onsequently docile) as was a mixture of >rigins a company manager urged the Commission in 1895 (three years >efore annexation) to “keep a variety of abourers ... and thus prevent any :oncerted action in case of strikes ...”!

The history of Hawaii, thus, was not uch as to favour either the survival of the triginal Polynesian cuisine or the mportation of the more sophisticated omponents of others. There are, of ourse, some Polynesian foods poi pounded taro, nowadays blended, for aole visitors, with mashed banana), kalua >ig steamed in an umu or earth oven and 2 ulau (pork, beef, salt fish and taro leaves ►aked in ti or banana leaves). There are Iso distinctive Portugese contributions Pao doce, a light and sugared round loaf; lalasada, a kind of doughnut; spicy ausage, eaten with bean soup; and arious characteristic marinades). There re Filipino dishes like lechon kawali baked suckling pig); adobo (stew); pancit ijon (a mixture of shrimp, pork, veg tables and noodles) and the übiquitous "rmented fish paste, bagoong surprisingly, perhaps, the alleged stimu mt balut does not appear to have

reached the islands) there is the usual range of foodstuffs which follow Chinese settlement in any country (notably the Chinese introduced a variety of veg etables beans, snow peas, bamboo, lotus and various cabbages as well as a range of dim sum tid-bits which later became pupus or canapes). There are the hot Korean flavours of him chee (pickled vegetables, with garlic and chillies) and kun koki (meat marinated in soy, sugar and sesame, broiled and served very crisp), and most importantly, there is a rich Japanese legacy that is unique outside Japan. As with Chinese cuisine, many dishes lend themselves to the American habit of pupu tempura , meat and fish in shoyu, sashimi, daikon (white radish) with ginger, sushi, mochi and others as well as more formally structured combinations.

But to the visitor, the culinary interest of Hawaii lies in local adaptations of traditional imported recipes and the converse, imported recipes using local materials. They range from rumaki (chicken livers and water chestnuts which may be served with either Chinese mustard, Japanese Shoyu or chillies), manapua (a local version of filled Chinese dumplings), saimin (a noodle soup in vented by Hawaian Japanese), teriyaki beef, and Hawaian char siu (sweet roast pork with white wine) to the use of Macademia nuts in place of almonds, Mani manju sweet beans in a pastry and a huge variety of American derived desserts, based on tropical fruits ( banana, pineapple, poi and guava muf fins, papaya and coconut candies, mango

tapioca pudding, tropical fruit crepes

and waffles, passionfruit pie, and avo cado sherbert). There is even a Moroc can restaurant serving couscous with a local flavour, an Italian trattoria (one of several) offering prosciutto with papaya (instead of melon) and excellent Thai, Indonesian, Swiss, Greek, Portuguese, French and American eating places, , , r J The demands of tourism and defencce have also led to a prohferation of takeaways. Inevitably, McDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken, laco Bell, various Pizza and Pancake chains are there 5 more unusual are the very good ( and cheap) onental takeaways in eluding Japanese and Korean outlets, Fast food 18 appropriate to Hawaii. After 1™"

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