The newly released “From Kau Kau to Cuisine: An Island Cookbook, Then and Now” is an informative and mouth-watering study in contrasts. Humble, plantation-era home-cooked meals are presented alongside their modern opposites, in which the same flavors or ingredients are
The newly released “From Kau Kau to Cuisine: An Island Cookbook, Then and Now” is an informative and mouth-watering study in contrasts. Humble, plantation-era home-cooked meals are presented alongside their modern opposites, in which the same flavors or ingredients are re-imagined into elegant dishes.
Throughout the cookbook, black and white images enhance the nostalgic chronicle of “before time” and colorful photographs inspire the cook. Author Arnold Hiura weaves stories of culture and tradition with recipes from “Then Master” Derek Kurisu and Jason Takemura, an Oahu-based chef who serves tradition with innovation.
“For most of my life I thought ‘kau kau’ was actually a Hawaiian word meaning ‘food’ or ‘to eat,’ writes Hiura in his first book “Kau Kau: Cuisine and Culture in the Hawaiian Islands,” an award-winning book and definitive guide to the history of food in Hawaii. “I was well into my adulthood when I was enlightened to the fact that ‘kau kau’ was not Hawaiian in origin but was very likely a local pidgin English word derived from the term ‘chow chow,’ which is Chinese for ‘food.’”
Hiura’s sequel, “From Kau Kau to Cuisine,” is an enlightening cookbook that reveals little-known facts, such as how shipping strikes influenced Hawaii’s fondness for canned meat and rice. A glimpse into Hawaii’s current food scene demonstrates the popularity of food trucks and pop-up restaurants, the influence of Hawaii regional cuisine on new chefs, an obsession with our beloved farmers markets and the lengths people will go to when seeking artisan products.
Kurisu grew up in a plantation town north of Hilo, where his father worked for the Wailea and Hakalau sugar mills. When the sugar plantations closed on Hawaii Island in 1992, he created Mountain Apple Brand and secured an income for hundreds who were out of work. Today, Kurisu is the executive vice president of KTA Super Stores and a television personality. His traditional recipe for loco moco is made with Portuguese sausage and white gravy.
Jason Takemura, executive chef for Honolulu’s trendy Hukilau Restaurant, as well as the traditional Pagoda Floating Restaurant, puts a contemporary twist on the classics. His recipe for loco moco, which is on the Hukilau Restaurant menu, piles meat that was braised for three hours in shoyu, sake and mirin, onto steamed white rice that is draped with the braising liquid instead of gravy.
Recipes, which are divided into “kau kau” and “cuisine,” contain charming tidbits about how the dish was invented, convenient cooking tips or the use of secret ingredients. Twenty-four meat recipes include Kim Chee smoked pork (cuisine), oxtail stew (kau kau) and Kalua pig hash Benedict with lomi tomato (cuisine). Steamed Chinese-style whole fish (kau kau), black bean Kona crab with Hamakua mushrooms and truffle butter (cuisine) and opihi two ways (kau kau) are among the 18 seafood recipes.
Sides and specialties feature 20 recipes such as warabi and pork (kau kau) and smoked pork and warabi salad (cuisine); fried tofu soup (kau kau) and tofu watercress salad (cuisine). Takemura shows readers how to brine and smoke beef brisket for a pastrami reuben sandwich and Kurisu demonstrates how to make SPAM musubi with an empty SPAM can.
During our interview, Hiura tells me that when he grew up, mothers fed a lot of hungry bellies affordably by stir-frying garden vegetables with SPAM and serving it with steamed rice.
“We didn’t eat big slices of SPAM like we do now,” recalls Hiura, who was born and raised in the sugar plantation town of Papaikou on the Island of Hawaii. “The meal was 80 percent vegetables and a little bit of SPAM for seasoning.”
Humble and soft spoken, Hiura thoughtfully recalls a meager time when food was valued because it satisfied hunger. Today, he expresses gratitude for the many food choices we have and concern for honoring the food of the past.
“Hawaii has changed quickly in just two generations and the younger generation is making smart food choices when it comes to eating well,” he tells me. “My hope is that a little bit of room is left for what took place earlier. You can’t eat SPAM everyday, but what’s wrong with it once-in-a-while?”
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