[Sca-cooks] Farmers Market, Hawaii

[Amanda Baker]

Morning, all!

        (Those of you who wonder why I'm Breakfasts Cook, check the
timestamp on the message :-)

>Hi Amanda!  Gads you finally caught up huh?

        Well, I've still got October to read through, but I'm going at
the list from both ends now!!!

> I like your idea of labeling the coffee and tea that way.

        I don't need caffinated beverages to start the day, but I
also don't need a lynching :-)

> I'm sure Stefan will point you to places in the Florithingy for
> breakfast stuff.

        I've already had a poke around there, Stefan, but you're
such an amazing human reference system for it, I'm sure you'll
have some suggestions which I've missed!  You are a Treasure
of the Known World, and irreplaceably - have you downloaded
a copy of your brain, and insured yourself accordingly???

> So, what is the weather like in Wales today girlfriend?  It is sunny with
> big puffy clouds and a nice chilly breeze here in Maryland, USA

        We'd had lovely late-autumn sun until yesterday around noon,
and then the November clouds gathered and the chilly drizzle began.
Still, good for the allotment garden, to bed down the cardboard mulch  :-)

Finnebhir wrote:

> About 98% of all the local produce gets shipped to Mainland USA. The
> rest of the stuff gets processed and then packed up.

        In other words, all that potentially wonderful food is actually grown
commercially, as trading goods, rather than as food :-(

> The best place to get the fresh squeezed juices is from the plantations.
> There is nothing like fresh- out-of- a- pineapple,- right out -of- the- field,
> glass of juice.

        I'll drink to that, although apple juice (what many of you guys, in an
apparently historically accurate fashion, call cider :-) under similar
circumstances
is truely wonderful too! I was too busy to make it out to any of the
plantations,
although we did circumnavigate the Big Island on one of my days off (two chicks
in a Miata :-)

> I didn't live there, but my brother did, and though a glorious land, living
> expenses are quite high. When a gallon of milk can run $4-5, you have to
> really think about what you buy. There is also such a shortage of land
space...

        Hmm - milk in the UK is about UKP0.40 per Imperial pint (20 fl oz)
retail,
so that sounds reasonably cheap to me; but then, the UK is a densely populated
island.

> There is also such a shortage of land space that most everything has to be
> shipped in.

        Is that really true? Is the population of the Hawai'ian Islands
sufficiently
large that it could not support itself if needs be? Obviously, certain things
would need to be imported or given up, because there is none locally - such
as oil and metal - but I was meaning, simply in terms of nutritional needs?

> All that juice you were drinking, probably from California.

        I tried to avoid the stuff that was labelled as such.

> Next time you are there, try the local, roadside markets. They were better
> than the stores and specialty markets. And definitly try to see the
> plantations.

        I don't expect there to be a next time in the foreseeable, but that
was the beauty of the Farmer's Market - nominally, Weds and Sat, but
there were actually a few produce stalls most days.

> If you do get back there, I would like to suggest you try the following food
> items, fresh poi

        Apparently, poi can be made from a number of starting tubers.  The kind
I had, made by a ethnic-native chef at the Astronomy 'base camp' of Hale Pohaku
(at 9000 ft on Mauna Kea, next to the Onizaku Visitor Centre), was a very pale
purply-grey, with a consistency like firm flour-and-water paste (there is a
reason
for that :-) and very little flavour.  My reading suggests that this would
be taro
poi, and that it is very nutitious. Unfortunately, I couldn't find anyone
else to
sell me any in the rest of my two week visit, so I didn't get to try it again.

        Poi is definitely an acquired taste - it can be made 'one finger',
'two finger'
and other consistencies, depending on how you can eat it with your hands :-)
- and also, a very important food historically in Hawaii.  If I can grow any
of the
relevant starter plants in my allotment, I'll try making some, as I do have a
Hawai'ian Cookbook with a recipe :-)

> jellied coconut milk (think jello)

        I've effectively made that myself, admittedly with tinned coconut milk.

> the ever famous, roast suckling pig in banana leaves,

        My plans to attend a ... luau? ... fell apart, unfortunately.

> and go see Waimaia Valley Falls on Oahu.

        There's also a Waimaea on the Big Island, right? I got up there, the
old,
eroded, lush part of the Big Island in the North (the volcanic activity is
in the
South), and we nearly ran over two peacocks in the road on the way back...

        All the best,

        Amanda