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Hawai'i Homegrown Food Network

Bamboo—Specialty Crop Profile

Written by Andrew Benton, Lex A.J. Thomson, Peter Berg, and Susan Ruskin | 28 December 2011

Bamboo can provide food, fodder, medicine, and a multitude of building and craft materials.

Bamboo has a range of benefits that make it excellent for developing small-scale productive enterprises. It is widely used throughout the Pacific for temporary building structures, rafts, harvesting poles, fishing rods, food and water containers, food tongs, and handicrafts. Bamboo species are most often harvested from the wild, such as secondary forests in Melanesia. In Hawai‘i, wild bamboo stands are commonly harvested for fishing poles, edible shoots, and some construction applications, as well as for some craft work and kadomatsu. It is little used for food except to small extent by Southeast Asian immigrants.

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Live-Culture Foods workshop photos

Written by Craig Elevitch | 27 January 2012

Sandor Katz (on right) led a vibrant 2-day live-cuture foods workshop in Holualoa, North Kona on Jan. 21-22, 2012

By eating a variety of live-cultured or “fermented” foods, you promote diversity among microbial cultures in your body. Biodiversity, increasingly recognized as critical to the survival of larger-scale ecosystems, is just as important at the micro level. Call it microbiodiversity. By fermenting foods and drinks with wild microorganisms present in your home environment, you become more interconnected with the life forces of the world around you.

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The Benefits of Tropical Homegardens

Written by Niki Mazaroli | 26 January 2012

Typical homegarden with coconut, banana, breadfruit, papaya and many other food plants in Suva, Fiji.

What is a Tropical Homegarden?

A traditional Tropical Homegarden (THG) of the Pacific Islands differs greatly from the raised bed or vegetable patch image commonly associated with temperate home edible gardens. A THG is a small-scale agroforestry land use system based on cultural traditions of subsistence living. A THG is in close proximity to a place of residence and tended to by the household members. Plants are grown for personal consumption as food, as well as for medicinal, ceremonial and construction purposes.

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Kava ('awa)—Specialty Crop Profile

Written by Scot C. Nelson | 28 November 2011

Kawa ('awa in Hawaiian) is a traditional ceremonial beverage in many parts of the Pacific, with commercial potential.

A traditional beverage made from the roots and stump of the kava plant is the most important kava product. This medicinal, psychoactive, and ceremonial drink is an aqueous suspension of phytochemicals called kavalactones and other components. Aerial portions of the plant should never be used in beverage preparations; consumption of photosynthetic tissues may pose a human health hazard.

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Coffee—Specialty Crop Profile

Written by Virginia Easton Smith, Shawn Steiman, and Craig Elevitch | 27 April 2011

Shade grown Kona coffee berries.

The coffee seed, referred to as “bean,” is processed, roasted and brewed for beverages. The roasted beans and brewed coffee are also used in candies, desserts and savory dishes. Many uses for the fruit, seed, and by-products can be found. The fruit pulp can be dried and used to make tea, which contains caffeine and antioxidants. The fruit pulp is high in nitrogen and potassium and is used, fresh or composted, for fertilizer and to add organic matter to the soil. The parchment skins also add organic matter and are used as mulch in coffee orchards and around other plants.

Hawai'i Homegrown Food Network

What is a Tropical Homegarden?

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