Hawai'i Homegrown Food Network

Food For Thought: Taking responsibility (vignettes of an amateur hunter and butcher)

Before the kill at butchering workshop at Evening Rain Farm.

I have butchered over 60 animals, and initiated many concerned vegetarian interns on my farm into the web of omnivorous life. As it turns out, many people crave the experience of "taking responsibility" for eating meat. The process begins by working at strenuous, physically demanding tasks for a month. This tends to develop a physical craving for meat. Then they see how our chickens live, foraging in the shrubs, eating insects, grass seeds, worms and so on, sleeping in the trees. Then I say, "Those two roosters are extra. If you want to eat one, I will walk you through the process." Invariably, the killing is the (emotionally) hard part, and the rest of the process is fascinating to them. I always offer to do the actual killing. Some people want to do it themselves, and some don't.

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Maku’u Farmers Market

A scene at the busy Maku'u Market located between Kea'au and Pahoa in Puna.

Our recent visit to the huge Maku’u Farmers Market took place on a breezy but gloriously sunny Sunday morning. The market place was buzzing and the parking was ‘competitive’ with new arrivals waiting patiently for early birds to leave an empty spot…but the waiting didn’t take long as there was a steady stream of in-and-out, well-directed traffic.

Farmers Market

Crop Share: Sharing our backyard abundance with our community

A regular Crop Share participant harvests a leek from Mala‘ai: The Culinary Garden of Waimea Middle School.

Depending on the season, the fruit trees and gardens in our backyards are overflowing with more food than we can consume.

Crop Share is an innovative project designed to gather these surplus fruits and vegetables from our communities and share them with individuals and families in need. Newly created non-monetary exchange markets, where no money changes hands, can serve as distribution channels for surplus backyard produce, and provide a welcoming environment where residents can share and trade community resources.

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Food for Thought: A lawn or a pasture?

Hair sheep grazing in Ka'u citrus/avocado orchard.

Imagine owning a lawnmower that makes its own blades, moves itself around the lawn, requires no gasoline (it runs on grass), makes very little noise, replaces itself every year or so, and you can eat it as a delicious high protein food. All you need to provide is a fence around the pasture, a small shed, some water, and mineral supplements. Sound like a crazy fantasy? If you have some land with grass on it, and you can afford to put a fence around it, tropical hair sheep are a viable option.

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Getting Protein in Hawai'i: What's for Dinner?

Poultry are far more efficient at converting their food into protein for human consumption compared with cattle.

Before Polynesians arrived in Hawai’i there were no amphibians, reptiles, or freshwater fish, and only two mammals, the ancient Hawaiian monk seal and the small Hawaiian Hoary Bat (Ope’ape’a). Early Polynesian settlers brought key plants and animals with them and after their arrival well over a thousand years ago these new species gradually but significantly changed the native Hawaiian environment. Though Hawai’i still provided the seafood protein that the Polynesians had depended on in the Marquesas and Society Islands, the Polynesians introduced protein sources that included taro, chickens, dogs and pigs.

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Food For Thought: Taking responsibility (vignettes of an amateur hunter and butcher)

Maku’u Farmers Market

Crop Share: Sharing our backyard abundance with our community

Food for Thought: A lawn or a pasture?

Getting Protein in Hawai'i: What's for Dinner?

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