paradise ali

It began when I was trying to think of ways to downsize our food budget.  We already drastically reduced the frequency of our takeout meals and eating out.  That, in and of itself, was a huge savings.  (I ain’t gonna lie.  We still hit the evil McD’s dollar menu on rare occasions.  It keeps the kids on their toes.)  So the next step was, what my hanai mom called, “stretching it.”  You know, instead of one steak per person for one meal, we’d have five or six meals of stir fry or stew or soup or something?  So there I was at our local grocery store craving stir fried green beans and when I saw the sign that said, “$6.00/lb.” I just about fainted!  I knew it was expensive but that was just ridiculous!  Ever since then, I’ve wanted to plant a garden in my backyard. 

When I was growing up we had a “hippie garden.”  Guess that was the unofficial local slang for organic?  I remember a lot of digging, long rows and rows of all kinds of vegetables and my folks weeding and fertilizing and watering and picking off any insect brave enough to snack on their crops.  To this day, I’m not sure if they gardened out of necessity and made it seem like an enjoyable hobby or if they truly enjoyed the hard work and the whole process.  I suspect the later.

A few years ago, the previous renters of our old house left an empty raised bed garden.  I planted mostly herbs like basil, thyme, lemon grass, rosemary, Thai basil, lemon basil, fennel, several types of mint, oregano along with the ever present green onions.  Once I planted them, they just grew like weeds on their own.  No maintenance.  It was gorgeous and the aroma wafting on the breeze was heavenly.  I didn’t really know how to use all of those herbs but I gave it away to friends and neighbors and savored what I could.  Now, I wish I would have grown vegetables.  I thought it was too work intensive and you know I was a couch potato back then.  But I digress . . .

The soil in my backyard is poor to nonexistent with lava rock patches here and there so I knew I’d have to do up another raised bed.  I started researching it and found this method called “square foot gardening.”  What I like in this method is that it utilizes a raised bed, there’s very little weeding, watering or fertilizing, and you can grow more in less space.  No need for those long row plantings my folks slaved over!  According to “All New Square Foot Gardening” by Mel Bartholomew, it uses (for the most part) only six inches of a growing medium called “Mel’s Mix.”  The garden can be placed in small spaces like on  an apartment lanai, on a patio, in boxes on steps, even on a table to allow for gardening while in a wheelchair.  How cool is that?!  There’s an official site, too.

I’ve started the string beans by a window in the laundry room and we should be able to transplant them and be up and running with the garden this weekend.  (Crossing my fingers and toes for good weather.)  We’ll see how it goes! 

Sugar Cane and Rainbow by Omega Man

I was raised in a rural sugar plantation/farming community.  My folks usually had a garden with plenty of lettuce, beans, corn, mustard cabbage, carrots and all sorts of things.  Even if it wasn’t in full production, there were always the staples of green onion and chili pepper.  We also had aloe.  Not to eat, it’s good for burns.  (We had animals, too, but I’ll save that story for later.)  It was nice back then, we gave our neighbors vegetables and mangoes and they gave us fish.  The hunters would share pigs, goats, pheasants and smoked meat.  Nobody ever called it bartering or trading either.  No one thought of it like that.  It was a gift from the heart with no expectations of reciprocation.  It was life.

People would come together to prepare the pig to kalua (bake in the ground) and dig the imu (underground oven) for a baby luau or party.  It was a time consuming process (I’ll spare you the gory details of pig prep), usually overnight, and it would be a mini party right there.  Primo and Olympia beer flowed freely and then there was the music.  Not just singing, mind you, they had ukuleles, guitars, bass, drums, harmonicas and even accordions!  Later, at the party, people would get up and do an impromptu hula or sing a favorite song. There was no such thing as karaoke–the backup music was live and unrehearsed!  It wasn’t uncommon for the singing and merry making to last a few days, especially when family from other islands came in to visit.  There was the cooking for the party, then the party, then the clean up where folks broke down tables and took the rubbish to the dump and then lunched on the leftovers.  (There was always food leftover.  Just about the worst thing that could happen would be having too little or running out.  That would be “shame”! )  It was a blast! 

Besides the parties, other things were based around food.  It was a culture of food.  The first thing you’d hear when you went to someone’s house to play was, “Come!  Come inside and eat!”  It didn’t matter if all they had were crackers and sardines, it was offered.  Oddly enough, in the humbleness of local style, if some aunty or uncle (every adult was aunty or uncle out of respect) asked if you were hungry, you had to say “no” even if you were starving.  Aunty would bring something out to eat anyway and you had better eat whatever was put in front of you and say, “thank you!”  How you behaved reflected directly on your family.  In a more formal visiting situation, you’d bring a gift of food with you.  Whether it was fruit from your backyard or homemade goodies like sweet bread or sausage, you wouldn’t think to go empty handed.  Same if you traveled to O’ahu or some other place, you’d bring something for your host and you’d bring back for family and friends things like King’s Bakery Sweetbread, Liliha Creampuffs, Chinese food from Chinatown, Kona coffee, Atebara Potato Chips, Kaua’i Cookies and other endless goodies.  Food is the universal language of love!

What were parties and food traditions like when you were growing up?