Tag: Summer 2014

Jana McMahon’s Grilled Sweet Potatoes with Honeyed Hot Sauce and Herbed Macadamia Nuts

 

JANA MCMAHON’S GRILLED SWEET POTATOES WITH HONEYED HOT SAUCE AND HERBED MACADAMIA NUTS

Photo by Jana Morgan
Course: Side Dish
Servings: 6 People
Author: Jana McMahon

Equipment

  • Large Pot
  • Peeler
  • Knife
  • Grill
  • Whisk
  • Food Processor

Ingredients

Sweet Potatoes

  • 3 Orange Sweet Potatoes Or Yams
  • 3  Purple Sweet Potatoes
  • Coconut Oil
  • Smoked Sea Salt (Regular Sea Salt Will Work Too)

Honeyed Hot Sauce

  • 1/2 Cup Local Honey
  • 4 Tbs. Favorite Local Hot Sauce
  • 1/4 Tbs. Sea Salt

Herbed Macadamia Nut Topping

  • 1 Cup Roasted Unsalted Macadamia Nuts
  • 1 tsp. Smoked Sea Salt (Regular Sea Salt Will Work Too)
  • 1 Tbs. Cane Sugar
  • 2 Tbs. Rosemary (Finely Chopped)

Instructions

Prepare Sweet Potatoes.

  • Bring a large pot of water to a boil. 
  • Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into ½-inch discs. Place potatoes into boiling water as you peel and slice them to prevent oxidation, which can cause the potato to discolor. Parboil potato slices for 5 minutes. The potatoes should be under-done, as they will finish cooking on the grill.
  • Heat grill. Dry potato slices well, rub with coconut oil, and sprinkle with smoked sea salt. Place sweet potato slices over the fire on the grill. Depending on the amount of heat, be careful not to burn the potato slices before they are cooked through. If the grill fire is too hot, move potatoes away from direct heat and close the grill top until sweet potatoes are done.

Prepare Honeyed Hot Sauce.

  • Blend all hot sauce ingredients well, adjusting hot sauce to desired heat level.

Prepare Herbed Macadamia Nut Topping.

  • Combine all ingredients in a food processor. Pulse mixture to a fluffy, medium-coarse consistency. Avoid a steady grind as you do not want macadamia nut butter. This topping keeps for two weeks in the refrigerator and is great on all kinds of foods: fish, chicken, vegetables, rice, potatoes, even popcorn.

Plate and Serve.

  • Arrange sweet potatoes on a serving platter and drizzle with honeyed hot sauce.
  • Sprinkle herbed macadamia nut mixture and serve warm.

Jana McMahon’s Radishes With Compound Butter And Salt

 

JANA MCMAHON’S RADISHES WITH COMPOUND BUTTER AND SALT

Photo by Jana Morgan
The French had it right pairing mild spring radishes with good butter and sea salt. This is what spring tastes like! Serving with smoked and citrus salts keeps this simple dish interesting and fresh.
Course: Side Dish, Snack
Author: Jana McMahon

Equipment

  • Food Processor

Ingredients

Compound Butter

  • 4 oz. Butter (Softened; Grass-Fed Or Local Butters Are Best)
  • 1 tsp. Thyme Leaves (Fresh, Chopped)
  • 1 tsp. Rosemary (Chopped)
  • Zest of 1 Lemon

Radishes

  • 1 Bunch of Radishes (Washed Well And Tops Removed; Keep Just A Bit Of Stem For Dipping)

Instructions

Prepare Compound Butter.

  • Place all the ingredients into a food processor and pulse until everything is well incorporated. Put the butter into a small dish for dipping.

Presentation and Serving.

  • Arrange radishes on a large platter or cutting board; serve alongside herbed compound butter and assorted salts for dipping. Each smoked salt has a different flavor unique to the wood it’s smoked over. Same with citrus salts. Enjoy!

Jana McMahon’s Fresh Corn Polenta

 

JANA MCMAHON’S FRESH CORN POLENTA

Photo by Jana Morgan
Course: Main Course, Side Dish
Servings: 4 People
Author: Jana McMahon

Equipment

  • Large Saucepan
  • Slotted Spoon
  • Bowl
  • Food Processor, Blender, Or Immersion Blender
  • Cast Iron Pan

Ingredients

  • 6 Ears Of Corn
  • 3 Cups Water
  • 3 Tbs. Butter (Cubed)
  • 1/4 Cup Baby Heirloom Tomatoes (If tomatoes are too big, slice in half.)
  • 1/2 tsp. Fresh Thyme (Chopped)
  • 1/2 tsp. Sea Salt
  • Black Pepper (To Taste)

Instructions

  • Shuck corn and cut kernels off the cob. Place the kernels in a large saucepan and cover with the water. Cook for 12 minutes on a low simmer. Use a slotted spoon to lift the kernels from the water. Save the cooking liquid and reserve ½ C. of the corn kernels in a separate bowl.
  • Put cooked corn into a food processor, blender, or immersion blender. Pulse for a few seconds, aiming for a medium smooth texture. Add back some of the cooking liquid a tablespoon at a time so the mixture stays silky and not too dry.
  • Place the corn purée in a cast iron pan with the cooking liquid and cook, while stirring, on low heat for 10 minutes. This holds beautifully on the back of the grill while you are grilling the rest of the meal.
  • Fold in the butter, ½ C. of reserved corn kernels, thyme, salt, and pepper to taste, and cook for 2 more minutes. Top with fresh baby heirloom tomatoes and serve.

Jana McMahon’s Steaks On A Hardwood Fire

 

JANA MCMAHON’S STEAKS ON A HARDWOOD FIRE

Photos by Jana Morgan.
President Eisenhower is noted for loving to cook his porterhouse steaks directly on hardwood coals and Julia Child dedicated an episode of her PBS show to cooking “dirty steak.” Adam Perry Lang coined this method “clinching,” after a boxing term for closing the gap between one and an opponent. Placing meat in direct contact with hot coals leaves no room for the fat to ignite into flame, eliminating that greasy black slick that can compromise the best of steaks. The results are astounding, an umami-rich crust and moist meat with a slightly smoky flavor revealing just where that steak has been. I chose macadamia nut for my fire, a hardwood that burns down easily and evenly, imparting a neutral smoke flavor. Kiawe would work, or any hardwood local to your area.
Course: Main Course
Servings: 4 People
Author: Jana McMahon

Equipment

  • Hardwood Or Lump Charcoal (No Briquettes)
  • Fire Starter(No Lighter Fluid)
  • Cast Iron Pan
  • Food Processor Or Blender
  • Jar With Lid

Ingredients

Steaks

  • 4 New York Strip Steaks
  • Sea Salt (Coarse Crystals)
  • Lemon Garlic Dressing (See Recipe Below)

Homemade Maui Mustard

  • 1/2 Cup Black Mustard Seed
  • 1/2 Cup Yellow Mustard Seed
  • 1 Can Maui Brewing Co. Coconut Porter (12 oz.)
  • 1/4 Cup Maple Syrup
  • 1/4 Cup Balsamic Vinegar
  • Sea Salt (To Taste)

Lemon Olive Oil

  • 1 Whole Lemon (Diced, Meyer Lemon Prefered)
  • 1 Cup EVOO

Lemon Garlic Dressing

  • 1 Cup Lemon Olive Oil Mixture (See Recipe Below)
  • 4 Cloves Garlic (Finely Minced)
  • Juice of 1 Lemon
  • 1/2 tsp. Sea Salt

Instructions

Prepare Homemade Maui Mustard.

  • Soak mustard seeds in the beer overnight. The longer the seeds soak, the milder the mustard.
  • Blend all the ingredients in a food processor, blender, or Vitamix. Blend less for coarser mustard, blend more for smoother mustard. This recipe is simply a template; feel free to mix up the soaking liquid, vinegar, and sweetener.

Prepare Lemon Olive Oil.

  • In a Vitamix or high-powered blender, purée one whole lemon, diced — yes, skin, seeds, pulp, and all — with oil. Meyer lemon is preferred due to its thin skin for this recipe, but any lemon will work. Use this flavorful, citrusy wonder as a base for all kinds of concoctions, marinades, or bastes.

Prepare Lemon Garlic Dressing.

  • Shake all dressing ingredients together in a jar.

Prepare Fire and Steaks.

  • Get your fire started. Make sure there is enough wood to create a 4 to 6-inch bed of red-hot coals.
  • While fire cooks down, bring steaks to room temperature.
  • Slightly wet hands and rub both sides of the steak with generous amounts of salt. Don’t hold back, really get the salt rubbed into the muscle fiber, it helps form the crust.
  • When wood has cooked down and the coals are glowing red with a cover of white ash, the fire is ready. It should be so hot that you are not able to hold your hand over the coals for more than a second or two. Flatten the surface of the coals to a uniform height of about 5 inches (I use a cast iron pan.) Fan away the grey ash from the top of the coals using a sheet pan or similar.
  • Place steaks directly on the coals. A 1¼ lb. steak will take about 9 minutes to cook. Time the steak for 4 minutes. Turn and baste the cooked side with lemon garlic olive oil mixture. Time second side of the steak for another 4-5 minutes. Turn and baste again with olive oil mixture.

Serve And Enjoy.

  • Rest steaks and serve with homemade Maui mustard. Enjoy!

Bringing The Hawaiian Heat

Hot or not? Our writer sampled over 30 Hawai‘i-made hot sauces; here are her notes on what’s worth a shake (or two).

Story by Vanessa Wolf
Illustration by Bambi Edlund

Jen Homcy’s Lost And Found Woods

Lost and Found

Story by Catherine E. Toth
Photos by Jennifer Binney

There isn’t a part of Jennifer Homcy’s home in Hale‘iwa that doesn’t have to do with her woodworking business.

There’s almost always a stack of logs in her front yard, dropped off by people who have heard she creates one-of-a-kind cutting boards, serving trays and frames out of salvaged wood.

Her backyard is her workshop, where the cutting, shaping and sanding is done under ‘ulu (breadfruit) and mango trees. One of the sheds is filled with rough-edged, mismatched pieces of monkeypod, shower tree and mango, their fate not yet determined. Band Saw, a charcoal-gray stray cat who got his name because the vet bill when Homcy found him totaled the cost of the new band saw she had been saving for, is often perched on the railing, overseeing the work out back.

And inside this 1930s home, which Homcy converted into the ultimate beach escape, is where her pieces of functional art soak in mineral oil and dry, then are stored in racks and on the dining room table she bought at the swap meet 13 years ago.

These are the headquarters of Foundwood, a woodworking company that uses only reclaimed wood to create heirloom pieces for the kitchen and home. It’s been a longtime hobby of Homcy’s that turned into a full-time business last year (2013), one that has allowed her to reconnect with her father, Dave, who died in 2003.

fruits

The senior Homcy started Foundwood in Florida nearly four decades ago. It was his hobby, too, collecting driftwood that washed up on Juno and Jupiter beaches. He turned these salvaged wood pieces into beautiful cutting boards and sold them at art festivals.

“And now 35 years later,”says Homcy, tanned and relaxed in a tank top and yoga pants, “I’m going back to my roots.”

A scientist by trade, Homcy grew up on the beaches of Florida, collecting driftwood and shells. She wasn’t planning on being an artist; in fact, as far back as she can remember, she has always had a love for animals, which ultimately turned into a career in marine biology.

“I rescued a bug out of my grandma’s pool when I was two,”she says, laughing.

At age 5, she volunteered at a wildlife sanctuary. As a teenager she was actively involved in marine conversation programs. And at the University of Southern Florida, she majored in biology and environmental science. She spent more than a decade working in the field.

But at the same time, she was always tinkering with wood, creating unique frames out of salvaged wood just as a hobby.

When her brother, the famed surf cinematographer and photographer Dave Homcy, moved to O‘ahu’s North Shore in 1995, Homcy started visiting the Islands more often. And in 2001, she made the move official, first taking a job with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, then as a boat captain for whale-watching and snorkeling tours. And for a few years, she worked as a science teacher at Kapolei Middle School. But her side business making frames and cutting boards started to take off, and she decided to pursue Foundwood full-time last year.

“It had started to grow beyond my capacity doing this part-time,”Homcy says. “It just grew organically.”

Homcy started making cutting boards about three and a half years ago. The first time she made a few, she took them to the Hale‘iwa Farmers’Market and sold all six before the market even opened. The next time, she brought 15 — and those sold by 10 a.m.

“I started to realize by that point there was something going on here,”she says.

Now, her one-of-a-kind cutting boards — all made from untreated reclaimed wood, mostly from trees that have been removed for development and salvaged from the chippers of tree trimmers — are her best-sellers, particularly the heart-shaped boards that start at $30. In fact, she’s so busy churning out these boards — with two full-time helpers, she can turn around 80 pieces a week — she barely has enough time to take on custom orders.

“There’s been a reinvigoration of food,”she says, attributing her boards’popularity with the coincidental rise in food and environmental consciousness. “And now it’s become an art.”

While the wood types vary on availability, she has used monkey pod, kamani and milo, Cuban mahogany, mango, eucalyptus, sometimes lychee or Malaysian tamarind trees for her various wood projects. And regardless of the wood, Homcy always works with the shapes and grains of each slab to create functional pieces that are venerable works of art.

That’s what William Chen, former chef de cuisine of the Beachhouse at the Moana Surfrider in Waikīkī, loved about her work. The restaurant purchased more than 30 different serving trays and small plates made from koa and monkeypod.

“The nice thing about it,”he says, “is that they’re all unique and all made from salvaged wood. Every piece has character. They’re just beautifully made but industrial, too. You can put them in the dishwasher.”

That’s the goal: to create unique pieces that are both beautiful and functional, that can hang on your wall as art but then be taken down to use as a cutting board or serving tray. That means all of her kitchen pieces — each a different shape, size and color —are soaked for a few days in mineral oil that’s non-toxic, odorless and food-safe.

It’s about repurposing the wood in a way that makes sense.

“Everybody needs a cutting board,”she says, grinning. “Even if you don’t cook, you still gotta cut a lime for your cocktail.”

Staying Sharp About Your Knives

Story by Wanda Adams

Home cooks and professional chefs have a distinctly different view of knives.

Home cooks are more likely to view a knife as just another tool in a jumbled utensil drawer. Something, perhaps, to be a bit nervous about. They readily fall prey to the glamour of big names with prices to match, or shrug and buy a Ginsu set on QVC, or worse, a full set of serrated knives. “Bad! Wrong! Should be stopped!” chefs implore.

Chefs are taught to think of them as an extension of the body. Through the chopping and slicing of hundreds of pounds of every kind of food imaginable in the early days of their training, they learn to adopt a certain grip, a certain motion and to favor particular knives for particular purposes. They develop strong emotional ties to their knives, carrying them everywhere in black roll-up kits and spending hours lovingly sharpening them on a honing stone. “Sharpening is ‘Zen-like,‘” said chef Kyle Kawakami, owner of Maui Fresh Streatery and a former chef-instructor at the Maui Culinary Academy.

What, then, can home cooks learn from the pros about learning to love their knives?
Knife, garlic,hand

Gripping Topic

The goal is to find knives that you’re comfortable enough with to actually use, says chef-instructor Grant Sato of Kapi‘olani Community College, who teaches a popular knife skills course in the school’s continuing education program.

“It’s not the name, it’s not the price, it’s not the quality of the metal, it’s how it feels in your hand,” says Sato. “If it doesn’t feel comfortable, you’re not going to enjoy cutting and you’re not going to enjoy cooking.”

Chef Carol Nardello, whose work testing recipes for cookbooks and role as in-house chef in a Wolf Sub-Zero demonstration kitchen bridges the gap between professional and home kitchens, continues this theme: “Everybody has a favorite knife, that’s the one you go to and you feel confident with,” she says. As one of eight children, she shares that her mother did some “pretty big cookin’,” mostly with a paring knife.

The only true test of whether a knife is right for you is using it. Short of toting along your own cutting board and an onion when visiting a store, never buy a knife without holding it and at least pretending to slice or chop, Nardello insists.

Think carefully about weight, length and heft. A burly European chef with hands like bear paws may be delighted with a German-made 12-inch chef’s knife, while a petite home cook would feel completely overmatched, her hand unable to properly grasp the handle, the length frightening and the weight too weighty.
Start with the Basics         

Kawakami is a self-described knife fanatic, owning costly custom knives, sushi knives, the works. But, he said, it does you no good to spend the money and collect the blades only to have them become “drawer queens,” knives that spend their lives in a drawer.

So what knives ought you consider to outfit a basic home kitchen? The chefs were unanimous:

  • An 8- to 10-inch European-style chef’s knife, a classic triangular shape with a sharp point.
  • A 4-inch paring knife, same shape.
  • A boning or utility knife, thin-bladed and pointed.
  • And a serrated knife for breads and some meats.

“That’s all you need. From there, you can do anything,” said Kawakami.

Well, not quite. The chefs are assuming one other must-have: a steel — a tool rather like a round, ridged, short-sword. Stroking the blade rapidly on one side and then the other, chefs can make the steel “sing.” The steel realigns microscopic “teeth” in the blade, removes burrs and minute chips and returns the cutting tool almost to just-honed sharpness.
Personal Indulgences

Beyond these, however, everyone has their oddball favorite. Sato’s is a good pair of kitchen shears, with which you can delicately snip herbs or brashly cut through bone. Kawakami is also partial to a sushi knife (these are long, single-beveled and devilishly sharp). Nardello’s favorite knife, before she went to culinary school in mid-life and learned to love the graceful curving motion with a chef’s knife, was a cleaver. Mine, if I may interject as one who has tested dozens of recipes, is an inexpensive, square-bladed, all-metal 8-inch Chinese vegetable cleaver.

To a degree, which knife you choose depends on what you cook: Western or Asian. If you cook a lot of Chinese food or local-style dishes with meats cut across the bone (such as chicken hekka), you should have a heavy cleaver — also great for smashing aromatics such as ginger and garlic.

Knives go in and out of fashion. Kawakami said a few years ago, the santoku, a Japanese hybrid knife (the name means “three uses”) was all the rage. Said Sato, a bit cynically, “knife manufacturers are in the business of selling knives so they have to keep coming up with something new.” On the contrary, Sato said, “one set of knives will last you a generation, about 20 years.”

Dinner prep, paring knife

Tips for kitchen knife care:

  • Preferred storage: an open, slotted knife block. These blocks are slotted all the way through, with small feet to lift them off the counter, so moisture can drip away and air can circulate, discouraging rust and mold.
  • Magnetic strip knife racks can scratch knives and be a safety hazard. Likewise, keeping knives in a kitchen drawer with other tools.
  • Never store knives close to the sink; moisture encourages rust. Rusty knives are not ruined but need a good going-over with old-fashioned steel wool.
  • Never soak knives in dishwater; unsafe and bad for the handles. Wash knives by hand with soap, water and an abrasive pad; wipe with clean towel or air-dry.
    Dishwashers can scratch or chip knives and the heat and chemicals are hard on handles.
  • Use a steel to “re-sharpen” your knives every time you use them.
  • Sharpen knives using a honing stone, never those metal-encased tools that look like a pair of sewing machine bobbins; those scratch the blade and don’t give it sufficient access to the stone. Learn how to sharpen a knife from a professional, or take an online tutorial; an improperly sharpened knife is a dull knife. A tip from chef Grant Sato: Look for a professional knife sharpener who also sharpens scissors for salon stylists; they know what they’re doing.
  • The kindest cutting board material is wood. Soft plastic boards are used in professional kitchens. Never use glass, hard acrylic or marble. Sanitize boards frequently with a solution of one gallon water to 1 cup bleach.

Summer’s Smok’in Hot BBQ

Story by Sara Smith
Photos by Jana Morgan
Styling by Melissa Padilla of Opihi Love
Florals by Christina Hartman of Wildheart

Chef Jana McMahon makes a living cooking in other people’s homes, so we grilled her on how best to cook in ours. Here are her tips for summer entertaining.

When it’s too hot to cook indoors, take the party outside. For advice on cooking an effortless and downright delicious summer barbecue, we couldn’t think of anyone better to turn to for help than a private chef. Jana McMahon, owner of Chef Jana McMahon has spent the last 10 years cooking for world leaders, movie stars, tech stars and many others. With her quick wit and vivacious humor, it’s possible she’s never met a stranger. Her approach to food, however, is decidedly more austere. She insists: simple, seasonal, approachable.

A private chef brings in raw ingredients and cooks in a home, providing an interaction that is unique (not to mention a valuable tie to the local food scene for the client.). Here at a private home, Jana prepares a fiery summer feast for friends. Her menu is shopped from local farm stands and largely inspired by what she finds, a process she calls “riffing the market.” From there, the ingredients just need to be “dressed with a light hand.”

“Start with quality, fresh local ingredients and don’t set a menu until you see what’s available,” Jana says. “I had asparagus in mind, but found gorgeous purple peas at the farmers market instead. They inspired my entire crudités platter.”

Cooking around a fire provides a main event, Jana says, because it’s “primal and molecular, it just resonates with us.” Jana fearlessly slaps her steaks directly on hot coals, a method called clinching that she tells us more about in the recipe. She serves it up with homemade mustard, of all things. Sound complicated? It’s not.

Smok'in Summer 2014

“Whipping up sauces and condiments is my forte. They define a dish, elevate it, brighten and compliment,” she tells us. It’s this extra effort with the details that sets her food apart.

Another thing that sets Jana apart is the heart she pours into her work. In addition to her business on Maui, she serves as the culinary and ag consultant for TERI (Training, Education, Research and Innovation), a North County San Diego nonprofit agency that advocates, teaches and houses people touched by autism and developmental disabilities. Jana got the job through cooking for a client on Maui, the agency’s CEO. “I was bringing down organic veggies I’d grown on the farm and I’d just happened to make cheese that day, so I looked like a real freak,” she recalls. She was a keeper, the CEO decided.

Jana spends three to four months a year in California, and in five years she’s helped blossom a seed-to-table program, install organic kitchen gardens at group homes, and turn lawns into urban farms. Under her guidance and insistence upon clean, fresh food, the client obesity rate has dropped from 85% to 15%. The TERI gardens just received USDA organic certification, no easy feat and an amazing commitment to quality for their clients.

A can-do attitude and unfussy approach to cooking infuse Jana’s entertaining style both as a chef and hostess. She shares her secrets with us in the Summer 2014 issue of the magazine.

Find some here.

0040
Menu: Maui Summer Barbecue
“This menu defines everything I am as a chef: fresh, easy, simple, delicious.”

  • Farm stand crudités with compound herb butter and tahini dipping sauce
  • Clinched steaks with homemade mustard
  • Fresh corn polenta
  • Grilled sweet potatoes tossed in honeyed hot sauce
  • Fresh green salad
  • Coconut sticky rice with mango and Kaffir lime

Ten Tips For Home Entertaining:

  • Know your audience and any food allergies that need to be accommodated.
  • Create a vision for the evening (casual vs. formal)
  • Think about color; you don’t want three yellow things on the table.
  • Keep flavor profiles in the same family.
  • Keep it simple: quality ingredients do not need to be fussed with.
  • Don’t do too many things in the oven.
  • Visualize the timing of how things will be prepared. Cooking should be fun; failing to plan ahead takes the fun away.
  • Make sauces ahead of time, and always cook extra.
  • If you offer dessert, make sure it can be pre-made so you don’t have to leave the party to prepare something.
  • For groups larger than 12, do a potluck!

Robert Kanna’s Kaua’i Clams

Robert Kanna encountered his first shellfish growing up on Kaua‘i’s west side. “My dad would go diving and we’d play in the tide pools and salt ponds,”recalls Kanna. His interest in sea creatures piqued, Kanna attended Oregon State University where he earned a degree in fisheries science.

After returning to Hawai‘i, a stint at O‘ahu’s Oceanic Institute led Kanna to a job in aquaculture on Kaua‘i’s west side where he started farming Pacific white shrimp, sold as Kauai Shrimp.

Today Kanna is the farm manager for Sunrise Capital, owners of Kauai Shrimp. With 40 one-acre and 8 half-acre ponds dotting the hot, dry Mānā coastal plain on Kaua‘i’s west side, the farm now raises Kauai Clams.

Mercenaria mercenaria, known as littleneck clams or simply hard clams, occur naturally along North America’s eastern seaboard. The farm starts with 4 mm clam “seeds” from Florida and New Jersey which are shipped to Kaua‘i planted in upwellers and later cages. Salt water pumped from 500-foot deep wells passes continuously over the clams for 11 months, providing them with oxygen and phytoplankton until they’re big enough for market.

Kanna’s crew currently harvests only about 125 pounds a week, which is quickly bought up by local chefs and two Kaua‘i grocers: Ishihara Market in Waimea and both Foodland stores on the island. Outside of Kaua‘i the only place you’ll find these clams is Mama’s Fish House on Maui.

What are Kauai Clams like? Above all, they’re fresh—reaching market just a day or two after being harvested. Kanna’s favorite way to eat them is raw: “No shoyu, no lemon, no nothing,” he says—just straight from the shell. “The flavor is amazing.”

Jaboticaba

Jaboticaba (myrciaria cauliflora)—Although native to Brazil, these fruit trees are found in many backyards in Hawai‘i. The tree is a slow-growing evergreen. It has salmon-colored leaves when young, which turn green as they mature. The tree prefers moist, rich, lightly acidic soil. Its flowers are white and grow directly from its trunk. Jaboticaba may flower and fruit only once or twice a year, but when continuously irrigated it flowers frequently, providing fresh fruit year round in tropical regions.

The fruit is a thick-skinned berry and typically measures three to four centimeters in diameter. Resembling a slip-skin grape, it has sweet, white or rosy pink gelatinous flesh encased in a thick, purple, astringent skin. Embedded within the flesh are one to four large seeds.

Jaboticaba fruit is largely eaten fresh; its popularity has been likened to that of grapes in the United States. The fruit begins to ferment three to four days after harvest, so it is often used to make jams, tarts, strong wines and liqueurs. Due to its extremely short shelf life, fresh Jaboticaba fruit is very rare in markets.