Local Dishes

1. Poi

   Poi (pounded taro paste)

   Usage

   It is eaten with the fingers, and its thickness is named by how many fingers it takes to scoop — one-finger poi is the thickest. Served alongside a lūʻau plate or a plate lunch; English menus spell it "poi" exactly as Hawaiian does

   Grammar Note

   ʻai means food, especially vegetable food as opposed to iʻa (meat or fish), and often refers to poi specifically

2. Paʻi ʻai

   Paʻi ʻai (hard pounded taro, undiluted)

   Usage

   It is the stage before poi, sold as a solid block at farmers' markets and poi mills; you thin it with water at home to make poi

3. Kalo

   Kalo (taro)

   Usage

   It is the raw material for poi, paʻi ʻai and laulau, and is sold under the name kalo at farmers' markets

4. ʻUala

   ʻUala (sweet potato)

   Usage

   On a lūʻau plate it usually appears as the purple "Okinawan sweet potato," which is what English menus call it

5. ʻUlu

   ʻUlu (breadfruit)

   Usage

   It is steamed, roasted, fried, or milled into flour for bread and sweets, and turns up at farmers' markets and at food trucks that advertise it by the Hawaiian name

   Grammar Note

   ʻulu (breadfruit) and ulu (to grow) are separate words — the ʻokina distinguishes them

6. Laulau

   Laulau (meat or fish wrapped in leaves and steamed)

   Usage

   A lūʻau staple that also shows up on plate lunches; English menus spell it "laulau" as well

   Grammar Note

   A reduplication of lau (leaf)

7. Puaʻa kālua

   Kālua pig (pork baked in an underground oven)

   Usage

   Pork baked all day in an imu (underground oven) — the centrepiece of a lūʻau, served shredded. English menus write "kalua pig" or "kalua pork," dropping the ʻokina and the kahakō

   Grammar Note

   Hawaiian puts the modifier after the noun, so this order is the regular one; the English-influenced order kālua puaʻa is also widely seen

8. Lūʻau

   Lūʻau (young taro tops cooked in coconut cream)

   Usage

   English menus list it as "squid lūʻau" or "chicken lūʻau." It must never be eaten raw — the leaves hold calcium-oxalate needles and are cooked for a long time

9. Haupia

   Haupia (coconut pudding)

   Usage

   Cut into squares and set at the edge of a lūʻau plate; English menus spell it "haupia" too

   Grammar Note

   The pia in this recipe is Polynesian arrowroot (Tacca leontopetaloides); the beer word pia, borrowed from English, is a different word with the same spelling

10. Kūlolo

    Kūlolo (steamed taro and coconut pudding)

    Usage

    Dense and sticky, closer to a firm fudge than a custard; sold in blocks at farmers' markets on Kauaʻi and in Hāna

11. Pipi kaula

    Pipi kaula (Hawaiian dried beef)

    Usage

    A paniolo (Hawaiian cowboy) preserve that is also served as a pūpū in bars

    Grammar Note

    The standard spelling is the two-word pipi kaula; English menus, by contrast, usually print it closed up as "pipikaula"

12. ʻInamona

    ʻInamona (roasted kukui nut relish)

    Usage

    The traditional seasoning stirred into poke; menus write "ʻinamona poke"

13. ʻOpihi

    ʻOpihi (limpets)

    Usage

    Eaten raw in the shell with salt, and the most prized item on a lūʻau table. Picking them is notoriously lethal — they are called "the fish of death" because gatherers are swept off the rocks — so buy, do not gather

14. Limu

    Limu (edible seaweed)

    Usage

    It is mixed into poke or salted and served as a small side; menus show it as "limu poke"

    Grammar Note

    The word is broad: on its own limu does not specifically mean edible seaweed

15. Poke

    Poke (cubed raw fish, seasoned)

    Usage

    Sold by weight at supermarket delis: cubed ʻahi tuna dressed with soy sauce, sesame oil, onion, limu and ʻinamona. It is the most everyday dish in Hawaiʻi that still carries a Hawaiian name. English keeps the spelling "poke"; "poke bowl" means the same fish served over rice

    Grammar Note

    Poke is a verb meaning "to slice, cut crosswise into pieces"; the food name is a modern development of that verb

16. Kāmano lomi

    Lomi salmon (salted salmon worked with tomato and onion)

    Usage

    It comes as a cold side on a lūʻau plate; English menus call it "lomi salmon" or "lomi lomi salmon"

17. Pūpū

    Pūpū (appetizer, bar snack)

    Usage

    Restaurant menus in Hawaiʻi still head their starter page "Pūpū," and the word turns up on happy-hour signs

    Grammar Note

    The first sense of the same spelling is "general name for marine and land shells". Dropping the kahakō gives a different word

18. Hōʻiʻo

    Hōʻiʻo (edible fern shoots)

    Usage

    The young fronds are eaten raw, usually with freshwater shrimp or salted salmon. Sold in bundles at Hilo and Hāmākua markets and served as a small side at poke counters; in English it is more often called "warabi"

19. Mea ʻono puaʻa

    Manapua (Chinese steamed pork bun)

    Usage

    This is the char siu bao brought by 19th-century Chinese labourers, now sold steamed at convenience stores and manapua shops. Shop signs almost always use the shortened Hawaiian-English form "manapua"

    Grammar Note

    "manapua" is a contraction of the three-word "mea ʻono puaʻa"

20. Imu

    Imu (underground oven)

    Usage

    Heated stones line a pit, banana leaves and food are layered in, earth is heaped over the top and it steams for hours. At commercial lūʻau the opening of the imu is staged as the evening's centrepiece

    Grammar Note

    Samoan umu and Māori umu are cognates, but the everyday Māori word for an earth oven is hāngī, a different word entirely

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