Share your favorite breadfruit creations at the Cooking Contest.

A breadfruit Cooking Contest will rock taste buds on Saturday, September 24 during the morning hours of the Ho’oulu Ka ‘Ulu – Breadfruit Festival at the Amy B.H. Greenwell Ethnobotanical Garden in Captain Cook. Contest entrants are encouraged to submit an entry form with recipe(s) via e-mail or snail mail to the addresses provided on the forms, but entries will be accepted until 8:00 am on the morning of the festival. Judging will take place first thing in the morning on the day of the festival. Please be sure to visit the website and carefully read contest schedule, rules and regulations and what time to drop off your entry.

"Celebrating ‘Ulu" Fine Art Contest Results

On Thursday, August 11, 2011 the Donkey Mill Art Center in Holualoa hosted an artist reception and educational program that featured ten finalists in the Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu – Revitalizing Breadfruit in Hawai‘i Art Contest. The well-attended reception began with a potluck dinner with numerous breadfruit dishes and other locally grown foods, highlighting the culinary arts of chef Olelo pa‘a Ogawa of Glow Hawaii. Artists and 'ulu enthusiasts had a chance to mingle in an open atmosphere of food, culture, and agricuture. After the meal, Andrea Dean and Craig Elevitch presented the Ho‘oulu ka ‘Ulu project and showed video clips of Hawaiian cultural experts relating the culture and history of breadfruit in Hawai‘i. Then well-known Holualoa artist Hiroki Morinoue shared his thoughts about each of the ten contest entries from a teacher's perspective. Finally, Gerald Lucent of Donkey Mill Art Center announced the winner of the contest, "The Gift of Kū" by Caren Loebel-Fried.

Dozens contributed to processing the produce, including these keiki who grated coconut for coconut milk.

Well…we did it! Planning for the first Community Harvest Hawaii was an exercise in trust. We were planning a large community food event where we didn’t know anything in advance. Important things such as how much food we would have to work with, what kind of food, and how many people were coming to eat, were all unknown! But in true Kohala community fashion everyone pitched in, we had a LOT of food and everyone got to eat and enjoy.

Steve and Lark Willey at Ka 'Ohi Nani Farm in Waimea

“Ka ‘Ohi Nani” means The Beautiful Harvest, and Ka ‘Ohi Nani Farm in Waimea is very aptly named. Tucked into one of the many little lanes near Pu’u Kapu, and just off the main road on the Hamakua side of Waimea, the farm is as beautiful as the name implies. Owners Steve and Lark Willey are as dedicated to beauty as they are to the fruit of their labors.

The first sign of beauty in the garden is a six year old rose vine covered arbor entryway that serves as the portal to the official ‘garden,’ fields, and farm buildings. After parking we walked to the recently finished processing shed. Outfitted with a center table, shelving, counters, and sinks with running water, this is where all the produce is first brought to be cleaned and packed for distribution. 

Ka'u coffee has developed a reputation as a high-quality coffee, and continues the tradition of coffee as a value-added crop for Hawai'i.

Even though hundreds of potential new crops have been introduced to Hawai‘i during the past 200 years, few continue to be economically sustainable for family farms. This is due to the relatively high cost of labor, land, and materials in Hawai‘i, which gives an advantage to cheap imports. One way family farms can remain economically viable is to vertically integrate their operations, i.e., grow, harvest, process, package, and sell in ways that add value to their products. When planned and executed well, the time, effort, and resources put into adding value can increase profits along with revenue.