Islandwyse

Sharing field notes from connecting purpose and restorative futures—bringing overlooked knowledge back into practice. Current deep dives into ancestry research and wellness curriculum work shared with founding members.

As we’re witnessing farmers and producers across Hawaiʻi impacted by recent flooding and ongoing systems failures, it’s becoming even clearer how much stronger support our local food systems need right now.

Hawai’ian Taro’s History Goes Back a Millennium. So often we look at food as satisfying to the hunger or taste buds and that’s it. Taro is completely different. It’s been a source of nutrition for centuries. On one end of the spectrum, it has been used as a first food for babies. On the other, the Taro plant is a marketing symbol used throughout numerous businesses throughout the Polynesian triangle today. After making Taro teething biscuits for my toddler from my homemade Taro powder, I learned that Hawai’ian Kalo flour or Taro flour had been a subsidy and export in the late 1800s, supplying the medical and baby food industry as a health food! With this history in mind, I created these recipes for a nutritious gluten-free diet, utilizing our treasured heirloom Hawai’ian plants. Most of the recipes are vegan, but most importantly they are for you to personalize and make them your own. Enjoy them! 

The collapse of Hawaii's tourism economy was not without warning. Over-burdening one aspect of a over-dependent island economy is bound to burn out at some point and the farming community was voicing this issue for decades.

See what we are doing along with the Aloha Connects Innovation.