YEAR OF INGREDIENTS

In 2018 I chronicled a different local Hawaiʻi ingredient every day on Instagram. Each profile includes a few facts, cooking suggestions and sourcing details.

Find the completed project on Instagram @yearofingredients

Year of Ingredients

2018

In 2018, I created “The Year of Ingredients.” The goal was simple: Find 365 ingredients grown and/or made in Hawaiʻi and write about them on Instagram. I had just moved to Honolulu from San Francisco the year before and had only begun to scratch the surface. on Hawaiʻi ‘s food scene. The day before New Year’s Eve, my friend Windy Chien surprised me by showing up in Honolulu and gifting me one of her famous knots. She told me about a project she had just completed called, “The Year of Knots.” Every day, for a year, she committed to learning a new knot and posted an image of it on Instagram. The knot she gave me was called a star knot, a knot she admittedly had such a hard time learning she had to watch YouTube tutorials to figure it out. As we sipped glasses of wine, I marveled at its beauty, but hadn’t yet realized its significance.

The next morning, I sprung out of bed knowing what I wanted to do. I would create “The Year of Ingredients!” It would be just what I needed to commit to my passion for local food on the highest level, in order to become the expert I wanted to be.

Not only did I learn about ingredients I’d never heard of, I also formed relationships with local farmers, toured farms and discovered farmers markets statewide. The project also helped me establish a daily writing routine. Sometimes on the mornings my internal forecast was cloudy and grey, writing my daily post perked me up.

I found that there are way more than 365 ingredients growing in Hawaiʻi. We can grow practically anything here with the right location and a strong enough desire. More small farms are stepping up to this challenge every day. Crops such as peppers, once notoriously difficult to grow, are at farmers markets and in locally made hot sauces, for example.

I enjoyed hanging out with the student farmers working the GoFarm program in Waimānalo, sampling ingredients ripped right out of the ground in front of me. Bryan and Natalie from De la Mesa Farm, Priscilla from Vida Farm, and Jacey and Miles from Roots and Remedies Farm showed me how rewarding it is to be stewards of the land and to grow your own food.

I learned about new crop varieties being developed to thrive in Hawaiʻi’s growing conditions at The Variety Showcase, I visited MAʻO Organic Farms, spent hours photographing flowers and vegetables at Counter Culture Farm, learned about canoe crops at the Mānoa Heritage Center, attended farm-to-table dinners at Mohala Farms, sourced ingredients from all corners of the island from my laptop thanks to Farm Link Hawaiʻi, and got to taste freshly harvested honeycomb from Tolentino Honey Company. I also learned about the struggles of processing meat and raising chickens in Hawaiʻi and the need for harvesting wild axis deer, boar and taʻape to help manage invasive species.

Hawaiʻi’s farmers, ranchers, fisherman, and small business owners generously shared their bounty and knowledge with me. Their dedication to nurturing the land and waters of Hawaiʻi goes beyond simply talking about sustainable practices, it is their life’s work. Getting to know them and their stories was the most rewarding part of the experience.

After a year of hunting for ingredients I now have a good understanding of what is available locally and where to source what. Most of all, I have an insurmountable feeling of gratitude for the people who produce them.

The Year of Ingredients inspired me to keep searching, shopping and eating local.

I hope it did for you too.

–Sarah (A.K.A. The Healthy Locavore)