0:08

Our second my tie of the day

0:11

was at Merrimans

0:15

Thank you. Yes. And I

0:17

had heard about this one because our coworker,

0:19

Alex, had been to Hawaii

0:21

recently for his honeymoon. And

0:24

Alex is very um poetic

0:26

with his words and um

0:28

he sent me up wonderful. I was like, we're going to Hawaii,

0:30

suggestions and he sent me a beautifully worded

0:33

list of suggestions and he it

0:36

was so like poetic

0:38

and epic what he said about this my

0:40

tie, and specifically the foam on top of lily

0:43

ki phone. Yeah, Lily COI being passionate

0:45

fuit. Yes. So I was very

0:47

excited to try this Alex had built up

0:50

and I gotta say it met the it

0:52

met the hype. Oh yeah. It

0:54

was one of the prettiest drinks we had all week. I'm

0:57

in the phone really did did

1:01

It added this like layer of tartness that um

1:04

that you don't always I mean, you know, if you get a really

1:06

good punch of lime juice, it can do a similar thing.

1:09

But I think it was that that set off

1:11

my obsession with Lily Koi for

1:13

the rest of the trip. I was just like more passion fruit

1:15

everything all the time. I'm never going to be able to

1:17

find this much of it anywhere ever again, so

1:20

please let me eat it all now. Hello

1:23

and welcome to save our protection of IHR Radio and Stephieia.

1:25

I'm Anny Rees and I'm Lauren Vogelbaum. And

1:27

today we're talking about lilla

1:30

koi u a k a passion fruit.

1:32

Yes, which is exciting.

1:35

We're excited about this one. Oh, yes,

1:37

so excited. It's like my new favorite food.

1:39

Yeah. I had not had

1:41

much experience with passion fruit before we went

1:44

to Hawaii, but while we were in Hawaii, it

1:46

was everywhere which was glorious. It

1:49

was it was that that foam, that

1:51

glorious foam and from the top,

1:54

oh my goodness. Um. But

1:56

yeah, we had this. We had Lita koi and

1:59

sodas and mal sada's, which are

2:01

kind of donut, like a

2:03

filled donut yet so good can

2:05

be filled anyway. Yes, we

2:07

had it in cocktails, and I feel

2:09

like we had it in other dessert forms.

2:12

Yeah, it was in at least two of

2:14

the fancy dessert the Michelle Carruca

2:17

served us over at MW Restaurant in

2:19

Honolulu. Yes, we

2:22

did eat a lot of food on this trip. If it wasn't

2:24

clear, but

2:26

this passion fruit lili quoi is

2:28

also popular, and champs ice cream

2:31

juice, butter wine, shave

2:33

ice. Some cultures believe that after

2:35

taking a bite of passion fruit, you will fall in love with

2:37

the next person that you see, or at the very least

2:39

that's the Internet lore about the

2:42

thing. I was not able to confirm

2:46

a passion in the name, sure,

2:49

and then that's all it took. But yes,

2:52

uh sauces, jellos, cocktails,

2:55

passion fruit wine. I went

2:57

from having to ask one of our interviewees like

2:59

what the heck liloquois is in reference

3:01

to that poem, I do believe um to being

3:04

like flat out obsessed with it within two weeks.

3:06

Um. I don't think I've had any

3:08

particularly exemplary interactions

3:11

with passion fruit here on the mainland,

3:13

but um, you know, I'd like mostly seen

3:15

it as a as a syrup or maybe an ingredient

3:17

in a fruit punch situation, or as an artificial

3:20

flavor. And I didn't even have a good concept of

3:22

like what that flavor was supposed

3:24

to be either, And

3:26

that brings us to our question passion

3:29

fruit, what

3:34

is it? Well, passion

3:37

fruit is the fruit of a flowering

3:39

vine in the passive Flora genus,

3:41

and there are a lot of distinct species

3:43

within this genus, some five hundred of

3:45

which about sixty bear edible

3:48

fruit, of which a handful are

3:50

widely cultivated. The vines

3:52

have these big, glossy, three lobed green

3:55

leaves, and they grow real vigorously. They'll

3:57

climb pretty much as high as you let them, and can

3:59

provide a lot of cover. Some

4:01

species are considered invasive in some places

4:04

in the world. The fruits are round

4:06

to oval and come in two main varieties.

4:09

Purple skinned, which are this like dark like gothy

4:11

purple when they're ripe and about the size of a golf

4:14

ball, and yellow skinned, which are lemon

4:16

yellow and ripe and can reach the size of a

4:18

grapefruit. Both have this like thick

4:20

like leathery skin that encases

4:22

many flat oval seeds, which are

4:25

each individually encased in a

4:27

little like jelly like juice sec. Yeah,

4:29

like if you've ever cut open a pomegranate. Um,

4:31

it's sort of like that, except where the arrows

4:34

or juice secs of a pomegranate are firm

4:36

and dry, the arrows of passion

4:38

fruit are soft and kind of slimy um.

4:41

The arrow's pulp can range in color

4:43

from white to deep gold to bright

4:46

orange, and the seeds are brown to black.

4:48

Both are edible. The seeds are like toasty flavored

4:51

and crunchy, like popcorn um, or

4:53

that's how I find them anyway, And the pulp is

4:55

just bright and sweet heart and

4:57

a little musky and floral and tropical.

5:00

Uh, sort of like a like a more

5:02

complex version of a of a pineapple

5:05

or a more acidic version of guava. If

5:07

you're familiar with that um. You can

5:09

strain the seeds out if you want. The purple ones

5:11

tend to be a little bit sweeter and more frost tolerant,

5:13

the yellow ones more acidic and disease resistant.

5:16

Which one you like and want to grow is

5:18

really really up to you. I can't

5:20

tell you what to do. Nope, that's not what we're

5:22

here for. Nope. Passion fruit

5:25

is a native to South America.

5:28

Why do we call it passion fruit?

5:31

I'm so glad you asked. Catholic

5:36

missionaries Gabolic

5:38

missionaries from Spain in the Brazilian

5:40

Amazon and the sixteenth seventeenth century

5:42

gave it the name floor passions

5:45

passion flower or Florida

5:48

sinco Yagas or Florida

5:50

sinco Chagas flower of

5:52

the five wounds. Okay, okay.

5:54

They thought that the purple flower looked

5:57

like Jesus's five wounds, the

6:00

passion being the passion meaning

6:02

suffering of the Christ, the days

6:04

leading up to his crucifixion, and

6:08

to be fair, I get, I get to be fair.

6:10

Um. These flowers do look wild like. They

6:12

can come in a few colors. The most common

6:14

have these large petals that are that are

6:16

white on their tips and royal blue to purple

6:18

towards the center. And then the spray

6:21

or corona of long ten drils

6:23

over top of the petals coming out from the center

6:25

and then coming up from that center, there's this like tall

6:28

structure with all of these anthers

6:30

and stigmas, you know, like the flowers actual reproductive

6:32

bits. Like these things look like like chi hilly

6:35

sculptures. They're super cool

6:37

looking. Yeah, kind of blow my mind. And

6:40

like the name goes even more even

6:42

beyond the passion. The five

6:45

spikes represent Christ's crown of florins,

6:47

the tin petals symbolic in

6:49

the minds of these Catholic missionaries of

6:52

the tin faithful apostles,

6:54

the three stigmata, the three nails, the

6:56

tendrils of the plant were reminiscent of whips,

6:59

and to the ovary and cup

7:02

the Holy Grail. The missionaries

7:04

used all of this, all of this tied

7:07

up in the anglicized passion fruit,

7:09

and you said, as part of their efforts to convert

7:12

the indigenous population to Christianity.

7:15

Huh, look at this fruit. It's

7:17

all of this stuff that we're trying to convince

7:19

you is the way to be Well,

7:22

I mean, I'd

7:24

never thought about why we call it passion fruit. I just assumed

7:26

it was like, right, it's it's passionate.

7:29

It's a bright flavor. Yeah, I

7:31

don't know, we like it passion. Yeah,

7:33

I had never thought about sixteenth

7:35

century missionaries. Nope, me

7:38

either. Well, here

7:40

we are food

7:43

shows. Um. When passion fruits

7:46

get ripe, they usually dropped to the ground, and even

7:48

commercial productions will usually harvest them

7:51

by collecting the fruit by hand from

7:53

the ground. Um. The skin of the fruit

7:55

will go sort of like dented or wrinkly after

7:57

they drop, and that's when they're the sweetest. Dented

8:00

frinkly equals good. Yes,

8:04

Chef Allen Wong, who we did interview,

8:06

but we did not ask him about passion fruit. Silly

8:08

us. Yeah, he told Honolulu Magazine.

8:11

Visitors always ask me what's the one thing

8:13

they should do before they leave Hawaii. I say,

8:15

go hiking and look for lili quoi, crack

8:17

with your palms between your knees and eat

8:20

them. There's nothing else like it.

8:22

That's a great tip, that is. Yeah.

8:25

And you and you can split them open, yeah, with with

8:27

your with your hands. They get a little bit messy, they might squish

8:29

out. I think using a knife to

8:31

open one is the preferred

8:34

cleaner method. But if you

8:36

don't mind a little bit of a mess, yeah,

8:39

go for it. Go for it. M What

8:42

about the nutrition, Well, passion

8:44

fruit is pretty good for you. Lots of vitamin C and

8:46

a smattering of other micronutrients, tons

8:49

of fiber, like even in the strained juice,

8:51

which is why the juice is so thick. In

8:53

the juicing industry, the seeds are often discarded

8:56

as waste, but they're now being investigated

8:58

for being like pressed for their oil as

9:00

a potential value added by product

9:04

um. The seed oil is also pretty good for you, Lots

9:06

of like good fats and nutrients UM and apparently

9:08

has a slightly floral or fruity

9:10

smell like the fruit, so fun

9:13

there um. The flowers and stems

9:15

and leaves are also consumed in a tea or

9:17

tincture form, more as an herbal medicine than

9:19

is like snacks um as. They have a

9:21

slight sedative effect that has been

9:23

researched as an anti anxiety medication

9:25

and sleep aid. UM. It's apparently on the

9:27

scale uh somewhat less effective

9:30

than like valerian root, but it does

9:32

rank Yeah how interesting.

9:35

UM. Extracts of the peels

9:37

are also being investigated for medicinal purposes.

9:39

They contain antioxidants and have been shown

9:41

to have some like anti inflammatory properties,

9:44

which in small studies have helped

9:46

folks control asthma and blood pressure.

9:49

UM and extracts of the fruit have been

9:51

found to have decent antimicrobial

9:53

properties in the mouth when taken

9:55

orally after dentistry UM

9:58

and a more pleasant taste than herbal remedies for

10:01

use in a developing countries. Oh

10:04

nice, Yeah,

10:06

well, we do have some numbers for you, we

10:09

do. Um. Though native

10:11

to the America's passion fruit and passion flowers

10:14

are grown all over the world and China

10:16

run India, Southeast Asia,

10:19

Australia, in the whole dayg

10:21

rest of Oceania, throughout tropical and

10:23

subtropical parts of Africa, and in Spain,

10:25

Portugal and Belgium.

10:27

UM. Brazil, though, is the largest producer

10:30

of the fruit. Over fifty percent of

10:32

the world's production happens there, and I've seen numbers

10:34

up to um

10:36

but most of that stays in Brazil.

10:39

Um Markets for both the fruit and extracts

10:41

for personal care products are growing and a

10:43

supply is currently struggling to meet demand.

10:46

We just missed the second annual

10:49

Mauie literally Ki festival. It

10:51

was on September, put

10:55

on by an Apuli farmers Market.

10:58

Maybe next year, Maybe next year. I

11:00

have so many things to return for let's

11:04

you know, let's just that's

11:06

a good problem to have. Oh yes,

11:09

yes, Anyway, until

11:12

then, in this very episode, we're

11:14

going to dig into the history of aliquois. But first

11:16

we're going to take a quick break for word from our sponsor,

11:28

and we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you.

11:31

So we humans

11:33

not like me and Anny, have known

11:36

that purple varieties of passion fruit originated

11:38

in subtropical parts of South America,

11:40

like round about modern day Brazil. Uh.

11:43

No, one's sure entirely how

11:45

the yellow variety developed as

11:47

a hybrid as a mutation

11:51

mysteries of history, oh my gosh. But

11:53

it seems in any case that native peoples have

11:55

been collecting and cultivating passion fruit and

11:57

passion flowers as food and medicine

12:00

for like a couple of thousand years throughout

12:03

the Americas, like like from South America

12:05

all the way up through as far north

12:07

as the modern day U. S State of Virginia.

12:10

Um. But unlike some other crops

12:12

that like immediately went abroad

12:15

after contact, passion fruit doesn't

12:17

seem to have made it out of the America's for a really

12:19

long time. Um. Maybe because it's

12:21

like so highly perishable and really

12:23

stubbornly tropical or subtropical.

12:26

But yeah, Uh. Colonists and traders

12:28

did introduce seeds of the purple type

12:30

to Australia in the early eighteen hundreds,

12:33

and then from Australia to Hawaii in

12:35

eighteen eighty, where it became a popular

12:38

home garden plant. The story

12:40

goes that when passion fruit first arrived in Hawaii,

12:42

it was planted in the Lilliquois District of

12:45

Maui and the name stuck. The

12:47

purple variety was uh

12:50

introduced or perhaps reintroduced by

12:52

white settlers into the South and central

12:54

mainland United States in eighteen eighties

12:57

seven, and then to India

12:59

and parts of a in Asia in the early nineteen

13:01

hundreds, into a few gardens in Europe.

13:04

Um And meanwhile it was spreading the

13:06

purple type like whoe in Hawaii.

13:09

UM. By the nineteen thirties, wild

13:11

lilliquoi could be found on all

13:13

of the Hawaiian islands. Yes,

13:16

uh and though the yellow passion fruit

13:18

arrived a bit later than the purple variety to Hawaii,

13:21

UM, it really took

13:23

off there in the

13:26

University of Hawaii picked lilliquoi as

13:28

one of the most promising crops. At

13:30

the time they were only about five acres.

13:33

Seven years later, twelve acres

13:36

of primarily yellow passion fruit were

13:38

up and running. The industry

13:41

was there to stay. The focus then

13:43

was on quick frozen lilliquoit juice.

13:46

Earlier in the nineteen forties, someone that history

13:48

knows only as Mr.

13:50

Hayley tried to market and sell

13:53

canned passion fruit juice, but he was ultimately

13:55

unsuccessful and closed up shop after

13:57

World War Two. In the nineteen fifties,

14:00

one Knoll Fujimoto selected yellow

14:03

passion fruit cultivars until he arrived at

14:05

the Knowles Special Variety,

14:07

which I just I love that name. Special

14:10

really shot the kernel on that one. But these were

14:13

hardier and produced more sellable fruit

14:15

than any other existing cultivar.

14:18

Along the same lines, two hybrids of purple

14:20

and yellow passion fruit developed at a research center

14:22

in Queensland, Australia had a higher

14:24

yield and fruit bearing window a longer

14:26

fruit bearing window than their purple passion

14:29

fruit predecessor, and these were

14:31

widely adopted in Queensland and New South

14:33

Wales. Going back

14:35

a little bit um and back to South America,

14:38

the yellow passion fruit started to gain more traction

14:40

in the nineteen fifties. Venezuela

14:43

fell in love with it in nineteen fifty four

14:45

ish and began trying to improve the yield

14:47

for products like passion fruit ice cream, juice

14:50

and uh, this passion fruit rum cocktail that

14:52

came into bottle. I think it's canned now anyway.

14:55

Going back to North America, when Julia

14:57

Morton of Florida requested seeds

14:59

of good strains for both purple and yellow

15:01

passion fruits from the Queensland Department of

15:03

Agriculture and Stock. Yes, she

15:06

received them um and once received

15:08

Morton then gave them to people willing to

15:10

experiment. Um. A yellow vine

15:12

flourished in Pine Crest, Florida, and

15:14

birds carried seeds that later fruited

15:16

to the nearby ish Everglades. She

15:19

found reports of passion fruit growing in coconut

15:22

grove and land lakes, also in

15:24

Florida. If you're unfamiliar, I've been to those places.

15:26

I know. I had to look up all these places like that

15:28

makes sense. They're all in this kind of Yeah, they're all

15:30

basically in the same area. Um and

15:33

uh. And some vendors in those areas started

15:35

selling the seeds as well. Around

15:37

the same time, San Diego boasted

15:39

small purple passion fruit plantations

15:42

that they would turn into both um fresh

15:44

produce and into juice. However,

15:47

Yeah, it just wasn't really very popular

15:50

in the mainland. United States. Two

15:52

officials for the United States Agricultural

15:54

Department authored two reports

15:57

on the problems of pollination of the yellow

15:59

variety. Problems in their mind, that would

16:01

make juice extraction from the fruit. Um.

16:05

Yeah, the yellow kind is is a little bit pickier.

16:07

In a lot of cases, you have to cross pollinated with something

16:09

else, and so yeah, it's got a little

16:12

bit more going on. Um.

16:15

So these these officials put out a call

16:17

saying, anyone or any entity

16:20

that wants to experiment with passion fruit to

16:22

improve yield and disease resistance, we

16:24

have samples available for you. Minute

16:27

made yes that one

16:30

answered the call in they

16:33

had a test colony of yellow

16:35

passion fruit, but two years later

16:38

they threw in the towel reasoning quote. The

16:40

yields are not as large as in more tropical

16:42

areas where the plant remains productive all

16:45

year round. Our plants

16:47

went out of production during the winter season. During

16:50

the windy spring months of March and April, the vines

16:52

are badly damaged and no flowers

16:54

are set until sometime in May. We also

16:56

found that the passion fruit were expensive

16:58

to harvest. The fruits to fall on the ground

17:00

and sometimes it gets hung up in the vines. There

17:03

is a continual collection of small quantities

17:05

of fruit throughout the bearing year.

17:08

Special equipment is needed to obtain the juice

17:10

from the fruit without bits of the calics showing

17:12

up as objectionable. Black specs.

17:15

This equipment is costly. It can only be justified

17:18

when a large all email fruit is being

17:20

processed. I

17:23

like your dramatic reading of that. I'm

17:26

not sure if they were quite as I mean, maybe

17:28

they weren't that frustrated. Maybe they were like, dang

17:30

it, dang everything

17:32

about this heck and thing. I like to

17:35

imagine that people bring the drama to what

17:37

seemed to be relatively boring.

17:42

Is not boring to me. But you know, dry

17:44

ish perhaps, yes, as

17:46

dry as the fruit of the vines. Exactly,

17:51

Lauren. Meanwhile,

17:54

nest Lee's r Indeed apartment. Yes

17:56

that Nestlee UM also got in on passion

17:58

fruit research. In five um

18:00

they was passion fruit as one of the European

18:03

markets three insufficiently known

18:05

subtropical fruits with the greatest potential

18:08

for processing for juice. Insufficiently

18:11

known. Yeah, I hope that's what would come up if

18:13

somebody was like trying to look me up at a computer, like

18:16

an FBI agent and a Reese insufficiently

18:19

known and it's a picture of me looking over my

18:21

shoulder with my eyes narrow, squinty.

18:23

Yeah, yeah, you know, in

18:27

the nineties, as part of a series of children's

18:29

books. We're telling European fairy tales in Hawaii.

18:32

Jack and the bean stock was reimagined as

18:34

kika and the litliquoi vine.

18:37

Oh well, indeed, um,

18:40

we do have some more for you. That about wraps

18:42

up our history portion. It does. But

18:45

yes, we will be back with more about local

18:47

produce in Hawaii after we

18:49

get back from one more quick break for a word from

18:51

our sponsor. We're

19:02

back, Thank you sponsored, Yes, thank you. So

19:04

all of this got me to thinking why

19:08

did lili quoi take off in Hawaii

19:10

and not in the mainland US Other

19:12

than the history, the taste, the

19:14

climate, and all the other stuff that we

19:17

just went over. Well, sure, but it could have hypothetically

19:19

been grown more extensively in Florida

19:21

or California. Um. And you know, certainly

19:24

in those places, Uh, people

19:26

didn't come up with a with a local name

19:28

for it and embrace it in the way that it's been embraced.

19:30

Yeah. Right, And and a part of it

19:33

is that that wanting to eat local,

19:35

that wanted to support Hawaiian

19:37

farmers and producers, and tourism

19:40

actually plays a role as well. Hawaii

19:43

has such a wealth of produce

19:45

and since it is a tourist destination. There

19:48

is an expectation among tourists

19:50

to experience the foods and drinks that they

19:52

associate with Hawaii, including

19:56

passion food and things made with passion

19:58

food. Here's Sean Joe Lamb

20:00

Luca Yellow, the director of Mythology

20:02

and Spirits Education with Southern Glazers,

20:04

Wine and Spirits of Hawaii. We

20:07

we do have some really respectable

20:09

craft bars here, but for the most

20:11

part, people that are visiting from

20:14

you know, Atlanta or Chicago

20:16

or Michigan, they don't want

20:18

like a Sasarak. They want

20:21

my Tide. They want to feel like they're on vacation. They

20:23

want to taste of labors of white. They want passion

20:25

fruit and guava and you know, locally

20:28

made spirits. She

20:32

also spoke about the creativity

20:35

that trying to buy local

20:37

and seasonal fosters when it comes to designing

20:40

menus and um and just experimented with what's

20:42

available. The produce is

20:44

great to use, but it is very seasonal, so

20:47

then you just change your menu with the different

20:49

seasons, which is fun too, because then we have

20:51

light che season that's here now, mango season

20:54

is right about to erupt, and all

20:56

the trees are just like just full

20:58

to the brim because we've had a lot of rain before

21:01

the season, which is great, uh,

21:03

but it is kind of hard to source

21:05

and if you can't really get it locally, it's maybe

21:07

not the best to use. So then you

21:10

just wait for the season and and then you work

21:12

with what you have. Why

21:15

is his dedication to supporting local producers

21:18

goes deeper back to that responsibility

21:20

our interviewees talked about in our first episode

21:23

of this mini series, because it also ties into

21:25

sustainability. As an island,

21:28

Hawaii's concerns around sustainability

21:30

are a bit different than those of the mainland.

21:32

When you're at least two thousand miles away from anything,

21:35

everything you ship is going to be expensive

21:37

and it's going to hurt the economy in the long term

21:40

because by outsourcing products, you're also

21:42

outsourcing jobs. And

21:44

sustainability is is a buzz word right

21:47

now, but it is not new at

21:49

all in Hawaii. Um uh Kiloha

21:51

Domingo touched on this. He's a He's a

21:53

Hawaiian cultural practitioner who teaches

21:56

people about Hawaii's native cultures through,

21:58

among other things, cooking local

22:01

first has been a strong model for

22:04

you know, I want to say, going fifteen

22:06

years now, although there

22:09

are so many times when it's so much easier U to go step

22:11

into Costco, you know, and it's right

22:13

there at your fingertips. But when

22:15

you understand and you appreciate

22:18

and you get to know that farmer

22:20

that grew that produce, when you get

22:22

to know that farmer that he

22:25

put his his good energy, his money

22:27

into the soil, into

22:29

the implements, into everything

22:31

from from seed from

22:33

July which is the planting media for our tarot

22:36

plant um. You know, when you put

22:38

that Julie in the ground, it's

22:41

you know, it's a part

22:43

of you. And that that sustainability

22:45

just flows, It comes naturally.

22:49

And I think the more the more people

22:51

understand that, the less likely we are

22:53

to go to Costco. We're

22:56

going to have a whole episode around

22:58

sustainability soon, yes, we

23:00

promise, yes, But in the meantime, we

23:03

would love to hear from you listeners.

23:06

You can contact us via email at hello

23:08

at saber pod dot com. You can

23:10

also find us on social media. We are at

23:12

saver Pod on Twitter, Instagram,

23:15

and Facebook. We do hope to hear from

23:17

you. Thank you so much to our super

23:19

producers Dylan Fagan and Andrew Howard

23:22

are Executive producer, Christopher Hasiotis

23:24

and our interviewees, and also Michelle

23:26

McGowan, Rice of the Hawaii Food and Wine Festival,

23:29

Don Sakamotapaiva of Put It on My

23:31

Plate, and Joy Goto and Maria Hartfield

23:33

of the Hawaii Visitors Center and Convention

23:35

Bureau for putting us in touch with

23:38

those interviewees. Sabor

23:40

Is production of iHeart Radio and Stuff Media.

23:42

For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, you can visit the iHeart

23:45

Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

23:47

you listen to your favorite shows. Thank

23:49

you for our special recording assistance today

23:51

from j J. Paseway. Thanks to you for listening,

23:53

and we hope that lots more good things are coming your way