One More of Brandon's Blogs

Day 15
May 4, 2008

Aloha!

Today, we visited the Hamakua Macadamia Nut Company. Hamakua Macadamia Nuts are grown on the lush, green slopes of the Big Island of Hawaii's four mountain ranges. They were all grown using environmentally, friendly practices without pesticides. Macadamia nuts fall to the ground when they are ready and farmers collect them when they are ready for processing. i got to try to crack the Macadamia nut using 300 lb of pressure and they were very good. I like them raw. Macadamia nuts are good for you and are high in good fat which helps reduce bad cholesterol levels. They also are good in vitamin E., which protects against cancer and other diseases. We tried samples and they were good.

During the evening, we attended the Island Breeze Lu'au held at the beachfront and we all dressed up in matching Hawaiian outfits. When we were greeted, my mom and my sister, Abegail, received fresh leis to wear, and my dad and I received kukui nuts lei also to wear. Then, we had our picture taken, and we got one of the best seats...the front seats. There was a wonderful dinner included full of authentic Hawaiian food; poi, a mixed taro root, and kalua pig, cooked under the sand with leaves, and lau-lau puaa (pig) a piece of pork wrapped in taro leaf and wrapped again in banana leaf and steamed in an imu (the place where a kalua puaa is cooked or maybe they steamed it in a pot). It's really good, and there was even live entertainment! There was a fireknife dancer, and hula dancers, and other dancers. It was really fun. I wish I could bring you all, but we didn't have enough money because it is very expensive!

Mahalo!