A hot large wok on a fire with the family gathered already asking when the tasty dish that quickly simmers will be done. Some may call this dish sukiyaki, however that wouldn’t be correct, since it is called hekka. The word hekka comes from the word sukiyaki in hiroshima dialect and has been a long time favorite hot pot of many families and in another dialect can mean a farmers blade. Often times the way families gather around a hot pot brings memories of family moments with their little plates that all dig in the pot of nice flavored ingredients. Its an old time favorite for sure from the plantation days.
In the rainy season the hot vegetables and meats would be delicious with a serving of hot rice. Especially near the mountainside on the ridges where the clouds would stick around for awhile. There was many vegetables that were available on a regular basis with even a produce man who would drive around the different camps. You could tell when a family was ready to make some hekka with the large amounts of vegetables that were purchased from the truck and taken in doors fast! The dish would create a large family sized meal that could feed plenty of people on a budget. Eating this food was more then to fill your stomach. A family that gathered in the mountain areas of Hilo side near the Hamakua Coast had told me a story about chicken hekka. They said that the importance of the dish is not just its origins, but its meaning as a local staple. A staple food of gathering that runs through the blood of families that passes any restrictions of adult or child (keiki) and helps connect the family with food without concentrating on what is different but what is shared. They said that it might have its variations of soupy hekka for the family who enjoyed their rice or stir fry hekka for eating with a variety of foods, but at the end of the day everyone around the table can say its a happy time spent with cherished friends and family. Kama'aina (Hawaii Residents) will be reminded of the saltiness in the dish with a strong flavor that lasts in a hekka. The must haves is the shoyu sauce mixture that flavors the broth with its meat flavoring. This is combined with a variety of ingredients, but the classic is: chicken breast, light shoyu, sugar cane sugar, sesame seed oil, ginger, carrots, sweet onions, mushrooms, bamboo shoots, watercress, and long rice noodles. Many people who cooked the dish in Hawaii never measured the ingredients and always tasted the dish till it was perfect for their family. If anyone looks for Hekka in Japan they will not find it, since it doesn't exist at all! It also has changed so much from Sukiyaki with its cooking being done with a chinese wok, Hawaii ingredients, and plantation tastes... it really has become a dish of the Hawaiian islands. It brings back many plantation memories and the hardships people faced back in the day. It roots locals deeply as a Hawaii dish that has its own history attached to it from every family that settled on the islands during the plantation days. Back in those days it was seen as a survival dish that could stretch ingredients from their homeland, but local style… and overtime it turned into a multicultural dish that would change based on the area it was made and what ingredients were to be used from the ice boxes or luxurious refrigerators later on. It was also a nutritious dish that families would eat to make sure the family was eating right. Back then it was rude to not try the food made at family homes, so even more so if the family was letting you try their family hekka recipe. The taste of each family of those areas was really their secret approval of letting a person eating it on their their style of flavor. While some maybe looking for their Japanese roots in this dish they will slowly realize through the many variations that it was a dish for all races and places of the people who lived in Hawaii that are passing on local culture to the future generations with their food. Cooked at home is usually where hekka is found, but it is slowly making its way back into restaurants from the old being new again. The competition is difficult with many Japanese Hot Pot Nabes to compete with as well as ethnic Sukiyaki that differs from local sukiyaki. Hekka is not heard of very often and is quickly disappearing amongst families who have not taken the time to learn their families secret recipes, so it is apart of the family recipe book or card collection to make sure that the hekka recipe of a surname family be preserved. Even the term of across the bone cuts of chicken to the butched is not common when a package says Chicken Hekka Chicken Cuts. Hawaii Hekka Varieties A Hekka dish consists of several elements: the sauce, the broth, and the method of cooking. The typical chunked meats are used for this dish are: chicken breast, chicken thigh, chicken quarters, boneless short ribs, pork loin, fried tofu, or daikon radish. The most common is the chicken thigh is used for the standard chicken hekka at home. Chicken Hekka Sauce. Many hot pots take a stock and throw in the magic sauce that adds much needed seasonings to the liquid. The base for the chicken hekka usually has light shoyu, dark shoyu, fish sauce shoyu, oyster sauce shoyu, sweet shoyu, ponzu or citrus shoyu. And then the limited cuts of chicken were what you would expect with: chicken wings, chicken drumsticks, chicken breast, chicken thighs, chicken carcass, and just about anything else on the chicken would be used. Mountain Hekka Foraging. A type of Hekka that was eaten by those who had left over meats or sauces that depended on foraging and home gardens. It featured plenty of greens, roots, and pickles all into a family friendly meal. Noodles were not always available, so it would be common to have thin sliced vegetables at times to replace them. With a variety of ingredients now the dish features mushrooms as well. Some of these msuhrooms and vegetables were watercress, green onion stalks, won bok, shiitake mushrooms, enoki mushrooms, alii mushrooms, daikon, daikon sprouts, bean sprouts, carrots, pickled ginger, pickled onions. Fishhead Hekka Fish leftovers. In order to have no waste their is a specialty Hekka from the Big Island in the Southern areas near the ocean. It’s made with a fish bones and fish heads with seaweed for a hekka that was eaten fresh. The big island has a variety of deep sea fish that were used for fish soups and many of those soups made their way to Hekka as a seasonal delicacy of fishermen with lots of vegetables. Not anyone could make it, since some fish had specific cleaning with cut gills, gut cleaning, and ways to prepare the fish before boiling. There are some Hawaii pond fish that were used as well on Molokai. Some seafoods used are: ahi tuna head, red snapper head, salmon head, bone fish head (Oio), crab shells, shrimp shells, clams.
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