Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia · Volume 07, The Reef, the Earth Oven and the Girmit Table
Vakalolo
iTaukei Fiji
Illustration
- Researched
- 9 sources cited
Grated cassava mixed with grated coconut, sugar and warming spice, wrapped in banana leaf and steamed, then served with hot coconut milk poured over. Suva market vendor Josese Nabau sells thirty containers, F$3 to 5 each, every Saturday from 10am, reportedly sold out by 2pm, a genuine, still-thriving piece of everyday food culture behind a dish that could otherwise read as archival.
As tradition built it
Steam 40 minutes.
Ingredients
- 360 ml grated cassava
- 60 ml grated coconut
- ¼ tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp ground cardamom
- 2 tbsp sugar
- as needed banana leaves or parchment, for wrapping
To serve
- to serve coconut milk
Method
- Mix all the ingredients in a bowl.
- Take a palmful of the mixture, lay it on the wrapping and wrap it.
- Steam 40 minutes.
- Meanwhile heat the coconut milk gently to a simmer.
- Unwrap the vakalolo into a bowl and pour some of the coconut milk over the top.
Notes
The recipe is The Fiji Times's (2 December 2016); it lists banana leaves and wraps in parchment. Maika CakaCaka, a Fijian cook on The Coconet, wraps handfuls of plain grated cassava in foil, boils them 45 minutes, kneads them, and pours over a syrup of 1 to 2 cups of sugar melted into 3 cups of coconut milk.
What a modern chef changes
The spice and the coconut given a little more precision, without changing the dish's plain, honest character
Kit note, not tied to a numbered rung
Method
- Dry-toast the cinnamon and cardamom briefly before adding, waking up their aromatics rather than folding them in raw, a small step no traditional recipe insists on but that costs nothing.
- Use a genuinely thick, first-press coconut cream for the pouring sauce, thinned only slightly with hot water, rather than a standard tinned "coconut milk," for a richer finish that better matches what fresh-pressed lolo would give.
- Serve slightly warm rather than hot, letting the cassava's own starch set a little first, for a firmer, more sliceable texture that holds together better on a plate than straight off the steamer.