Progressive Dinner in Rarotonga

We'd been debating for a few days about whether we wanted to go to one of the "island nights" that were advertised everywhere. They were supposed to be big events with food slow-baked in hot rocks, buried in a pit, and traditional dancing by the locals. While this might have been fun, I have to confess it sounded a bit too tourist-oriented for my tastes. On one of the days we were in town, we stopped by the local tourism office and asked about the "Progressive Dinner", for which we'd seen a couple of very small fliers. The lady at the desk was happy to set us up for the one that week, and that night we were picked up by one of the organizer's sons and dropped off at the first location. It turned out the first home we were to dine at was just a block or so away from our hostel!

There we were met by our first host, Dan, who explained that his wife was busy with her new shop, and that he was in charge for the night! After a van carrying the rest of the guests arrived, we set out on a tour of Dan's garden, which stretched out behind his house towards the center of the island and covered a good 2-3 acres. There were quite a few familiar and unfamiliar fruits and vegetables, from 2-3 varieties of mangos - sadly not in season - to papayas, starfruits, cacao, vanilla beans, 2 varieties of taro, pistachios (our second host, Timu, informed us that the islanders ate the fruit and not the nut!), Several kinds of bananas, pineapples, coffee and numerous citrus trees whose varieties were not named. There was also a fair-sized vegetable patch, full of green leafy plants locally known as "rocket" like those we'd already seen for sale in the supermarket as well as several other vegetables.

After the garden tour in the fading daylight, we retired to an outdoor patio on the south side of Dan's father-in-law's house, which sat immediately behind Dan's house, where we were served steamed taro, a lemon-juice cooked fish soup with bits of scallions and tomatoes in the lemon-juice coconut milk base, and fresh starfruit. Champagne and homemade tropical fruit juice blend were available to drink. The 'fish soup' was both Christina and my personal favorite - we'd been used to a similar dish in Tucson, but made without the coconut milk. The steamed taro was very mild, and not especially flavorful, but tasted fine. I think that I liked it better than Christina. To my palette, it would have been better used as a base for a more involved dish with a few spices added. Whatever else, it was certainly filling - like eating starchy bricks! I suppose I'm not doing a very good job of selling taro; it really seems to be one of the polynesian cultural equivalent of potatoes, along with kumara. The starfruit we had already been enjoying since we'd picked up a bag at the local supermarket. Their taste was watery but refreshing - in a manner reminiscent of grapes.

After about an hour, we got in the van and moved on to our next hosts, Timu and his wife. On the drive over, which took perhaps 15 minutes, we found out that virtually all the other dinner guest were Kiwis, a set of 4 middle-aged couples who were long-term friends and took vacations together. Once they found out we were heading to NZ next, we were deluged with suggestions as to where to go and what to see. Everyone seemed rather concerned that it was going to feel terribly cold to us, although given the weather we've been having, I haven't quite figured out why. While we drove, Dan and a friend played island (and other) music on ukeleles.

At Timu's house, we had barbequed chicken drumsticks and fresh-caught fish, along with a bit of salad, cookied greens (spinach-like) in coconut cream, and slices of cool watermelon. While we ate, Timu told us a bit about his business, which was a black pearl farm. It's one of the few industries which the cook islands supports besides tourism. We were serenaded towards the end of the course by Dan and friends on ukeleles and some sort of upright instrument made out of a box with a single pole running upright through it and supporting a single string from a pivoting bar at the top of the pole. By pulling the end of the bar, they could stretch the string tighter and thereby produce notes of different pitch.

Finally, with the sun completely gone and twilight almost over, we got back in the van and travelled to our final hosts' house Tim and his wife, whose name I did not catch. Tim was a decendant of the famous William Marsters, who travelled with 3 of his 4 wives to the Palmerton North and founded a great clan. There we enjoyed orange upside-down cake (made from local oranges), fruit salad made from papayas, starfruit, guava, watermelon, passion fruit and oranges; and coconut macaroons, along with a bit of ice cream if one wanted. The evening ended quietly with tea or local coffee at your choice, and finally we all got back in the van to be dropped off wherever we were staying.