There are still villages and remote islands on these islands that sustain themselves through self-sufficiency with local foods like coconut and tubers as their daily staples.

One of the easiest sources to procure is the breadfruit. It grows effortlessly, and one only needs to use a stick to pick the fruit, making it extremely convenient. When Europeans first saw breadfruit in Tahiti, they remarked that by planting ten of these trees in a lifetime, one could fulfill their livelihood for themselves and their family without struggle or effort. It's easy to cook and can be preserved. Eaten extensively throughout Oceania since ancient times, many islands heavily depend on breadfruit.

Alongside breadfruit, other important staples are root vegetables like taro, yams, and tapioca.

Harvesting tubers from the field is easy, but digging up "Giant Swamp Taro" that grows in marshy areas, similar to rice paddies, is genuinely labor-intensive. It demands strength and puts a strain on the back. It's impressive that on the islands, even women and children engage in this task.

Taro fields are generally cultivated in secluded lands near flowing rivers. On coral atolls with low rainfall and infertile soils, people ingeniously dig deeper into the ground to allow for water to seep in to cultivate taro.

Households without farmlands buy taro and breadfruit from local markets or stores. There are island-style convenience stores selling traditional cooked meals. Despite imported rice being mainstream, there are elderly folks who prefer taro over rice, working-age individuals claim they need to eat taro once a day for strength, and children who love tapioca. Thus, local foods remain popular even in modern times.

What's interesting is the variety of traditional foods eaten across different islands. For instance, Yams are consumed more frequently on Pohnpei Island compared to others, and they are also offered during the unique feast called "Kamatep." On Palau, tapioca takes precedence. Both in daily lunches and special events, tapioca is indispensable.

Breadfruit is a staple in the islands with low rainfall and infertile lands, such as Chuuk, Kiribati, and the Marshall Islands. Conversely, islands blessed with rich mountains and rivers excel in taro cultivation. The Yapese, in particular, favor glutinous taro. One Yapese visiting Japan sampled a variety of taro and commented, "This tastes similar to taro and is delicious!" He consumed it daily.

A noteworthy commonality across islands is their tradition of consuming foods in a "mochi-like" form, regardless of the fruit or tuber. Here are a few distinctive dishes representing the "bounty of the land" consumed across these islands.

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■ Taro Cuisine with Taboos (Kosrae Island)

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Kosrae Island boasts a traditional food called "Fa'fa," crafted from a variety of taro known as soft taro. It's pounded after steaming or boiling, flattened, or molded into round dumplings similar to mochi, a process common across the islands. What makes Kosrae's Fa'fa unique is the presence of taboos in the creation of this sacred food.

To start, only specific lineages possess the ability to produce Fa'fa. It's a task for certain males (although a few females are said to also partake), passed down from grandfather to father, then son. In predominantly Christian Kosrae, it's said that only authoritative church members were allowed to prepare this food.

It's made specifically for celebratory occasions. Though it's now served at gatherings like parties, it originally held a sacred place at celebratory feasts. Hence, taboos persist even today, such as refraining from agricultural work or touching dogs before making Fa'fa, keeping the hands pure before crafting this sacred food.

Observing the process firsthand: The host, adorned in a "meshmesh," a banana leaf apron, sat atop a spread of banana leaves, diligently pounding the taro. The tools used were a small stone pestle (locally known as "tuk") and a rounded wooden base (locally called "dapo'en"). Although households usually use coral or wooden pestles, a specific black stone pestle is carved from the mountains of Kosrae exclusively for Fa'fa making. This stone pestle, though small, weighs around a kilogram and is quite hefty.

Fa'fa's ingredients are solely soft taro and coconut milk. After steam-baking the taro and peeling off the skin, it's mashed like mochi. As it tends to stick to the pestle, crushed banana pulp is used to prevent this from happening. Once it achieves a mochi-like consistency, it's formed into small round balls by squeezing them between the palm and fingers. Skilled hands create uniformly sized dumplings. Plated and drizzled with a sweet sauce made from boiled coconut milk and sugar, the dish is complete.

Upon tasting, the Fa'fa is soft with the stickiness of taro, reminiscent of the texture of Japanese dumplings. As the taro itself isn't strongly flavored, the sweet sauce plays a crucial role, akin to Japan's "mitarashi dango."

Additionally, there's also a flat variant of Fa'fa besides the rounded dumplings. The flat Fa'fa, interestingly, is considered the traditional form. The preparation method is identical, except the flat Fa'fa is served with a generous topping of unsweetened coconut milk, not the sweet sauce.

It's intriguing that while most indigenous traditions have faded from Kosrae Island, Fa'fa alone remains. When questioned, the island's elders couldn't provide a definitive answer. Kosrae Island has a history of population decline due to diseases, natural disasters, or intertribal conflicts, potentially leading to the extinction of many traditions. Perhaps Fa'fa survived because of the living memory people have of its taste. The sacred taro dumpling, Fa'fa, made by clan heads, remains one of Micronesia's enigmatic local foods amid forgotten traditions.

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■ Tapioca, Loved by All Ages: Palau Islands ■

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Of all the Micronesian islands, the Palau Islands stand out as the greatest enthusiasts for tapioca. Tapioca dishes are an absolute staple in Palau – they appear as main meals, snacks, at parties, and during events. Even welcome gatherings for foreign presidents and dignitaries visiting the islands featured tapioca dishes.

When you think of tapioca, for the Japanese, it's the popular drink with round pearls. But tapioca, the raw material, refers to cassava, a root vegetable – in other words, a type of yam. What's made from the starch of this root is termed tapioca, and the processed round pearls are called tapioca pearls. However, in the Palau Islands, both the root and the cooked snacks made from it are collectively referred to as tapioca (local name: Diokan).

Grating fresh tapioca and steaming it wrapped in young coconut leaves results in a subtly sweet, sticky treat reminiscent of a lightly sweetened, sticky willow-like texture. When you visit local stores, you'll find long, slender tapioca pieces sold individually, wrapped and tied in coconut leaves. Moreover, at homes hosting gatherings with many guests, numerous steam-cooked tapioca strands shaped into long, slender forms hang under the eaves. Apparently, making over a hundred of these, divided for serving at the party and as gifts, is quite a task.

Tapioca inherently offers a mild sweetness when cooked, but in the Palau Islands, it's preferred more as a sweet dessert by adding a coconut milk sauce with sugar or even baking it. Perhaps owing to the influence of Japanese sweets like oshiruko and karinto from the colonial era that have persisted into modern times, many Palauans have a fondness for sweet treats.

Similar to taro and breadfruit, tapioca, when cooked, has a texture resembling mochi. During the Japanese colonial era, it was referred to as "Tapioca Mochi," and even today, Palauan elders proudly recommend it as "This is Palau's mochi. It's delicious!"

■ Transformation of Breadfruit into Mochi: Chuuk Islands ■

The breadfruit (commonly known as "breadfruit") is widely consumed in villages and remote islands from Chuuk Islands to the eastern side of Ponape Island, Kosrae Island, Marshall Islands, Kiribati Islands, and others. But why is it called breadfruit?

This name originates from European explorers who, after tasting breadfruit for the first time in Tahiti, described it as having a taste similar to "English penny bread (cob bread)." In English, it was termed "breadfruit," and during Japan's colonial era, the Japanese adopted the term "breadfruit" (pan no mi).

Harvesting breadfruit, which grows on trees over 10 meters tall, involves plucking them using a long stick shaped like a 'Y' at the tip. The cooking process resembles that of Japan's sweet potatoes, where they are roasted whole over direct flame or cut into appropriate sizes and boiled or steamed—a straightforward and convenient fruit for both gatherers and cooks.

Now, how does it taste? It's akin to unsweetened sweet potatoes. Sprinkling soy sauce makes it palatable for Japanese taste buds. Due to low moisture, baking it can render it dry, but when thinly sliced and fried, it resembles tasty potato chips.

Similarly to taro, steaming or boiling and then mashing breadfruit into a mochi-like consistency and drizzling it with coconut milk enhances its taste. With just one breadfruit, it serves as an adult's main meal for a day, offering more satiety compared to wheat bread.

A notable cooking method for breadfruit exists in the Chuuk Islands. These coral reef islands have a high reliance on breadfruit in their local cuisine. Similar to 'fa'fa' on Kosrae Island, the peeled steamed or boiled breadfruit is mashed using a coral mortar and pestle, kneaded into a mochi-like consistency. Termed "pan mochi" (local name: 'kon') during Japan's colonial era, the Chuukese people enjoy it.

At the town's local market, wrapped breadfruit mochi (1 piece for 2-3 USD) is displayed. Just as Japanese people buy bento boxes at convenience stores, Chuukese people come to purchase this breadfruit mochi during lunchtime. Freshly made breadfruit mochi feels like sticky mochi, but on the Chuuk Islands, people prefer it slightly sour from fermentation after being wrapped in leaves for a few days. While freshly made ones are fine for foreigners, the aged ones after a few days are considered risky to eat.

Shaping it into mochi has been a traditional cooking method. When ground in an "umu" (stone steaming) underground without adding water, its shelf life increases. To preserve it, avoiding adding water as much as possible when kneading it is essential, but the elderly often complain that modern people tend to add water when mashing the fruit due to impatience with the heat, causing it not to last as long as before.

 

In Guam, a single bundle of breadfruit mochi costs around 5 to 6 US dollars, prompting the Chuukese people to produce large quantities and airlift them to families working as laborers in Guam. In households across villages, families gather during weekends to prepare and stockpile breadfruit mochi, creating a rhythmic sound reminiscent of Japan's traditional mochi pounding.

The traditional method of making mochi using a wooden base and palm-sized pestle, known as "Island-Style Mochi Pounding," is carried on in Chuuk Islands and Ponape Island as breadfruit mochi, as 'fa'fa' in Kosrae Island, and as tapioca mochi in Palau Islands, passing down to modern times. When Micronesians witness the sounds of mochi pounding, akin to the sounds of "pan, pan" (Japanese for "pounding"), they might be astounded by Japan's representative preserved food-making and New Year's mochi-pounding traditions.

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