Involving the Family in Breadfruit Recipes

by Dr. Lois Englberger

In the last few weeks, there has been an amazing flurry of interest in breadfruit!!! After sending out the KP article "Breadfruit provides health benefits" to an email list, people started a dialogue that has continued for two weeks! One question was presented as to whether more local
restaurants might offer a choice of breadfruit and rice. The potential of small-scale food processing was discussed, which led to a meeting 5 August at Pohnpei Agriculture. There a small group agreed upon priorities for the small-scale processing of breadfruit:

• Breadfruit chips or pops (snack food)
• Fermented breadfruit (mahr)
  
• Dried breadfruit, traditional (sehnikun)
• Dried breadfruit, new or other technology
  
• Frozen breadfruit, vacuum-sealed
• Breadfruit flour
  
• Canned breadfruit
  

Dr. Richard Beyer, food scientist, will be arriving on 3 October to assist in small-scale food processing development, focusing on breadfruit in a project coordinated by the Island Food Community of Pohnpei/Pohnpei Agriculture. Efforts are now being made to identify potential
entrepreneurs who may be interested in taking this up in an active way. Anyone interested in making appointments with Dr. Beyer should contact Pohnpei Agriculture at 320-2400 for registration.

We would also like to here present another great breadfruit recipe. This is kansun, which can be made with any breadfruit variety. This recipe was prepared by Pelihna Moses of the Mand Community Working Group on June 30, 2005 as a part of the project to document the traditional food system of Pohnpei.

Family involvement is a traditional part of breadfruit production and consumption. During the survey work in Mand this last July, one family was preparing kansun and offered some to the survey team. The young son was skillfully peeling the kansun breadfruit, using the traditional
hibiscus stick. What a great family activity!!! Thank you again to the families of Mand!!!