Taro: Traditional Dishes

In Hawaii the cultivation of Colocasia taro, locally known as dalo, is ancient; the peeled cormels are primarily pounded into poi, a starchy paste or pudding, that is of great cultural significance and served at every festivity or luau. On the American mainland, and in order to serve Asian and Caribbean immigrant populations, since the 1900s Colocasia taro, among others, has been commercially cultivated in Florida and South Carolina. In Asian cuisines (e.g., China, Vietnam, Philippines, Cambodia, Indonesia) peeled and boiled taro corms or cormels are a rice substitute, and many times considered a poor people’s food, with a low social status. In Pacific and Philippine cuisines the leaves are boiled in water or coconut cream. Taro stalks are frequently thinly sliced and used in soups. The petioles are sometimes eaten raw, and the Chinese are known to deep-fry grated tuber strips. In traditional Japanese cuisine boiling taro in water is most common; the dishes are referred to as nimono (boiled materials or stews). The leaves and petioles (zuiki) are used as a vegetable. Taro (both Colocasia and Xanthosoma) is a prominent staple in the diets of numerous West African communities; common preparation methods for the corms and/or cormels include boiling whole in the skin, pounding, roasting, fermenting, and baking. Taro and other starchy tubers and roots—alone or in combination—are used for the preparation of the traditional staple fufu or futu. In the Western world the pounded porridge or pudding is mostly prepared with fufu flour.