Jake Shimabukuro: Steamed Kumu
Your Last Meal with Rachel Belle
Rachel Belle
4.4 • 709 Ratings
🗓️ 30 December 2021
⏱️ 34 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Award winning ukulele player Jake Shimabukuro is a lifelong Hawaii resident, where catching a big fish in the morning means feasting with friends and family that evening.
One of his favorite catches is kumu, a fish that exists nowhere else in the world except Hawaii. Host Rachel Belle chats with Mark Healey, a Hawaiian professional surfer who has been sustainably spearfishing for his dinner since he was a toddler. Mark shares his secrets to charming and successfully hunting a kumu while also holding his breath (under water, not during our conversation!).
Jake also loves poi, one of Hawaii's most sacred and traditional foods. Don't know what poi is? We got you! Learn its history and cultural significance with the owner of Oahu's Waiahole Poi Factory.
Plus Jake shares his secret to making fried rice pop and you'll hear a song from his brand new album, Jake & Friends!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Alaska Airlines has teamed up with Hawaiian Airlines to create new nonstop international flights. |
| 0:05.8 | Go to Alaskaair.com or Hawaiian Airlines.com and I'll tell you more details later in the show. |
| 0:11.6 | Cairo, Seattle. |
| 0:30.6 | I'm Rachel Bell, and this is your last meal, a show about famous people and the stories behind the foods they love most. Today on the program, award-winning ukulele player Jake Shimabukuro. |
| 0:56.8 | Jake plays jazz, blues, funk, rock, bluegrass, classical folk, and flamenco, all on his teeny tiny ukulele. And on his new album, Jake and Friends, |
| 1:02.9 | he duets with everyone from Willie Nelson and Jack Johnson to Michael McDonald and Bet Midler. |
| 1:07.1 | I feel like Jake was probably that guy in high school that was friends with everybody. He was friends with the nerds and the stoners and the jocks. Jake grew up and still lives in |
| 1:12.1 | Hawaii. So we're going to learn all about poy, which is Hawaii's most sacred dish with the owner |
| 1:18.1 | of the Waiahoa Poi factory in Oahu. And I chat with Mark Healy, a Hawaiian pro surfer who has been |
| 1:24.2 | spearfishing for his dinner since he was five years old. But first, my |
| 1:28.4 | conversation with Jake Shimabukuro. I just want to talk about your early days. So talk about how, |
| 1:41.1 | oh wait, that's not where I want to start. I remember where I want to start. I want to talk about pronunciation, first of all, because in Hawaii, there is a different way |
| 1:48.4 | to pronounce the instrument that you play compared to kind of how the rest of the country pronounces |
| 1:54.0 | it. So will you say the name of your instrument? And does it bug you how we say it? No, I mean, |
| 2:00.2 | it doesn't bug me. |
| 2:01.6 | I mean, it's just the way I was taught, you know, like all of my teachers growing up in |
| 2:07.4 | Hawaii, they said, Ukulele, which is, I guess it's made up of two native Hawaiian words, |
| 2:14.0 | uku and Lele. |
| 2:15.3 | And it actually means jumping flee is the literal translation. And it got its name |
| 2:20.7 | because I guess your finger looks like they look like little jumping fleas on a fretboard. |
| 2:25.8 | Oh, that's so funny. Yeah. So that's kind of how it got so ukulele. But you know, I think there was a |
| 2:31.0 | period where people would shorten the name and it would just say UKE. And then |
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