There is something interesting going on behind the scenes at Hamakua Springs and I talked Richard into letting me tell you about it.
They are fixing up a small building that has long sat empty on the road at the edge of the farm, and the plan is to open a farm stand there, probably around late August.
It will most likely be open on Saturday mornings, though everything is still in preliminary stages right now. Richard says the number one goal is to serve the farm’s neighbors in Pepe‘ekeo (though you are welcome, too).
On Fridays, you’ll be able to come here to the blog and see what produce will be available the following morning.
“It will depend on the season,” Richard told me. “I can tell you for sure that we’re going to try to do watermelons and melons during the off-season. Smaller, personal-size specialty melons, like the French Chrentais. That’s an orange-fleshed melon with a real sweet aroma you can smell through the skin.
“And pumpkins at Halloween, and I don’t know what else yet. This is all kind of new to us, so we are doing a lot of experimenting.”
He says they don’t intend the farm stand to compete with the supermarkets. In addition to selling “seconds” of bananas, tomatoes and other produce, they will test-market different, interesting produce there.
You’ll get to see (and buy) some of the fancy vegetables Hamakua Springs grows for and sells to chefs, but which aren’t available in the stores. Like really tiny baby lettuces, different-colored carrots and radishes and small eggplants and squashes that are great for throwing on the grill. Richard says they are tastier than some of what’s available at the market, and I can attest to that.
There will also be gift baskets of various combinations of produce.
“We’ll do what we do,” he says, “and develop it along the way. Who knows where it will go. It’s kind of exciting. I know that we’ll be very responsive to the people and what they want to see.”
Richard is very open to ideas as they think through the scope of the farm stand. “I’d like to hear what people think might be unique or interesting—something they’d like to see in a farm stand that’s not being done now, or a kind of product that’s not being produced now,” he says. “We’re just open to all kinds of suggestions.”
If you have ideas, you can comment here or contact Richard directly at “mkeabanana@aol.com.”
You’ll have to stop by the farm stand if only to have a look at the building, too, because it has an interesting history. It sits near the old airstrip, and Richard says they assumed it had been used to support the airplane operation, which the sugar plantations used to fertilize the sugarcane.
But he has since learned the building predated the airstrip, and thinking back, he remembered there were leather harnesses in the building when they bought the farm. It turns out the building was there to support mules, back when the plantations used to plow with mules.
We’ll update you here as plans develop. And if you have ideas and want to help shape the farm stand, let us know.
We’re almost halfway to our goal of sending Keaukaha Elementary students on field trips they otherwise won’t get to take. Click here.
– posted by Leslie Lang