Pan Sushi from The Big Island

My favorite ratio is “Effort to Taste” — and Mom Asking For the Recipe

Sheldon Simeon wrote one of my favorite cookbooks ever, Cook Real Hawai’i. I pull it out every time I think of having a dinner party, or simply having dinner. It’s for when I want something delicious outside my wheelhouse. It’s for when I wish I was in Hawai’i.

I’ve bought, borrowed, and browsed thousands of cookbooks. I rarely cook straight off the page unless I’m adding to my cooking vocabulary. I’m looking for inspiration, stories, kitchen companionship.

Sheldon gives me what I’m looking for in spades.

© Willow Pennell

Cook Real Hawai’i delivers the history and contribution of every cultural contributor to contemporary Hawaiian food: Native Hawaiians, Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, Portuguese, Haoles, and Filipinos.

The cookbook’s pictures eschew sunsets and palm trees for rural roads, small towns, keikis, aunties, and fishermen. It’s what you see when you drive away from the resorts and into the heart of the Big Island.

I’ve haven’t cooked exhaustively out of this book. I like to pick u…