Ohelo berry

What it is

The berry is only about 0.6–1.3 cm (¼–½ in) across, with many tiny brown seeds. Its botanical name is Vaccinium reticulatum. Colour alone does not tell you whether it is ripe.

Red Button, one of the named varieties, has light orange-yellow berries dotted with red.

Where it comes from

ʻŌhelo belongs to Hawaiʻi. It is most common on Maui and Hawaiʻi Island, with smaller populations on Kauaʻi, Oʻahu and Molokaʻi. It is among the early plants to grow on lava flows, ash dunes and beds of volcanic cinders.

Seed collected near Kīlauea Volcano in 2005 led to two named varieties, Kīlauea and Red Button, in 2008. Growing them offers another source of berries while leaving more wild fruit for the nēnē, Hawaiʻi’s native goose.

How it's eaten where it grows

In Hawaiʻi, ʻōhelo goes into jam with sugar and lemon juice. Winona Like Hopkins’s recipe starts by boiling the berries with a little water until they break, then adds the sugar and lemon.

For ʻōhelo cream-cheese pie, a local home recipe layers a buttery flour crust, sweetened cream cheese and whipped topping, then cooked berries. The berry has an older ceremonial place, too: Hawaiians offered fruiting branches to Pele at Kīlauea.

How it's grown

Small-farm cultivation gives this wild shrub a place in pots and in the field. In Hawaiʻi trials, some seed-grown plants flowered just ten months after sprouting, far sooner than the five years once reported; plants moved from the greenhouse to the field at sixteen months bore berries a year later. Cultivation also eases the pressure of berry gathering on fragile wild habitats.

When and where you'll find it

Wild berries in Hawaiʻi are usually most plentiful from late August through September. Local people gather them for jam, jelly and pie filling, and at Kīlauea General Store in Volcano, ʻōhelo jam is among the things cooking in the back kitchen. Home cooks also freeze the berries for desserts beyond the fresh season.