Okolehao

Okolehao is an alcoholic spirit whose main ingredient is the root of the Ti plant. Okolehao's forerunner was a fermented ti root beverage and when distillation techniques were introduced by English seamen in 1790, it was distilled into a high proof spirit. Hawaiians discovered that if the ti root is baked a sweet liquid migrated to the surface of the root. They did not know that chemically, the heat changed the starch in the root to a fermentable sugar. The baked root was then soaked in a vat of water which dissolved the sugar and fermentation began to take place. The beer was later distilled into a high proof spirit which became Hawaii's only indigenous distilled liquor, and was prized by the King.