Kapisi Pulu

Ingredients

Main

• 2 tinscorned beef, about 340 g each
• 1large cabbage, roughly chopped
• 3onions, sliced
• 3tomatoes, chopped, optional

Coconut cream

• 800 mlthick coconut cream
• or 2 mature coconuts, grated and squeezed
• 1 teaspoonsalt
• black pepper

To wrap

• banana leaves
• or foil
• or a covered dish

To serve

• boiled taro or cassava
• or ufi, yam
• or plain rice

Directions

1. Crack open a mature brown coconut. Drain the water out and keep it to drink. Grate the white flesh as finely as you can. Add a little warm water to the gratings.
2. Squeeze it hard through a clean cloth. The first pressing is the thick cream. Cut the cabbage into rough large pieces. Do not shred it finely at all. Wash it and shake it fully dry. Preparing the corned beef takes a moment.
3. Break it up roughly with a fork. Do not mash it down into a paste. Wash the banana leaves thoroughly. That makes them soft and foldable.
4. Line a deep dish with banana leaves. Let them overhang the sides generously. Put a layer of cabbage in the bottom. Scatter the sliced onion over it. Add a layer of broken corned beef. Add chopped tomato if using it. Repeat those layers to the top. Finish with a layer of cabbage.
5. Pour the coconut cream over everything. It should come most of the way up. Season it with salt and black pepper. Taste before adding much more salt. The cabbage and cream take some seasoning. Fold the overhanging leaves over the top. Cover it with more leaves if needed. Cover the dish with foil as well. It must be sealed to steam properly.
6. Heat the oven to 180C before baking. Bake it for about ninety minutes. Do not open it during that time. Set the wrapped dish on the hot stones. Cover it with leaves and then earth. Give it about two full hours in it.
7. Let it stand for ten full minutes. Serving it is done hot from the dish. Spoon it out through all the layers. Serve boiled taro or cassava alongside. It keeps two days refrigerated.

Technique

• Kapisi means cabbage and pulu means beef, the word pulu coming from the English bull, since cattle were not native and the word arrived with the animal.
• Tinned corned beef kept indefinitely without refrigeration, which mattered enormously on remote islands, and it became valued enough to be given by the carton at weddings and funerals, carrying real social weight in Tonga.
• Tinned corned beef is high in salt and saturated fat, and the documented shift across the Pacific from local foods to imported processed ones ran alongside sharply rising obesity and diabetes rates, with Tonga among the highest in the world; the dish is recorded as it is genuinely eaten, and fresh meat or fish can replace the tin.

Substitutions

• Fresh beef, chicken or fish can replace the tinned corned beef.
• Foil or a covered dish stands in for banana leaves.

Variations

• Some cooks add chopped tomato between the layers.
• Lu pulu wraps the same filling in taro leaves instead of cabbage.
• It is cooked in the umu on Sundays and in an oven on other days.

History

Tinned corned beef arrived with traders and became a prestige gift; layered with cabbage and coconut cream it feeds large family gatherings cheaply.

Frequently asked questions

What is Kapisi Pulu?

Kapisi Pulu is a main from Tonga: corned beef and cabbage baked in coconut cream, the everyday umu dish. Tinned corned beef arrived with traders and became a prestige gift; layered with cabbage and coconut cream it feeds large family gatherings cheaply.

How long does Kapisi Pulu take to make?

Kapisi Pulu takes 25 minutes of preparation and 1 hour 30 minutes of cooking. The recipe makes serves 8. It is rated easy to make.

What can I substitute in Kapisi Pulu?

Yes, within limits. Fresh beef, chicken or fish can replace the tinned corned beef. Foil or a covered dish stands in for banana leaves.

What is the most important thing to get right in Kapisi Pulu?

Squeeze it hard through a clean cloth. The first pressing is the thick cream. Cut the cabbage into rough large pieces. Do not shred it finely at all. Wash it and shake it fully dry. Preparing the corned beef takes a moment.