Page 18 - Fiji Traveller Issue 1

Words: Rajan Sami Photos: Kanalevu Kitchen, Samantha Magick

My first introduction to Kanalevu Kitchen, the popular eatery at Suva’s
National Stadium, came by way of a younger colleague in 2020, who was
then following the emerging food brand on social media.
Following their trail of enticing food posts, we soon found ourselves at a
tiny wooden cottage just outside Suva’s Aquatic Centre, where Kanalevu
ran a three-month pop-up, co-sharing a space with an existing Korean
restaurant.
It was there that I first tried their ‘Island Nachos’, Kanalevu co-founder Vui
Saketa’s Pasifika take on the Mexican staple.
A fan of localising ingredients, she had swapped out corn chips with
thinly-sliced crisps made from kakana dina: taro, cassava, breadfruit, vudi
(plantain) and sweet potato atop which sat either kai, octopus, or cured
poke; rourou instead of guacamole; and a spicy pineapple salsa.
The creative substitutions worked; and hit the right balance of ‘Salt Fat
Acid Heat’ advocated by Californian chef Samin Nosrat in her bestselling
book and Netflix series.
On subsequent trips back to the pool-side bure, we found other Fijians
hovering over their lunches with their phones out to capture the perfect food
shot.
For Kanalevu Kitchen, which Vui started as a home-based corporate
catering business in 2017 (having left a secure bank job to do so), the
pop-up allowed a transition to serving restaurant goers within a bricks-and-
mortar situation. Today, it does both.
At the outset, the small business had zero marketing budget but managed
to find an audience with enticing food shots, a catchy brand name (Kanalevu
means big eater in the iTaukei language) and an exciting concept: iTaukei
food for a modern audience.
Before places like Kanalevu (and the excellent Bar Belle at the National
Fitness Centre) came along, iTaukei food, which can be labour intensive
to make, could be tricky to find in Suva’s restaurants (and outside of food
courts, the municipal market and people’s homes).
Previous Fijian food stalwarts like Takayawa’s Vale ni Kana in Toorak
and Mary Nelson’s Old Mill Cottage Café on Carnarvon St had been long
shuttered by the time this new wave of iTaukei eateries cropped up with a
younger generation at their helm.

Localising nachos
For her Island Nachos, Vui was inspired by the Mexican joints she
frequented on an extended trip to Sacramento, California’s capital.
Back home in Fiji, she’d craved those nachos, couldn’t find anything
close, and did the next best thing: she made her own.
Island Nachos are sadly no longer on the menu although the same
ingredients can be found in other dishes like the Kusima Plate, which
features kokoda, local greens including nama, ota, and rourou; and root
crops.

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