Market Hauls and Local Noms

As a Canadian citizen, I’m always a little ashamed to admit that I don’t like winter. In fact, one of the reasons I decided to work remotely and ultimately become a digital nomad was simply to avoid exposing myself to the cold and snow!

Lately, though, I’ve been trying to reframe my relationship with the season and combat my long-ingrained belief that the final weeks of fall represent the most depressing time of year. I have a long way to go before fully embracing winter and peacefully accepting the end of autumn, but I’m happy to report that I’ve found something to keep me going as the days grow darker and colder: holiday markets!

One of the loveliest markets I attended in recent weeks was My Peoples’ Market, Portland’s largest BIPOC maker’s market. Held at the Oregon Convention Center from November 23-24, the event introduced me to many talented creators, including Robert Batulayan and Kristy Mollena-Batulayan, the founders of Koa Roots, as well as Robert’s sister Vanessa.

Robert and Kristy hail from different islands in Hawaii and met while studying in Corvallis, a city in central Western Oregon. In college, the couple used to do a lot of seafood bars, and it was during a night of hosting that a happy accident occurred. As Robert recalled in a segment on KOIN 6, “We had a friend that had brought over some smoked Hawaiian sea salt and then we burned the drawn butter that we were supposed to make for the Dungeness crab that night.” Rather than discarding it, they combined the butter and salt, creating a prototype of their OG product: Smoked Brown Butter.

Made with fragrant applewood smoked spices infused in local butter, the couple’s cooking butters come in various flavors, including Garlic & Onion, Chili, and Sage & Thyme. Their latest variation, Oregon Truffle & Hawaiian Sea Salt Smoked Butter, exemplifies the cultural and culinary fusion at the heart of their business. Robert summed it up best, saying, “A lot of our flavors incorporate Oregon and Hawaii.”

Although the butters make a fantastic addition to savory dishes and sweet treats alike (check out the awesome recipes on Koa Root’s blog for more information!), the couple knew they also “wanted to do something sweet” to honor their roots and their newfound Pacific Northwest home. Eager to offer a product that everyone could enjoy, regardless of dietary restrictions, they decided to put a plant-based spin on the fruit butters they grew up eating back in Hawaii. Reflecting on this decision, Robert shared, “Being here in Oregon, we’ve met a lot of people that were either lactose intolerant or allergic to eggs, so we went to go and try to figure out a way to make something that we normally would put eggs and butter in and then settled with oat cream that we make in house.”

The fruit butter gift pack I picked up from the market featured four flavors: Guava, Passion Fruit, Peachy Mama, and Strawberry Guava Passion Fruit. The latter, Kristi revealed, was “made for our wedding. We actually did that as a launch because he loves guava, I love passionfruit, and we wanted to incorporate Oregon into it, so we decided on Oregon strawberries.” As for the Peachy Mama, she explained, “The two farms that we get the peaches from, [Peachwood Orchard in Hood River, Oregon and Pheasant’s Eye Farm in Parkdale, Oregon] are BIPOC, family-owned farms.” The butter also contains raspberries from the Willamette Valley (Oregon’s wine country) and vanilla pods from the Laie Vanilla Company on Oahu, Hawaii, which the couple uses to make their own vanilla sugar. Kristi noted that the Peachy Mama “takes about a year for us to make, which is why we only bring it for the holidays.”

Robert elaborated on the process, saying, “We don’t use any chemical emulsifiers in the fruit butters, so they will naturally split like a natural peanut butter, so give them a shake and stir, and then because we don’t use enough sugar in them, they’re not shelf stable after you open them, so you do need to put them in the refrigerator. We really believe in natural. The first ingredient is always going to be fruit, and then the sugar we use is all cane sugar. We don’t use a lot of sugar beets, [since] it gives it a weird flavor. We’ve always spent a little more and done the cane sugar.”

As I admired the rest of their beautiful display (which I sadly forgot to take pictures of), Robert explained how their snacks grew out of a desire to minimize waste: “We started making value-added products with a lot of the byproducts that we had [from] making our fruit butters and brown butters, so we don’t waste [anything]. We put a lot of things that we strain out into our snack mix.” The flavors rotate but have previously included Irish Cream, Ube & Pandan, and Nacho Cheese. Kristi pointed out that “the extra fruit butters we have we incorporate into other products,” like the delicious set of caramel shortbread bars pictured below.

When I asked the couple about their long-term goals, they spoke about their focus on giving back: “We love to share our story. We do a lot of advocacy, a lot of business training, a lot of education, helping small businesses start up. We incorporate Koa Roots in it. We’ve done a few case studies to help raise funds for everybody. We want to have it evolve that way, [with] a lot of advocacy, community, and philanthropy.” Kristi added, “But the thing is, we always remember our mission and why we started this. That’s why we always come back to our roots of being humble.”

Speaking of roots, Robert explained that “The name [Koa Roots] is a play on words. Koa is the largest, hardest tree that grows indigenously in Hawaii, but it also means perseverance, strength, bravery, taking on new challenges, so we use koa as a play on words rather than technically koa.” Kristi added that the idea of roots is important “so that we never forget where we came from.”

If you’re looking for a way to bring a taste of Hawaii into your home while supporting a small business committed to sustainable practices and community engagement, be sure to check out Koa Roots! Their products are versatile, delicious, and made with so much love and care for the environment and customers.