It isn't summer without shave ice

Shave Ice. No, I did not mis-type that, it's not "shaved ice," it's shave ice. Every area of the world has regional food specialties that, even in today's Internet-connected world, most of the rest of the world hasn't heard of. I'm heading to Hawaii in a few weeks, and one of my favorite things to get there that I have never seen anywhere else in the world is this treat.

It looks a lot like a sno-cone, but don't get confused. Sno-cones use crushed ice, while a shave ice uses, you guessed it, shaved ice. There are other key differences, I've found, to a true Hawaiian shave ice. Underneath the ice and syrup you'll find vanilla ice cream, and sometimes sweet bean paste. If you're lucky, you'll get sweetened condensed milk on the top.

Historically, it was brought by Japanese immigrant workers who moved to Hawaii to work on the sugar plantations. That makes sense; if you're going somewhere hot to work in the field, you'll want your favorite cool treat to make you feel happy and at home. It had a long history of being lugged from high in the mountains down to be stored in caves and served to only the upper class.

These days, though, shave ice is for everyone, and the stands I frequent when I get to go to Hawaii are reminiscent of an A&W root beer stand, the ice cream stand where you go in the summer, or your classic independent burger joint. People getting shave ice are happy. You can watch a pretty typical experience here.

What about that name? Chalk it up to regional speaking differences-- the "d" got lost somewhere in history, though I couldn't tell you where and haven't been able to find it. What I can tell you, though, is that if you're able to find somewhere here in the states, shave off some time to go and get one...

Image courtesy of Sean Loyless via flickr