Hoolaulea 2008

This is Ryan with his friend Sproles (aforementioned namesake of his band). Both are tuba players and performed with the rest of the band at Hoolaulea on Saturday.

Darrell and I worked hard at Hoolaulea...didn't even get to shop or walk around much. In fact, when I was taking a shower that evening, my right arm felt weak...it was a weird feeling. The first thing that crossed my mind was that I was having a stroke. Then I realized that it was probably just muscle strain from moving the chicken skewers with tongs from one pan to another for two hours, then flattening out the malasada dough for three hours. This was confirmed when I woke up a couple of hours later, with pain in my both arms! It was pretty exhausting, but I'm glad we volunteered to help.

Making malasadas was interesting...never knew much about the process. Wish I had taken photos, but my hands were mostly gloved and covered in flour. First they make the dough in the kitchen (didn't get to see this part). They put the dough in garbage bins and drive it up to the malasada booth. The dough is dumped onto the table and a portion is weighed out. The dough is then shaped into a ball, smooth on top (Darrell had this part down). My job was to flatten the ball into an oval shape (which I guess made me use muscles I don't normally use - ow). The next person put the flattened dough into a press twice, so it came out looking like a pizza crust. The flattened dough is placed into a round pan, like a pie crust, and then the pan is put in a press that cuts the dough into many pieces. Next, the cut dough is dumped out of the pan and broken apart and each piece is placed on a cookie sheet. This pan is placed in a warmer so the dough can rise. When it's ready, the raw malasada dough is placed in the fryer, flipped once, and they come out golden brown. From the fryer, the malasadas are dumped onto paper to drain the oil, then rolled in sugar. Done! I'm not usually a malasada fan, but maybe because I contributed to the making of it, it was pretty good!