Hangi Thread

[Projects]

Was asked Awhile back to create a thread of the Hangi process i do. I was asked by a local school where my daughter goes (she's 4th genration of my family through the primary school) to put down a hangi for Matriki week and the children can learn more about the cooking process of the hangi. Not only the children i think the teachers and adults got an education out of it as a lot of them had never seen this being done in the ground. Our numbers were to be 180 people as a taster with other shared food, the children were to learn not only about the cooking but also providing of food and sharing of food.

Each child brought 2 vegatables to provide for the hangi, and some people provided meat as well. ranged from old mutton, lamb, pork, wild pork, beef, chooks it all goes in.

The process involves heating of volcanic rocks/stones, irons, another father provided some ex manganese balls from a quarry crusher(these things got bloody hot!) heated for 3 hours depending on the fire and temperature, its all a feel with the conditions at hand. The fire needs natural hard wood, we had a mix of manuka logs, and macrocarpa rings/chunks. I set my fire to the side of the pit this way the ash doesnt get in the hole, it can dry the hole out on a wet cold morning, and easy to roll the rocks into the hole.




Once the fire takes off it burns down and the stones get white hot and the irons begin to glow red (I'd love to put a temp sensor on these at this time. Never have done though.


Meanwhile the veg is prepped into its own muslin bags and soaked in water. Hemp sacks and a a table cloth are soaked in water as well. Steel baskets are linned with cabage leaves and meat is thoroughly salted and layed in the baskets. Prior to the stones being removed the wet vege bags are put on the meat and the stuffing is ready as well.




The stones are removed from the fire and racked shoveled and swept into the hole. This stage is really hot and exciting for the kids. Cotton overalls on rakes and shovels out and short quick shifts getting the stones removed as fast as possible.



Once the stones are all in the hole i use the wet table cloth to beat the stones and remove any excess ash sitting on the stones. the baskets are sat on top of the stones.



The table cloth covers the food and wet sacks cover the table cloth. The dirt then covers all the sacks passed the outer edge to seal off the dirt with the dirt. This locks in the heat and steam created from the wet sacks and hot stones, making it a giant pressure cooker or sort.




I then sit around watching the pile of dirt for 3 hours watching for any steam vents that might appear, i use excess dirt to cover these vents a seal off the dirt again. always good when its venting means the foods cooking.


Times up and its time to begin removing the dirt and fingers crossed everything is cooked. Reverse process, scrape the dirt off, peel the sacks back in reverse order and lift the baskets out.





Bon Appétit we ended up feeding 200 people easy with this.