Lovo Night

Thursdays are Lovo Nights at Fiji Palms, considered the best lovo in Fiji. As you remember from my previous post, a lovo is an underground oven, cooking the food over hot rocks covered in leaves and dirt. Well I managed to capture the whole process.

Heating the rocks

Preparation starts in the morning building a fire and piling it high with rocks to heat up.

This is left to simmer all day until the rocks are sitting on a bed of glowing coals.

Red hot rocks

Once the rocks are hot enough, palm stems are laid over the rocks to protect the food from scorching. The food to be cooked is wrapped in aluminium foil, then wrapped again in leaves.

Adding food to lovo

Once the food is stacked on top of the palm stems, it is covered first with a layer of ordinary leaves, followed by a layer of palm leaves.

Covering food with leaves

Finally, a layer of wet hessian is put on top of the leaves, then the whole lovo is covered in dirt.

Hessian layer has been added

Once the lovo has been covered in dirt, it is left for around two hours to allow the food to cook completely.

Lovo being covered in dirt

After the two hours have passed, the layers of dirt, hessian and leaves are carefully removed, because they are still very hot! The food is left wrapped in the leaves and foil to keep them hot until it is time to eat.

Removing food from lovo

The whole process takes about six hours. I think it is easier to just press a button on  a stove or a microwave, but this is tradition and must be experienced.

The whole group

The whole reunion group got dressed up in their reunion t-shirts and sulus for the traditional group photo before the lovo was served. Somehow Ros and I ended up in the front row.

The feast!

The table was laid beautifully with a large range of food available, mostly Fijian, such as tapioca, roro, dalo and more typical western foods such as whole fish, chicken and pork, plus a large range of salads and vegetables. Everything in the meal was obtained from Fiji locally except for the mayonaise in the coleslaw which came from U.S.A.

Fijian band

While we ate, we were entertained by a Fijian band, whose repertoire was exceptional, including traditional Fijian songs, but also Australian and New Zealand songs which everyone sang along to. We loved Down Under, whereas the Kiwis got misty-eyed when they sang a stirring rendition of Pokarekare Ana. The organisers then got all the Australians up to sing Advance Australia Fair and Waltzing Matilda, followed by the Kiwis to sing their National Anthem.

Nurses Line Dancing

Then it was time for each group to entertain the rest, and our group put on a line dancing display, and a few of us got up and regailed the rest with jokes, stories and songs, including your scribe who brought the house down with his story of an unfortunate encounter with a cat one night.

Yvonne the organiser and plaque

At the end of the night we unveiled the plaque that was to be nailed to the wall of the dining area, along with the many, many others to commemorate our visit to Fiji Palms. Yvonne Moala, who organised the whole trip, is pictured left holding the plaque. After that it was time for bed, and we slept very well after all this.