Palarasul kava: smooth calm, quiet strength

Palarasul is a single-origin noble kava from the volcanic highlands of Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu, smooth and creamy going down, with a gentle uplift and a deep, dreamy calm. Most people don't realize this because they're often looking at the body heft, but Palarasul is consistently one of the strongest kavas in Vanuatu.

I have a soft spot for the quiet ones, and Palarasul is about as quiet as they come. The first time I really sat with it, I irresponsibly poured a double cup for my cousin and I during our family Easter gathering, right around when we were supposed to be hiding the eggs for the kids. I was expecting smooth to medium-mild the way some of these kavas usually do with most things. 15 minutes later we both found ourselves struggling to formulate sentances and taking a break to sit and vegetate on the couch, even though we had only hidden 2 dozen of the eggs. Fortunately even with angry wives scolding you, this kava is able to relax you in the most intense of situations. Anger and curt stubbornness was nowhere to see, just pure love and appreciate. I will say, it will keep you clear enough to follow every word, but you may find trouble articulating responses outside of comical utterances or grunts. That gap between how soft it tastes and how much it is actually doing under the hood is pretty much the whole personality of this cultivar.

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Grown high, on the roof of Vanuatu

Palarasul comes from the highlands of Espiritu Santo, and Santo is not a small place. It is the largest island in the country and the most mountainous, home to Mount Tabwemasana, the tallest peak in all of Vanuatu. Up in those fertile, cool, volcanic highlands the soil is rich, the air is thin, and the kava that comes off it tends to be smooth, creamy and a little nutty. Kind of like my writing.

Up here the altitude is obviously not just about the beautiful scenery, it is the reason palarasul along with the most prized coffee and teas in the world are almost always grown high. Up where it is cooler and the air is clearer, the plant grows both strongly thanks to increased transpiration, and slower thanks to the cooler temperatures. A slower-growing crop often has more time to pack its roots with the compounds that actually matter to us. This way you are more likely to end up with a denser more concentrated harvest than the same plant grown fast and easy down on the flat. Ie, the mountain makes the plant work harder, and the plant pays you back for it in abundance. It's kind of like people who train fighting up in the higher altitudes. The higher altitudes strengthens their cardio and make them often more robust and able to handle more intense situations (ie, they got more gas in the tank). This is probably why Palarasul tasting gentle while also being one of the strongest in the country is not a contradiction. It is exactly what slow, high, hard-won growth produces.

That same island, lower down, also grows Bir Kar, the fast, bright, red-stemmed focus kava, which tells you how many vastly different varietals one island can hold.

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What does Palarasul taste like?

Smooth, creamy, subtly nutty. For a category where most options taste like peppery dirt, Palarasul is genuinely easy to drink. The smell and the taste set an expectation of gentle crusing but you'll be delighted how long and hard this cultivar hits.

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Is Palarasul heady or heavy?

Palarasul is balanced, leaning smooth. You get a gentle, clear uplift, a warm dreamy headiness, a loose swirl behind the eyes, sitting on top of a deep calm. It is not the muscle-melting, pin-you-to-the-couch heaviness of a true sedating cultivar, and it is not the bright, short pop of a pure heady one either. It lands in the middle, it's super versatile, and that is a big part of why so many people love it. I really enjoy the overall feeling of wellbeing this varietal produces. The chemotype backs this up leading with kavain and dihydrokavain, the kavalactones tied to that clear-but-relaxed feel rather than pure sedation.

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How strong is Palarasul, really?

Stronger than it tastes. Locally in Vanuatu, Palarasul is regarded as one of the strongest kavas around, and the people saying that drink kava every single day. The strength as alluded to earlier is more like the sneaky kind, and because it goes down so smooth and the uplift is so gentle, it is easy to underestimate and very easy to over-pour. So treat the smoothness as a kind warning label. Start with a couple of scoops, give it a real fifteen minutes, and let the calm find you before you reach for more. Palarasul rewards patience and quietly humbles people who are in a hurry to some mental or body-state destination.

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How to drink it

Our Palarasul is instant, so there is no straining and bag wrestling. Scoop two into a glass or shaker. Add about 6oz of water and shake for fifteen seconds. Sip slowly, then wait a full fifteen minutes before deciding on a second. If you want to learn the full traditional batching ritual one day, our first timer's guide can give you a more in depth general batching method.

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Love Palarasul? Here's where to keep finding that feeling

Palarasul is Reserve stock, single-origin from one highland region, limited harvests, and when it is gone for the season it is just gone until the next one.

If you want this exact cultivar, start with our Instant Palarasul. It gives you the smooth, creamy, deceptively strong single-origin profile in an instant jar. This is obviously also available in the traditional medium grind format Medium Grind Palarasul. For a core blend with a similar clear, gentle uplift, choose Raw Epicure, our smoothest and most euphoric everyday blend.

To meet the rare single-origins themselves, look at the Reserve Variety Pack. And if you are brand new and still finding your lean, start with the regular Variety Pack and taste across the range before committing to a jar.

As stated before, I am still learning what each of these cultivars wants to be, season to season. But Palarasul taught me the lesson I keep relearning with kava, that the gentlest one in the room is often the one doing the most. It's definitely one you want to experience sometime during your kava journey.

From our ohana to yours, mahalo nui.