Solomon Islands kava: the quiet exporter

Solomon Islands kava is a bit of a different story from the rest of the Pacific, because the Solomons grow kava mostly for export rather than for drinking at home, and some of the main cultivars they grow came over from Vanuatu in the first place. So what you are tasting is essentially Vanuatu's noble genetics raised in Solomon soil. But having said that, the kava leans in a way Vanuatu kava does not and it's pleasently surprising.

I find the Solomons fascinating precisely because they are often the understated one in the lineup of world kava's. Nobody is writing songs about Solomon kava the way they do about Fiji's grog culture or Vanuatu's nakamals, and locals there do not drink much of it themselves, so the whole crop is basically grown for the rest of us kava lovers. Even though the strains originated from the motherland (Vanuatu), the texture, flavor, and experience are quite different.

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The island it passed through without stopping

Here is the strange part of the Solomon story, kava did not skip the Solomon Islands by accident. It came through. Thousands of years ago the Lapita people, the great seafaring ancestors of the whole Pacific, carried kava out of northern Vanuatu in their canoes and seeded it across the islands as they went. So the plant was there but the Solomons never built the deep ceremonial, spiritual, daily kava culture that Vanuatu and Fiji and Tonga did.

I think this is interesting because this shows how a plant showing up somewhere is not the same as a culture actively choosing to integrate it into their daily and ceremonial customs. We tend to assume that if something useful or intoxicating reaches a place, of course the people there will take it up, but the Solomons are the clean counterexample sitting right in the middle of the kava world. Its sort of a deep reminder that culture is not just a function of what is available to it, it is actually a series of deliberate choices.

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How kava actually got established there

The version that stuck came late and came deliberately. The Solomon Islands got cuttings from Vanuatu, some in the 1980s and a bit more recently, and started growing kava primarily as an export crop. You all know I'm a big fan of Lebot, and his survey work complicates the "it passed through and nobody drank it" story. Three things are true at once. First, the wild ancestor really is native here even though most 'kava experts' swear it was not. I've been told by multiple generational farmers and wise men of the islands that it was always there. Piper wichmannii, the rough untamed grandmother plant that is undrinkable grows naturally in Solomon rainforests and even has its own local names, kava qwua on Santa Isabel and kwakwako on Guadalcanal. This means the deep botanical roots of the whole family genome was genuinely placed by the creator on this set of islands. Second, there were small pockets that did drink it. Down in the far southeast of Solomon on the Santa Cruz islands and the Polynesian outliers of Anuta and Tikopia, people drank kava that Polynesian voyagers from Samoa, Tonga and Wallis most likely carried in over the last thousand years or so. This activity faded out until on Tikopia only a wild, unusable form the locals call kavakava atua was the only plant left. Third, there was a brief real kava culture on Malaita in the early 1900s, and it came from Fiji. Solomon Islanders had been recruited to cut sugarcane on plantations in Queensland and Fiji, and some came home as committed kava drinkers. Because of this a whole ceremonial drinking scene grew up in the Fiu villages, enough that the Anglican mission panicked that men were putting this ungodly kava drink before church and set about stamping it out. And by the 1930's thanks to these missionaries it was again gone.

So the solomon islands actually did not ignore the canoe plant, it was actually catching popularity but was snuffed out each time by missionaries and distance. After Lebot's work kava then became a modern export crop grown for the rest of us.

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The cultivars, and why there isn't a homegrown one

Worth being clear about something first. The Solomons technically don't have their own indigenous cultivar, bred and named in Solomon valleys the way Vanuatu's are. What they have is two separate things. There's the wild ancestor, Piper wichmannii, the rough untamed grandmother plant that grows naturally across this whole western-Melanesian homeland and that I dug into in the Papua New Guinea guide. And then there's what people actually grow and export, which is Vanuatu's noble genetics, cuttings carried over and raised in Solomon soil. So the two cultivars below aren't Solomon inventions, they're Vanuatu hybrids with a Solomon twist to them, and they usually carry the same chemotype numbers Vanuatu drinks. The Solomons (like PNG.. the island country not the photos) have also become a source of cheaper non-noble kava heading overseas, since farmers without a deep drinking culture don't always sort noble from tudei the careful way Vanuatu does. So when sourcing from Solomon you should be careful. Everything we bring in from this side is noble, but it's exactly why knowing your source matters here.

• Melomelo. The standout. Originally from Ambae in Vanuatu, the misty island that James Michener could see from Santo and turned into Bali Haʻi in Tales of the South Pacific, Melomelo is named for exactly what it does, mellow. It has a zesty, peppery, slightly sweet and clean scent, and the effect is classic, long-acting, deeply relaxing, body-led. That being said, it is not the full pin-you-down heaviness of a high-tudei kava. I personally feel it is the one you reach for when you genuinely want to settle. Common chemotype's are 245361, the heavier noble profile that leads with the body-side lactones.
• Borogu. The same everyday-standard cultivar that anchors Vanuatu's nakamals, grown here for export. Balanced and dependable, the reliable house-pour character, just raised on a different island. Chemotype 423561, which holds the classic kavain-forward noble fingerprint.

Now these are the main cultivars out there but solomon kava still does tend to hit a bit different. For one as I mentioned earlier, the texture/mouthfeel and flavor is almost completely different. solomon's taste more on the end of balsa woody creaminess, and is genuinely delicious in comparison to some spicy Vanuatu's I've had. The texture is also very.. fluffy? It's pretty fun to see the solomon blend after we dehydrated it. Something about the lipid-like kavalactones seems to be different in the way they grow and eventually become part of the drink. Something about Solomon's climate and soils creates a wildly different experience, even though the same ingredients are the same. I would say this is akin to mac and cheese tasting different if made by Dad versus Mom. Same ingredients but different experience. Let me state once again, I am not a medically trained physician and I am not making health claims, just describing how the cup tends to feel when I imbibe so take it more as one drinker's experience.

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Is Solomon Islands kava heady or heavy?

The Solomon side of the Pacific lives mostly on the heavy end, body calm, slow build, wind down style. So if you are someone who loves the feeling of sinking into the couch during evenings more than the clear social afternoons, this origin is squarely your neighborhood.

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How to drink it

Whatever the origin, most of our kava is instant, so the straining and bag-wrestling are off the table. Scoop two, add about 8oz of water, shake fifteen seconds, sip, and give a heavy kava a real 15+ minutes before you decide on more. If you'relooking for something more readitional, our first timer's guide covers the full traditional ritual too.

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Where to start

If that deep, warm, body-led calm is what you are after, our Barava blend is built from this smooth side of the Pacific, and it is a great place to land, easy to drink, deceptively strong, exactly the Solomon leaning character. Want to go even heavier on the wind-down? Connoisseur and Gravis sit right there with you. And if you are still figuring out which end of the spectrum is yours, the Variety Pack lets you taste across heady and heavy without committing to a full jar. It also helps to read the Vanuatu kava guide, since that is where all of these genetics trace back to.

I am still learning new things about every origin season to season, but the Solomons are genuinely interesting and taught me that the process and people growing matter more than the exact cultivar itself. try one out and let me know what you think!

From our ohana to yours, mahalo nui.