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KAPAA – As the trussed pig spun slowly on the polished stainless steel rotisserie, Keala Kai’s thoughts turned to a thousand other luaus and the grandfather whose passing had left him as one of Kauai’s most sought-after chefs.

“In the last two years and 76 days, I’ve cooked 61 pigs,” he said with a combination of pride and weariness. “You think of good friends when you start up the machine. It brings back a lot of memories.”

Those memories include more than 40 years of cooking and working side-by-side with Bill Chu, the grandfather who raised him since Kai was a young boy. Chu, who was an accomplished machinist and welder and who designed and built Kai’s four stainless steel rotisserie machines from scratch, passed away in February 2001. 

In his lifetime, the two men were almost inseparable. Kai will keep Chu’s memory and family tradition alive at the Rotary Club of Kapaa’s 14^th annual Taste of Hawaii June 2 for which he’ll roast a 125-pound pig and a 61-pound side of beef using Chu’s custom-made spits.    

Initially Kai wasn’t so sure about returning to the food-tasting festival without his grandfather. When family members learned that he hadn’t committed to participating this year, they reminded him, “Grandfather would go.” 

“This one’s for Grandpa,” Kai said. “In my heart I know he’ll be watching,”

The vigil will being early in the morning. Kai and his “boys,” good friends like Jonathan Kato who faithfully help him, arrive at Smith’s Tropical Paradise while event organizers are still asleep. 

“For the pig to come off at 1 p.m. I have to get there by 3 a.m. and have it spinning by 5:00,” Kai said. “It’s a long day.”

Roasting the pig is just a fraction of the work, Kai said. The whole process is a three-day project which includes assembling the rotisserie, catching and killing the pig, dressing it, roasting it for at least 8 hours, cutting it up to be served, cleaning, maintaining then disassembling the machine.

Kai learned his culinary skills from Chu at a young age. “In actuality I didn’t really have a choice,” Kai said laughing. “I got to meet a lot of famous people with this machine because of him,” he said, gesturing to one of the larger rotisseries.

Chu, who owned the Pau Hana Bar in historic Hee Fat Marketplace bulidng in Kapaa, organized and catered parties large and small, for local residents and famous visitors to Kauai.

In true aloha spirit, he did not charge for his services. But his operations were as organized and detailed as any business. 

Chu’s talents went beyond food.  “He liked to keep stainless steel handy,” Kai said, while looking around the workshop behind his Kapaa house where he and Chu spent many hours creating things. “He liked to make things out of it.”

Kai proudly displays his grandfather’s many finely detailed, laminated mechanical drawings and schematics for his diverse creations: rotisserie machines of varying sizes, a wheelbarrow more functional than most, even an ingenious (and quite effective) aluminum can crusher.

“I remember when he was making the can crusher. He wouldn’t tell me what he was doing,” Kai reminisced. “We were both working in the workshop. I’d go over to his side of the workshop and say ‘What you doing?’ He’d say “Nothing.’ Then he’d come over to my side and say “What you doing?’ ‘Nothing.’ “

Like two peas in a pod.         

Kai modestly defers any comparison of his building skills to Chu’s, saying, “I can sand real well.”

Kai grew up immersed in a family whose work ethic was heavy on aloha. Photos in Kai’s many cherished family photo albums illustrate this point.

There’s the faded 40-year-old photo of the Chinese-Hawaiian Chu and his wife standing near an impressive mound of about 2,000 lau lau that had just been unearthed from the pit which they had been steamed.

Then there’s the photo taken in 2000 of the tall, lean and still-vigorous Chu welding his latest creation in the workshop. “He was welding up until he was 84,” Kai said. “And he had steady hands.”

Kai’s full-time job as a Kauai County lifeguard at two county pools and at Kauai High School keeps him busy during the week. Occasionally he’ll teach water safety classes to children, bringing his own inventiveness to lesson plans.

“Sometimes I’ll bring a real octopus, a lobster or sea urchin,” he said. He makes the children clean the octopus and put it on his fish box for drying.

“I was taught by my grandfather if you can hold somebody’s interest, that’s the main thing,” Kai said. “And you’ve gotta have imagination.”

Continuing the family tradition started by Chu, Kai has catered parties at no cost for years, charging recipients only for the pig and charcoal. His time, upwards of 15 hours per event, has been given freely.

“But I have my manager now,” Kai said, laughing and motioning toward his girlfriend Diane Hughes. Kai said it’s become a bit taxing to continue expending so much time for other people’s parties. He and Hughes have been discussing how much he should charge for his services, but both acknowledge that there’s no way he can charge for all the time he actually spends.

“In order for somebody to do this, you really have to love what you’re doing because it cuts into your weekends,” Kai said. “If you don’t love what you do, it eats you up. But it’s getting more like work.”

“He needs a break now,” said Hughes. “He has so many other projects that need finishing around here that he hasn’t had time for.”

Kai agreed that he’ll take a much-needed break after Taste of Hawaii, but he really has no complaints. “I think we live in the best of times. A touch of the old with the new,” Kai said. “Life is maybe too fast now. But I find myself being real fortunate.”