Karewe

Sap from the coconut flower

Karewe is collected from the flower stalk of the coconut palm before the sheath around it opens. A chapter on atoll agroforestry on Tarawa and Abemama, published by the United Nations University, describes how the flower spathes of selected trees are cut, bound and tapped twice a day, in the morning and the afternoon, giving roughly two coconut shells of sap a day.

A step-by-step account of the work comes from the Banaban community of Rabi Island in Fiji: an essay by Linda Karakaua, then a senior student at Rabi High School, which won second place in the 1995 Banaban Literary Prize and was reposted on Banaban Voice in 2021. It describes the cutter binding the flower stalk with cord, cutting off its tip and hanging a container, te ibu, below it, with a piece of frond guiding the sap in and another covering the opening against insects. Morning and evening he climbs up, takes down the full container and shaves a thin new slice from the stalk. The flow is small for about the first four days and then increases.

The practice also reached other islands. The Sikaiana Archives, an anthropologist's record of life on Sikaiana in Solomon Islands, note that toddy cutting and the fermenting of the sap were learned there from Kiribati (Gilbertese) people who were brought to the atoll in the 1800s; there too the sap is tapped twice a day.

A daily staple

The United Nations University study calls fresh toddy a dietary staple for most I-Kiribati households, drunk daily, and notes that it matters most in severe droughts, when palms bear few nuts but still yield sap. Citing nutrition research, it describes toddy as rich in energy and vitamin C, with useful amounts of vitamin B and iron.

It is also given to young children and new mothers. In a 2019 study in the journal Nutrients on infant and young child nutrition in Kiribati, caregivers in rural Butaritari included toddy (karawe) in their free lists of young child foods, though it ranked only ninth, and the study also counts toddy among the sugary drinks commonly given to children under two. Health workers urged pregnant and breastfeeding women to drink it to increase breast milk. The Banaban account likewise says the first sap from a newly cut flower is mostly given to infants and nursing mothers.

A University of Auckland article written for Kiribati Language Week in 2026 describes te karewe as a sweet sap harvested from coconut blossoms that remains an important part of everyday life and culture.

Syrup, sugar and sour toddy

Fresh sap goes sour if left; the Banaban account describes lightly boiling it (te katete) so that it keeps until evening. Boiled down for hours, it becomes kamaimai, a thick reddish-brown syrup. The Banaban account describes it being drunk with water or tea, used in place of sugar and eaten like honey on breadfruit or bread, and says it keeps for as long as a year, which has made it a product sold from Tarawa to the outer islands. The Nutrients study similarly describes toddy syrup as condensed coconut sap that is usually diluted with water, and the UNU chapter mentions toddy molasses used to sweeten other foods.

Left to stand, karewe ferments. The University of Auckland gives the name kaokioki for this traditional alcoholic drink, while the Banaban account calls it kamanging and says it is ready after two or three days standing, or in 12 to 18 hours if fresh sap goes into a container that still holds old sap. The UNU chapter notes that the fermented drink varies in strength and is rich in vitamin B.