Taro cultivar. Wairuaārangi.
Māori names
Māori names
Food
Taro cultivar grown and used in the North - Bay of Islands, Hokianga and Kaitaia - and on the East Coast and in Hawkes Bay. A sweet, grateful kind, having a flesh of a peculiar pink tinge. Used for noble or welcome visitors (Colenso 1880).
Name means `Reflection-from-(the)-sky': "meaning, the light reddish-pink tint, as sometimes thrown of an evening over the features of the eastern landscape from a glowing sunset; also, the more distant, faint, reddish hues of the rare ends of an aurora australis."
In 1845, Colenso stayed at Mataikona, near Castle Point. Talked with one of the oldest chiefs about the taro plant, and its varieties. Chief said he had long ago seen and cultivated the sort Wairuaārangi, but that it had long been lost to them. Chief said of its colour "I tu-a-kowhewhero tona kiko" (meaning its flesh was pinkish) (Colenso 1881b)
