On With The Show

Chris Bailey, Wahiawā Value-Added Product Development Center Manager; Chef Lillian Cumic

Honolulu plays host to many important events throughout the year, but none is more vital to the tourism and food industries than the annual Hawai‘i Hotel & Restaurant Show.

In its fifth year, this top-tier hospitality trade event — a partnership between Hawai‘i Lodging & Tourism Association (HLTA) and Honolulu Star-Advertiser with help from sponsors Sysco Hawai‘i, Avendra, Domino’s Hawai‘i, Council for Native Hawaiian Advancement (CNHA), Hawai‘i State Farm Bureau, American Savings Bank and Hawai‘i Gas — is scheduled for June 18-19 (9 a.m.-5 p.m.) at the Neal S. Blaisdell Center Exhibition Hall and Arena.

The showcase, which is expected to draw a record 300-plus exhibitors (hence the need to reserve both the exhibition hall and arena), highlights the best that Hawai‘i and the Pacific Rim have to offer by connecting members of the restaurant, hotel and hospitality industries.

Dennis Francis, president and publisher of Honolulu Star-Advertiser, referred to the upcoming event as “an all-inclusive resource” for vendors, service providers, distributors, travel and food service companies, and pledged support for the hospitality and restaurant sectors and their continued success.

“Working closely with our partners, Hawai‘i’s newspaper is committed to facilitating business and serving our community,” Francis says. “Our team is proud to assist HLTA in its efforts and pleased with the growth of this important industry event.”

New to this year’s show is CNHA’s Pop-Up Mākeke in which Native Hawaiian artists and purveyors will present their locally made products. In addition, graduates of Leeward Community College’s ʻĀina to Mākeke cohort program will also occupy booths and unveil their own creations to the masses. These graduates-turned-entrepreneurs now operate businesses like Farm to Fudge Maui, Alohamade Bites and Galleon Chocolate.

Showgoers can also look forward to live cooking demonstrations from Lillian Cumic, the vegan chef who beat out tens of thousands of other cooks — except one — to finish second in last year’s Taste of Home’s “Favorite Chef” competition. A native of Australia, Cumic moved to the islands in 2018 after spending three decades working in the culinary industry in Sendai, Japan. She is the author of three cookbooks: Hawai‘i A Vegan Paradise (2020), Tasting Hawai‘i Vegan Style (2021) and Hawai‘i Washoku (2023).

For HLTA president and CEO Mufi Hannemann, the 2025 event, with its lineup of new exhibitors and a prominent guest chef, promises “to continue our tradition of excellence.”

“Our goal is to deliver a dynamic expo that provides unparalleled value for exhibitors and attendees alike,” he says.

Among the new faces with tables at this year’s show will be several who successfully completed the food business education program ʻĀina to Mākeke. They include Justin Udom, founder of Pop Culture Artisan Pops, and Katy Tsark, owner of Maui Cocktail Kits.

Both are driven individuals looking for additional avenues for their tasty creations, says Chris Bailey, manager of LCC’s Wahiawā Value-Added Product Development Center (WVAPDC), which provides a setting for program participants like Udom and Tsark to gather, learn topics ranging from food science to e-commerce and develop a stronger skill set as entrepreneurs.

“Justin and his Pop Culture company do really exceptional and seasonal popsicles,” Bailey explains. “They use a lot of local ingredients, a lot of local fruits and things like local honey. They’re delicious, incredible products that Justin already sells in a number of retail stores and even ships to stores on the neighbor islands.”

The beauty of the Hawai‘i Hotel & Restaurant Show, however, is that it grants Udom a forum to showcase his flavorful popsicles in front of a brand-new audience.

“For him to be able to bridge to more of the hospitality industry could create a whole new sales channel … it could create a whole new revenue stream for him,” Bailey adds.

The same holds true for Tsark.

“She does these dehydrated cocktail kits that you infuse in the spirit or liquid of your choice,” Bailey explains. “They’re premium cocktail infusion kits using local fruits, botanicals, herbs and other ingredients, and they’re just delicious. They come in a variety of flavors, but I think that could be something really compelling for the bar program at a resort or a restaurant.”

Bailey is grateful for the annual show because it helps transport ‘Āina to Mākeke students from a classroom setting into a real-world experience, granting these fledgling entrepreneurs and their products greater exposure.

“It’s great to have the class to build skill-sets, but our students are entrepreneurs and an entrepreneur needs a sales opportunity,” he says, adding that the program is a 12-week course that is run in cohorts and is offered two to three times each year. “If we’re going to take them through the rigors of this course and not provide them with the go-to-market opportunity, then it will feel a little incomplete.”

Thankfully, robust opportunities are “what they’ll have at the Hawaiʻi Hotel & Restaurant Show,” he adds.

Much of the credit for the ‘Āina to Mākeke program goes to WVAPDC, a 33,000-square-foot facility that opened a year ago and is equipped with a production kitchen and classroom space. The center is a satellite campus for LCC and services both farmers and entrepreneurs, many of whom also participate in monthly webinars, product development boot camps for early-stage founders and hands-on workshops.

“From our opening ceremony to now, we’ve been able to engage over 1,000 people across all the programs, so that’s really exciting for us,” Bailey explains. “It’s all about Leeward’s effort to build this ecosystem that supports these emerging food and beverage businesses.

“What we’re doing is helping entrepreneurs increase production, do it more efficiently and at a much bigger and faster scale, and that will allow them the best chance to grow and get more local food and beverage products around the state. Ultimately, it could even create a channel for them to export beyond Hawai‘i’s borders,” he adds.

When she was still quite young and growing up in Sydney, Lillian Cumic woke up one day and decided to turn herself into a vegetarian. The decision alarmed her parents so much that they decided to take her to the doctor, who recommended they chop up all meat and disguise it in the youngster’s meals.

Of course, that didn’t work as Cumic still refused to have anything to do with red meat and poultry.

“I would just spit it out,” she recalls. “I would not swallow it.”

Over the years, she continued to refine what she consumed. By age 35, for example, Cumic — who was already well into her career as a chef, running a “dining bar” in Japan and teaching cooking classes there as well — had given up dairy products altogether. And when her dining bar, which started off vegetarian, moved toward plant-based cuisine by its second year, life as a vegan suddenly began to look very appealing to her.

Cumic ultimately closed her dining bar in Sendai and moved to Hawai‘i. Since then, she’s continued sharing her favorite vegan dishes in cookbooks and promoting them as a private chef through exclusive dining experiences.

Lately, she’s been going through a rebrand, a change that includes planning a forthcoming cooking show while still promoting all things vegan.

“Being a vegan is a lifestyle — it’s not just a diet,” explains Cumic, whose personal story can be viewed on YouTube in the Hawai‘i-based docuseries Following Journeys, hosted by Alice Inoue. “This lifestyle stems from mindfulness and being in harmony with the seasons, and all of this reflects in my cooking and how I live my life.

“Moving forward, I’ll be promoting this lifestyle that can change and benefit others and how they approach life — not only by what they put into their mouths as food or nourishment, but how they set up their environment, too.”

This rebranding also consists of Cumic reviving her modeling career, which began in Australia as a child and led to her signing a modeling contract in Japan at age 18. Earlier this month (and following a 16-year hiatus), Cumic modeled for “Peace On Your Wings,” a benefit show staged by fashion designer Anne Namba.  And later this month (May 23), she’ll be one of the featured models at International Fashion Week in Hawai‘i, which will be held at Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikīkī Beach Resort.

Despite being a veteran of the catwalk, Cumic confesses to being anxious about modeling once again.

“It has been a while,” she says. “But when I had a fitting with Anne Namba, she actually told me, ‘Your walk is great.’ I was so glad to hear that.”

What Cumic isn’t on edge about is her part in the upcoming Hawai‘i Hotel & Restaurant Show, where she’ll be conducting cooking demonstrations on how to create vegan sushi and sashimi with a Hawaiian twist.

“I’ll also be walking around from booth to booth and talking to people because, you know, I do like to talk and entertain and do stuff like that,” she says before jokingly adding, “they’re going to give me a mic but, I don’t know, that might be a bit dangerous.”