Locals Only

Nearly all the food served at Hawaiian hotels is imported. Chef Isaac Bancaco is on an obsessive one-man mission to change that.

- By Sarah Z. Wexler

MOST MORNINGS, Isaac Bancaco starts his day by grabbing his speargun and donning a thin wetsuit printed with a camouflage pattern to blend in with the reef. He’ll take a deep breath and descend 40 feet in the balmy waters on the west side of Maui. On one recent dive, he’d been down for about a minute when he spotted a school of uhu, bright green and blue parrotfish. He thought briefly of his Hawaiian-Chinese-Filipino a grandmother, Lani, the best skin diver in the family. Then he took careful aim and pulled the trigger, nailing his target.

Back on the beach, Bancaco, the executive chef at the Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort, showed his catch to his friends— local fishermen who offer him first dibs on their freshest catches of uhu, Palani (surgeonfish), ono (wahoo), mahi-mahi (dorado), ahi (yellowfin tuna), opakapaka (pink snapper), uku (blue-green snapper), and hapu'u pulu (sea bass), all to prepare and serve to hotel guests.