The aroma of freshly sliced pineapple and dragonfruit, along with the faint notes of a Mariah Carey song, wafted onto the street from Big Island Juice Co. on Waianuenue Avenue. Inside, people sipped smoothies blended inside coconut halves. A hand-lettered
The aroma of freshly sliced pineapple and dragonfruit, along with the faint notes of a Mariah Carey song, wafted onto the street from Big Island Juice Co. on Waianuenue Avenue. Inside, people sipped smoothies blended inside coconut halves. A hand-lettered menu on the wall described the ingredients of Bombay Bowls, Avo Bowls, Jawaiian Bowls, Tornado Turkey Sandwiches, and Kaletastic Salads. Opposite the menu wall stood a refrigerator full of cold-pressed juices made the night before.
Two customers walked out the door, one still holding his coconut half.
“Thanks guys,” he said to owners Lokelani (Loki) and Camu Wentzel. “We’ll be back shortly.”
A few tables and bamboo chairs were tucked alongside the storefront, next to a sandwichboard sign that read, in bright green lettering, “We are FINALLY OPEN.”
After months of selling their juices at farmer’s markets and health food stores around the island, all while working to finalize their menu, secure county permits, and renovate the shambles of the storefront they’d rented, the Wentzels officially opened the doors of Big Island Juice Co. on Jan. 1.
“We didn’t plan on that,” Camu, 31, said of the auspicious date. “That was kind of funny.”
They didn’t initially plan to open a juice bar and restaurant, either.
Sketched in basic terms, the Big Island Juice Co. story is one of two people falling in love in the big city, having a baby, and deciding to start a business together so they could provide a good life for their son.
Fill in the details and the story becomes less typical. He’s from Finland, she’s from Pahoa. She’s a holistic nutritionist with a background as a raw vegan chef and he toured the world as the frontman of Finnish band Naked.
It’s not surprising that their paths crossed in New York City.
When they first met, Camu said, he was sick all the time, prompting Loki to put him on a juice cleanse.
“Suddenly he became the juice man,” Loki remembered. Camu began working for Juice Press, a New York-based company with locations in Greenwich, Conn., and Boston. Loki, meanwhile, was playing around with how to create the perfect acai bowl.
“I was always wishing, ‘Man, I wish I could get fresh lilikoi, I wish I could get fresh this, fresh that — we could make them so much more awesome if we were in Hawaii,’” she said. “If you want to buy a dragonfruit (in New York), they’re $15.”
By the time son Makani was four months old, they had decided to move to Hilo and open up their own place.
The Wentzels landed on the Big Island last March after first spending time in Finland.
A month later, they rented the storefront. Camu began constructing all of the interior decor.
The only things that aren’t handmade are the tall bamboo chairs at the tiki bar.
Camu also built a stage in the back, ostensibly for music performances, but mostly as a loading zone for the deliveries of hundreds of coconuts that are dropped off each week.
Loki sources her ingredients locally as much as she can (she won’t buy local kale because of the potential for rat lungworm disease), and tries to buy organic when possible.
“We have this abundance of beautiful fruits and veggies,” she said. “(The menu) is kind of like a celebration of that.”
It also draws on the couple’s previous experiences. The Bombay Bowl, for instance, was inspired by Camu’s time in India when he was on tour.
“People know about curry,” he said. “But they don’t know how many kinds of curries are out there.”
In the past few weeks, Big Island Juice Co.’s social media accounts have taken off, perhaps because Loki is committed to making food that looks as good in real life as it does in digital form. What you see on Instagram is what you get, she said. No filters needed.
“We have a lot of repeat customers,” Loki said. Neither she nor her husband expected the business to jump out of the gate as it did, keeping both owners as well as the restaurant’s seven employees on their toes.
Lunch rushes are “insane,” Loki said. “A madhouse.”
At night, the space becomes a juice factory.
“We sell about 100 juices every day,” Camu said.
“That means when we close the doors (of the restaurant) we make cold-pressed juice for 6 hours, start to finish. If someone is commited to doing a juice cleanse, that means they want to change their life. If we can assist them in that journey, that’s awesome, that puts a smile on our face. Just like handing a young boy or girl a coconut with a straw on it puts a smile on our face.”
“Fresh,” “wholesome,” and “healthy” come up quite a bit in conversation with the Wentzels, but so does the word “indulgence” and the phrase “tastes good.”
“I want people who I grew up with, and their families, to also be treated well, just like how tourists are,” Loki said.
The music inside had switched to a slide guitar song.
“Our main thing is we want to have fun,” Camu said, describing days when little kids, including Makani, now 1 1/2-years-old, danced around the restaurant.
“I wish I could have gone to a place like this growing up,” he said.
“I would have come here.”
Email Ivy Ashe at iashe@hawaiitribune-herald.com.
