Huli Huli Chicken Hawaiian Culture Shirt - Aloha Tee, Hawaii Heritage Gift, Pacific Islander

Huli huli chicken — split birds turning slowly over a long open grill, basted with shoyu, ginger, garlic, brown sugar. The word huli means "to turn," and the chicken does, all afternoon, until the skin caramelizes into something sticky and incredible.

Huli huli chicken was invented in 1955 by Ernest Morgado on O'ahu, who grilled hundreds of birds for a Pa'ia Farm Bureau fundraiser using his mother's teriyaki-style marinade. He called it "huli huli" — the cooks would shout the word across the grill to signal it was time to flip the racks. The dish became a beloved fundraiser staple all across the islands; today every weekend, you'll see roadside huli huli setups on the Big Island, Maui, and Kaua'i, raising money for schools, churches, and canoe clubs, the smoke visible from a half-mile away.

For locals, this tee is the smell of weekend fundraiser smoke drifting across a parish parking lot. For visitors, it's the memory of buying a half-chicken in a foil tray from a teenager with a clipboard and eating it on the hood of your rental car.

Soft unisex tee. Multiple sizes and colorways available.