Among indigenous vegetable productions came first the universal fern-root (_Pteris esculenta_), which was cooked in various ways and made into a kind of bread. Then there was the tap-root of the cabbage-tree palm, yielding a highly farinaceous food when baked; the pith or young shoot of the nikau; the root of the toi; the root of the raupo, and the pollen of the same plant made into bread; the berries of hinau, similarly treated; the flower and fruit of kiekie or tawhera; a species of seaweed boiled with the juice of tupakihi berries, and forming a nutritious jelly; some orchids, green spinach, cresses, and fungi; the inner stems of mamaku or tree-fern; the berries of poroporo, tawa-tawa, koraka, kahi katea, rimu, and other trees. The expressed juice of the tupakihi berry is called by the Maori tutu. It is a pleasantly insipid drink when fresh made, but appears to undergo a slight fermentation when allowed to stand some time, and when mixed with some other ingredient. The seeds are always carefully eliminated from this preparation, as they contain a dangerous narcotic principle. The old Maori say, that in ancient times, before going into battle, they used to eat taro to make them strong and enduring, shark-meat to make them ferocious, and used to drink tutu to make them brave and unflinching. The Maori cooking operations were, in former times, always performed by women and slaves; now, though women are invariably the cooks in the kainga, yet no man considers it beneath him to prepare his own food when obliged to do so. Most of the old methods of cooking have fallen very much into disuse, since the modern Maori possess kettles, iron camp-ovens, billies, and other Pakeha appliances; but still, in remote spots, one may come across a relic of the olden time. The only method of boiling formerly employed was by dropping heated stones into the water contained in a calabash or rind of the hue. Expert as they were in this process, it was still a rather toilsome and ineffective one, and in these days of kettles and pans it is never returned to. Fish and meat were frequently roasted on the clear side of the fire in the ordinary hunters' fashion, but the great national culinary institution was the earth-oven, the kopa or hangi.