A small Hawaii bakery is turning imperfect local fruit into jams, cupcakes, and cake mixes, and is about to start shipping nationwide — good news for the island's small farmers.

• Aloha Bites buys "B-grade" fruit that grocery stores won't take, like bruised starfruit and lilikoi, and cooks it into jams and jellies, cutting waste and giving farmers a buyer for produce they'd otherwise lose.
• The business started in 2020 as a way to support struggling local farms during the pandemic, and has since grown into cakes, mini cupcakes, and a breadfruit-based cooking mix made with chef Sam Choy.
• Its starfruit pepper jelly won a Good Food award this year, and its products use natural food coloring, with the breadfruit mix being vegan and gluten-free.
• The company is joining Goldbelly, the nationwide online food-delivery platform, in October, putting Hawaii-made jams and cupcakes in front of buyers across the U.S.

Outlook: The Goldbelly launch could turn a farmers-market operation into a mainland brand, giving Hawaii growers a bigger outlet for surplus fruit.