Summer nights, paper lanterns, drummers, dancers, food! Honolulu's bon dance season kicks off tonight with the big one beneath the looming white stupas of Honpa Hongwanji on Pali Highway, a two-night fest that draws more than 1,000 people a night. It's actually third on the Islandwide schedule, but the first in the urban corridor, and that's where we're concentrating our round-up of the season's best eats.

No two temples are alike. With members chipping in closely guarded recipes, scouring the island for the freshest ingredients and even importing ideas from Japan, a handful of temples are known as much for their food as for their dances, taiko drumming and live festival music from the central yagura towers.

A few things they all have in common. Bon is Japanese Buddhism's season to honor the dead, a huge three-day holiday that to this day empties out cities in August as Japanese head home to the countryside. In Hawai'i, plantation workers organized summer bon dances in the cane fields, but with all the sake flowing around, temples took over and spread the events from June through September.

Today bon dances are like carnivals, good times for families and communities, where non-Japanese, tourists, even the most uncoordinated uncle who shows up everywhere in T-shirt and rubber slippers, are invited to jump in. The movements are simple and repetitive, happy and hypnotic: People are smiling, arms waving, feet stepping in unison with hundreds of others under lanterns and stars.

And the dances? Everything from traditional country favorites like Tanko Bushi, a coal-mining number that draws even the most dance-challenged; to the fun, lilting movements of Okinawan dances; to newer stuff like Electric Slide and Pokemon Ondo. If you know nothing about bon dancing, follow the moves of the inner circles, where dance troupes in identical yukata lead the numbers.

That's another thing: You don't need a yukata or happi coat to dance, although many temples sell them.

The formal silk kimono hanging on your wall has no place here — happi and yukata are strictly cotton, thin and cool for summer. Ask one of the yukata-clad ladies how to fasten your obi: Chances are they've come early to help each other tie the intricate sashes, or have already taught this to their granddaughters.

Through the evening, different troupes will take turns in the red-and-white yagura or tower, playing bamboo flutes, hand gongs and shamisen while others pound the taiko drums below.

The whole air of a bon dance is happy: Temple members hang the lanterns to welcome home the dead, and some will be dancing hatsu-bon for family lost within the year. Haleiwa Jodo Mission takes tradition full circle, ending with a toro nagashi, a floating of candlelit lanterns on the sea to guide the spirits back to their world.

It's a good way to say hello to those who have gone before, no? Now, here's the rundown on the best bon dance eats in town:

HONPA HONGWANJI

(Today, Saturday)

No question the most talked-about item is the ... corn? It's Kunia Super Sweet, crisp and fresh, picked at Aloun Farms the morning of the bon dance and delivered by temple member Morris Moribe. It comes boiled and dipped in butter with salt or furikake — or, as Moribe suggests, "It's so fresh you can chill it a little and eat it raw."

New this year will be shortbread brownies, a recipe Lee Ann Wong got off her Hawaiian Electric bill that has become a favorite at temple events. Also popular: short-rib beef stew, which typically sells out before 8; Chinese fried pretzels; and Spam musubi with sweet-salty sanbaizuke and furikake.

Temple ladies sell used yukata and fans and will dress kids in traditional bon costumes for picture-taking at a Bontique bazaar. Park in the lot behind the temple, on the other side of Pali Highway or at Kawananakoa Intermediate School.

KAILUA HONGWANJI

(July 18)

Kailua's claim to food fame lies in its top-selling chili and plate lunch, which comes with a teriyaki stick, hot dog, potato salad, rice and tsukemono. Mitch Shimamura of the Hawaii Eisa Shinyu Kai Okinawan dance troupe says when competing bon dances on the same night force his troupe to split in two, he always chooses Kailua. "I think this is my favorite out of them all," he says. "You're dancing on the grass, under the stars. It has a real nice country feel."

Park at the temple or Kailua Elementary School.

JIKOEN HONGWANJI

(July 24-25)

At Jikoen, it's a given that everybody goes for the andagi. Other long lines form for the fried noodles and the dinner plate, with teriyaki beef, chicken or kalbi, that Kunia Super Sweet corn, takuan, rice and Okinawan sweet- potato pie with a layer of haupia on top. Banana lumpia made by Jikoen's preschool teachers is also popular. Park at the temple or nearby Kapalama Elementary School.

KOGANJI TEMPLE

(July 31-Aug. 1)

The secret here is all in Bishop Jikyu Rose's touch. It's her teriyaki that's brushed on the grilled corn, her special sauce that seasons the yakisoba fried noodles, her potato salad that goes inside the crispy-hot croquettes. The 82-year-old bishop stands in the kitchen, throwing in ingredients without measuring, stirring, tasting, directing. "We just carry the pots," says Sandy Gon-Hata.

Also popular: mochi made by members at New Year's, boiled and seasoned with sweet kinako roasted soy powder or a sugar-shoyu glaze, and the spare rib plate lunch, which people line up for before the bon dance starts. Park at the temple or on surrounding streets.

SHINGON MISSION

(Aug. 7-8)

Tucked next to a McDonald's parking lot on Sheridan Street, tiny Shingon Mission set its sights on gastronomic glory when year after year, the bon dance schedule put them in direct competition with Koganji for townie crowds. Now it's eased up: The two temples no longer go head to head on the same weekend, but the heavily Japanese identity Shingon carved for itself has stuck. "Our theme is country bon dance in the city," says the Rev. Reyn Tsuru. "It's not just barbecue sticks and saimin."

Shingon is the only temple we know of selling kushidango, mochi balls grilled on a stick and glazed with sweetened shoyu. It features a bar where a chef makes nigiri sushi to order. Recently it debuted a popular make-your-own poke booth.

A new 4-H tent this year will sell $10 boxes of farm-fresh vegetables and local eggs. Park for free in the nearby HMSA building or on side streets.

OKINAWAN FESTIVAL

(Sept. 5)

This mammoth festival's closing-night bon dance at Kapi'olani Park marks the end of the urban season, although the final-final dance isn't until two weeks later at the Hawaii United Okinawa Center in Waipi'o. The key to good eats is to get here early. The bon dance starts at 5:30 p.m., but most food booths close at 6, except for the andagi and Okinawan soba booths. What do you want? Andagi, of course, and the chewy-thick soba. And you absolutely have to try the shoyu pork, big, chunky and still almost melting between your chopsticks.

Parking? Don't even worry about it. Just head straight for the massive lot at Kapi'olani Community College.

2009 O'AHU BON DANCE SCHEDULE

Today-Saturday: Honpa Hongwanji, Hawaii Betsuin, 6:30 p.m., 536-7044.

Today-Saturday:: Wahiawa Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 622-4320.

July 3-4: Moiliili Community Center/Moiliili Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 949-1659.

July 3: Kaneohe Higashi Hongwanji, 6:30 p.m., 247-2661.

July 10-11: Waipahu Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 677-4221.

July 11: Tendai Mission, 7 p.m., 595-2556.

July 11-12: Koboji Shingon Mission, 7 p.m., 841-7033.

July 17-18: Shinshu Kyokai Mission, 7:30 p.m., 973-0150.

July 17-18: Haleiwa Shingon Mission, 8 p.m., 637-4423.

July 18: Kailua Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7 p.m., 262-4560.

July 18: Waianae Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7 p.m., 622-4320.

July 24-25: Jikoen Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 6 p.m., 845-3422.

July 24-25: Palolo Higashi Hongwanji, 7:30 p.m., 732-1491.

July 24-25: Haleiwa Jodo Mission, 7 p.m., 637-4382.

July 24-25: Wahiawa Ryusenji Soto Mission, 7:30 p.m., 622-1429.

July 25: Kahuku Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 293-5268.

July 31-Aug 1: Higashi Hongwanji Betsuin, 7:30 p.m., 531-9088.

July 31-Aug. 1: Manoa Koganji Temple, 5:30 p.m.; 988-7214.

July 31-Aug. 1: Waipahu Soto Zen Temple Taiyoji, 7 p.m., 671-3103.

Aug. 1: Waialua Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 625-0925.

Aug. 7-8: Shingon Mission of Hawaii, 7 p.m., 941-5663.

Aug. 7-8: Pearl City Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 455-1680.

Aug. 7-8: Soto Mission of Aiea-Taiheiji, 7:30 p.m., 488-6794.

Aug. 14-15: Soto Mission of Hawaii, 7:30 p.m., 537-9409.

Aug. 21-22: Mililani Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7:30 p.m., 625-0925.

Aug. 22: Kapahulu Senior Center, 5 p.m., 737-1748.

Aug. 29: Nichiren Mission of Hawaii, 6:30 p.m., 595-3517.

Aug. 29: Aiea Hongwanji Buddhist Temple, 7 p.m., 488-5685.