LuCI Value, -- custom -- option displayed as "undefined"

I am porting some code into a luci-app from my luci-proto module which is using CBI Value classes (https://github.com/openwrt/luci/wiki/CBI) to create a dropdown menu in which the final option, displaying -- custom -- would turn into a text field if selected. My problem is in the luci-app version I have achieved same functionality, but instead of showing -- custom -- in the dropdown for the final option it shows undefined.

I think it's possibly a missing dependency in the luci-app context as opposed to the proto, but I don't know where to look to fix it. I have already grep'd for -- custom -- in the source code which mainly showed me translation files.