Category Archives: Culinary

NYT’s take on açaí in Belém

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From The Good Blood, I saw an article she posted from the NYT on açaí from Belém. I’m surprised and pleased to say the NYT writer Seth Kugel did a great job on accuracy in the article, especially when he said the following…

“The velvety texture of the thicker varieties is wonderful, but the taste is more — how to put this? — earthy. O.K., it tastes like dirt. Making matters worse, the manioc flour that’s often mixed in to thicken it has the consistency of sand.”

I’m also glad the writer mentioned Cairu ice cream store because that’s the only place that I found great (cough*Rio style*cough) açaí, even if it was a little more pricey for what you get. Cairu also sells a flavor called ‘paraense’ which is açaí with tapioca balls mixed in, which I personally think dilutes the flavor.

On Eyes on Brazil, I’ve talked about açaí a few times already. You can find out what I think here (in general), here (while living in Belém) and even here (on açaí in the US).

Pitaia – Tastes like kiwi’s cousin

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Pitaia, or Dragon Fruit (also known as ‘strawberry pear’), is native to tropical regions and actually comes from a cactus. Taste-wise, it’s not too sweet but due to the tiny black seeds, it looks a bit (on the inside) and tastes a bit like a kiwi.

The red flesh version shown in the first picture above is called a Costa Rican Pitaya in English. Other versions include the Red Pitaya which has red skin and white flesh while the Yellow Pitaya has yellow skin and white flesh. All three are quite high in vitamins and minerals.

CucaBrazuca’s Quindim Recipe

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Doing the post yesterday on the Brazilian dessert called Cartola made me think of others…

The site where the video came from is called CucaBrazuca. In case you are unfamiliar with the method used to cook the quindim over water, it is known in Brazil as “banho maria” (from ‘bagno-maria’ in Italian), which allows the substance being cooked to cook in a slow and uniform manner.

“The heavy use of egg yolks is characteristic of many Portuguese sweets and pastries, such as the papo de anjo (“angel’s double chin”) and fios de ovos (“egg threads”). Their combination with coconut and sugar was probably created by African slaves in 17th century Brazilian Northeast, where coconuts were abundant and sugar (from sugarcane) was a major industry.

The word itself comes from a Bantu language, and originally meant “the gestures, or demeanor, or humor characteristic of adolescent girls.” – Wikipedia

Cartola – A dessert I would’ve eventually invented

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Again, at Street Smart Brazil, there’s a post on desserts from Pernambuco and one caught my eye. It’s the cartola and although I don’t add chocolate, it’s something I’ve been doing for years without knowing it had a name. My invention just followed a grilled cheese, banana and cinnamon sandwich I used to get at the lanchonetes in Rio, only I wouldn’t use bread in the recreation.

“One of my favorite desserts is Cartola: sliced fried banana with queijo mateiga or coalho (two types of very delicious Brazilian cheese), topped with with cinnamon and chocolate. Oh it is so good! It is one of those things that you have to try; the list of ingredients may not sound that exciting, but the dish is fantastic. In fact, the state of Pernambuco has been discussing the idea of officially recognizing Cartola as cultural heritage.”

Cartola Sobremesa Recife Pernambuco < Cartola

from the blog Cozinha Cani.

For more Pernambucan desserts, go here!

Brazilian Mint Tea effective painkiller

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“A cup of Brazilian mint tea has pain relieving qualities to match those of commercially available analgesics, a study suggests. Hyptis crenata has been prescribed by Brazilian healers for millennia to treat ailments from headaches and stomach pain to fever and flu. Working on mice, a Newcastle University team has proved scientifically that the ancient medicine men were right.

The study is published in the journal Acta Horticulturae. In order to mimic the traditional treatment as closely as possible, the Newcastle team carried out a survey in Brazil to find out how the medicine is typically prepared and how much should be consumed. The most common method was to produce a decoction. This involves boiling the dried leaves in water for 30 minutes and allowing the liquid to cool before drinking it as a tea.” – BBC (more here)

Finding açaí in Belém – Observations

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You would naturally assume that finding the dark purple color of açaí in Belém would be as omnipresent as the color green in the trees, especially since açaí comes from this region…but you’d be slightly mistaken (if what you were looking for was the cold and delicious kind).

In Rio, you can find açaí (na tigela, or in the bowl) in many places, from lanchonetes (snack bars) to carrinhos (karts) on the street corner but in Belém, it can be found in a specific store (usually either called Casa do Açaí or Ponto do Açaí) selling only açaí by the liter. At places where you can eat açaí right then and there, such as at Ver-o-peso market, the açaí comes warm, sugarless and bland. I would say “don’t fret, there are ways to make it taste better!” but even those things (such as ice cubes, tapioca balls and sugar) don’t do much for my tongue.


(from the blog ‘Sabores do Pará’)

Another option for getting your fix is the ice-cream shop, where it is sold by the bola (scoop, which I would guess equals around 100ml) at a price that would get me 300-600ml in Rio, depending on where I was. Also, in some supermarkets in Pará such as Líder, it is sold as pulp in thin clear plastic packages for a bit of a better price.

I never did find açaí na tigela here (in Belém), but the many scoops of ice cream I did try were just as good if not better than any place in Rio!

California’s Sambazon goes fair-trade

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“California-based Sambazon, a supplier of the Brazilian Amazon açaí juice, has now been certified as Fair Trade in Brazil. The certification by Ecocert, a global control and certification organization, guarantees that Sambazon ensures fair labor conditions and wages for workers, promotes environmentally sustainable farming methods and reinvests money into the community.” – Brazzil (more here)

food_bocaditos

I’ve gone through *a lot* of açaí drinks in the US in my quest to find something, anything that resembles the good purple stuff I wolf down when in Brazil and I’m almost always disappointed. However, Sambazon, makes a worthy case and while I do enjoy their curvy little bottled drinks (even if they are just a tiny bit too expensive), their açaí sorbet is great! It’s best to wait until it melts a little bit before diggin in so you can pretend its a little more like a smoothie and while I still haven’t quite figured out what “Rio Style” means, I’m sure it probably helps with getting newcomers to give it a try. Good job, Sambazon!

Gourmet Diary of a Foodie – Brazil

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Interesting that I first saw this a few days before moving across the country for school and I really wanted to know more about this program. A lil’ random research later and violá. Here’s the 24-minute Brazil episode!

“Foreign chefs settle and blend their own cultural traditions with indigenous recipes in Brazil.”

Unfortunately, Hulu hasn’t learned how to play nice with other countries so the show is only available to US audiences.

Fruit terms in Portuguese

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General Fruits

Apple – Maçã
Avocado – Abacate
Banana – Banana
Blackberry – Amora silvestre
Cherry – Cereja
Grape – Uva
Lime – Limão (or Limão-verde)
Lemon* – Limão (or Limão-amarelo/siciliano)
Mango – Manga
Orange – Laranja
Papaya – Mamão
Peach – Pêssego
Pear – Pêra
Pinapple – Abacaxi
Plum – Ameixa
Strawberry – Morango
Tomato – Tomate
Watermelon – Melancia

* – In Brazil lemon is limão-siciliano, Mexican (Key) lime is limão-galego, Tahiti (Persian) lime is limão-taiti and Rangpur lime is limão-cravo. Bearss (Siciliano) is grown in the hot and humid climate of Brazil for the same reasons it is the main variety in Florida. Whereas Mexican and Tahiti limes are better suited to the climate and therefore much more common in everyday use, the ‘Siciliano’ lemon is a specialty food item in Brazil, much appreciated for its fragrance. Most of the crop is eaten fresh, some of it is used for rind oil.

Brazilian Fruits

Açaí
Acerola – Barbados Cherry
Cacau* – Cocoa
Caju – Cashew fruit
Coco da Bahia* – Coconut
Cupuaçu
Goiaba – Guava
Jaca – Jackfruit
Maracujá – Passionfruit

It is estimated there are 312 kinds of Brazilian fruit, although only 6 kinds are widely cultivated (subtract Jaca and Acerola from the list above). Among the stranger kinds, there are names like banana-de-macaco, marôlo, araticum-cagão, taperebá, cariota-de-espinho, pau-alazão, marajá and fruta-de-ema. One strange sounding fruit isn’t mentioned though, it’s the ‘oiti-da-baía‘, which although the favorite fruit of Dom Pedro II, is extinct.

* – Cacau, while translated as ‘cocoa’ is not chocolate-flavored as the seeds from the cacau are what make the chocolate.

* – Coco da Bahia is a Brazilian coconut variety. The origin of coconuts in general is not known. Coconuts received the name from Portuguese explorers, the sailors of Vasco da Gama in India, who first brought them to Europe. The brown and hairy surface of coconuts reminded them of a witch called coco (that used to be represented as a carved vegetable lantern). When coconuts arrived in England, they retained the name and -nut was added.

Fruit-related terms

Pulp – Pulpa
Seed* – Caroço
Skin/Peel – Casca
Vine* – Vinho (or Videira)

* – Semente also means ‘seed’, but in a general sense. It is not used for what is found immediately inside a fruit, that’s a caroço, while the semente is protected by the caroço. In summation, caroços are hard but it’s the sementes that germinate.

* – Vinho can also mean wine.