A Contradiction in Terms? Vegetarian, Organic Feijoada Arrives

Properly made, a plate of feijoada, Brazil's most popular candidate for the status of "national dish", is a vegetarian's nightmare. Centered around a bubbling pot of black beans laden with chunks of all the fattest, greasiest parts of the pig, feijoada must seem like the devil's dish itself to someone who eschews animal-derived food. The cauldron that is the centerpiece of a feijoada table is likely to contain, hidden under the glossy, pitch-black surface of the beans, things like fat links of sausage, racks of smoked ribs, salted pig's tails, ears and feet - anything and everything that's full of animal flesh and fat.

But the love of feijoada runs deep indeed in Brazil, and even vegetarians and veganBrazilians can't imagine living a feijoada-less existence. In São Paulo, at least, they no longer have to. A small enterprise called  Comida & Consciência (Food and Consciousness in English), in the city's upmarket Higienópolis neighborhood, has come to their rescue. Every Saturday (the traditional day for eating feijoada) the owners of Comida & Consciência make organic, vegetarian feijoada for their loyal customers, thus allowing those folks to share in Brazil's weekend ritual of feijoada.

Comida & Consciência is in the business of making and delivering home-cooked ready-to-eat vegetarian meals to their customers' apartments, houses or offices. Because many of their customers get their meals delivered every day from the shop, there are no repetitions on the monthly menu - except for feijoada, that is. It, by popular demand, is available every Saturday. Originally started by two friends who shared a common interest in healthy, organic eating and who began sharing their vegetarian dishes with likeminded friends, Comida & Consciência has become a way for the two women to share not only their philosophy of food, but also, as they say, their "consciousness of life."

Comida & Consciência's feijoada contains black beans, of course, but instead of cooking the legume with smoked pork products, their vegetarian version uses smoked tofu, soya cutlets, zucchini, parsley stalks, beets and strips of dried coconut to give the beans depth and richness. The beans are accompanied by traditional accompaniments - rice, sauteed kale and toasted oat flour, which stands in for the traditional toasted manioc flour. All the ingredients are organic, and the dish is completely vegan. Each serving of feijoada costs R$20,00, or just USD $10 at current exchange rates, plus a small delivery charge which varies depending on distance.

Lighter, less heavy and much healthier than traditional feijoada, Comida & Consciência's feijoada might just be the proof (literal in this case) of making a silk purse out of a sow's ear.

With material from the food section of Estado de S. Paulo newspaper,

Four Hundred Caipirinhas Later....

So how do you think you'd feel after drinking four hundred caipirinhas? Actually, make that four hundred caipirinhas in thirteen days - an average of about thirty cocktails per day. You'd probably feel just like Robert Scott Utley, an American tourist in Rio de Janeiro, felt recently as he was being carted away in the paddy wagon after skipping out on his hotel bill. Nauseated, confused and embarrassed - and probably just a little bit relieved that the binge was finally over.

Robert Scott Utley

Mr. Utley, aged 63, who surely deserves a mention in the Guinness Book of World Records for his prodigious caipirinha-drinking capacity, was arrested at Rio de Janeiro's Tom Jobim International Airport on May 10 when he was trying to catch a Delta Airlines flight to the United States. The manager of the hotel in Rio's Copacabana district where Mr. Utley had spent the previous 13 nights became suspicious when the tourist booked an airport car without settling his account. He called the police when Mr. Utley left the hotel without paying his room charges, and they obliged him by arresting Mr. Utley upon his arrival at the airport.

Utley didn't skip on just his bar tab, he left without paying any of his hotel bill, which totalled R$14,488, or about USD $7500. The charge for caipirinhas alone, which cost R$15 each at the hotel, was R$6000, or USD $3000.

According to an article in the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper, after being arrested, the tourist was taken before a magistrate who charged him, and then let him go free on bail, as there were no provisions under Brazilian law to detain him until trial. After signing a note promising to appear before a Brazilian court whenever summoned, he was released and taken to the city's American Consulate. His passport was not taken nor was he forbidden to leave Brazil, and the consulate refuses to say if he has left Brazil or not.

The newspaper article says that Mr. Utley's defense for skipping out was that his credit card had been counterfeited and cancelled, and he couldn't pay his bill. So he decided to return to the United States and send payment from there. But, according to Mr. Utley's statement, lack of funds wasn't the only reason for leaving the hotel on the QT. He told police that although he had reserved the hotel for fourteen days, he left on the thirteenth day because he was having heart problems due to his seven bypass grafts and wanted to get back quickly to the US for treatment.

Let's do a little calculating here. Four hundred caipirinhas in thirteen days with seven bypass grafts. That works out to just about four caipirinhas per graft per day. That's a serious thirst and an impressive feat. Too bad it all went south before he got on that plane to the USA. Besides, what was he thinking trying to catch a Delta flight to the US? Delta doesn't even serve caipirinhas as far as we know!

Floods in Rio de Janiero State - How You Can Help

News media around the world have recently been giving a good deal of coverage to the tragic situation in the mountain regions of the Brazilian state of Rio de Janeiro. Torrential downpours have caused massive flooding and a large number of mudslides that have killed at least 700 people and have destroyed the homes and livelihoods of thousands. It is the largest natural disaster in Brazil in the past forty years, and perhaps, by the time the final count is made, the largest natural disaster in the history of the country.

Here in Brazil, donations of money, food, clothing and shelter have been making their way to help those in dire need in the cities of Teresópolis, Petrópolis, Novo Friburgo, and other smaller towns in the alpine region, only 100 km. from the city of Rio de Janeiro. Information on how and where to donate is available everywhere - in the internet, on the radio and TV, and in newspapers and magazines.

For readers of Flavors of Brazil who are not in Brazil but who would like to help in the relief efforts, we suggest that you make a donation for a charitable organization called ShelterBox, headquartered in the UK, but with offices in many countries of the world. They specialize in rapid-action teams who move directly into distaster-struck regions and aid local workers in any number of ways. They currently have a team on the ground in the Brazilian disaster area. On the ShelterBox website, there are links to all the offices in various countries, with information on how to donate. According to the USA-based Charity Navigator Rating, ShelterBox is a highly reliable agency, with over 81% of money donated being spent used in program expenses, and only about 18% divided between administration and fundraising expenses. A copy of the repost of ShelterBox is available here. Flavors of Brazil urges all its reader to do whatever they can to help the people who have been devastated by floods and landslides in Rio de Janeiro state.

Thank you. Muito obrigado.

Eating Locally in Brazil

The first decade of the 21st century saw the birth of the locavore movement in many scattered corners of the world - a combination of ecological, sociological and heath philosophies that averred that eating food from "one's own backyard" made sense in any number of ways. Food that hadn't travelled 3000 miles or more from the farmer's field to the family dinner table was heathier, supported a sustainable community of farmers, and was better for the environment. Popularized by the international Slow Food movement, in books such as "The 100 Mile Diet", on TV programs, in newpapers and magazines and on the internet, the locavore movement has become a component of our contemporary zeitgeist.

A recent article in my local newpaper here in Fortaleza, O Diário do Nordeste, provided some interesting statistics about "eating locally" in the state of Ceará. It seems that this state in Brazil's northeast is doing a good job of supporting local agriculture and eating local food. What I find interesting is the supposition that this is not the result of a locavore revolution, but rather the continuation of traditional practices of food sourcing. I do notice in supermarkets in Fortaleza that local products are beginning to be highlighted as such, but I think that most local residents eat locally because that is the way they have always assured good quality, low price and reasonable availability.

The article points out that the family farm still provides the bulk of the food consumed in Ceará. Approximately two-thirds of all food that arrives at the family table in Ceará originates on family farms. I'm sure that this is a significantly higher percentage than in most, if not all, metropolitan areas in North America and Europe. For example, 82% of the dried beans consumed in Ceará come from family farms, as does 81% of the corn, 78% of the manioc, 64% of the rice, 77% of the pork products and 76% of the milk. In the case of fruits, 55% of total consumption comes from family farms within the state.

The economic pull of agri-business is strong in Brazil, but to date seems to concentrate on the export market, leaving local consumption to local farmers. One fervently hopes that these economic behemoths continue to ignore the domestic market here, so that in the future Brazilians will not have to start all over again to create a sustainable network of local, family-owned farms, as locavores in the Northern Hemisphere are having to do right now.

Good Food in an Unlikely Place

Among the places where one's expectation of a good meal is minimal, certainly the most infamous is at 35,000 feet on board a plane - any plane. Complaints and jokes are airline food are legion, in Brazil as elsewhere in the world. Stale sandwiches, unhealthy packaged snacks, wilted salads - the list goes on and on.

Interestingly, there appears to be a small number of exceptions for this rule, including one in Brazil. The largest catering company at the largest Brazilian airport - LSG Sky Chefs at São Paulo's Guarulhos Airport has been winning a number of prizes internationally for the quality of the in-flight meals they prepare. Granted, to compare airline food with meals served on terra firma will always end to the detriment of "sky-high" cuisine, but when comparing airline food to airline food, LSG Sky Chefs appears to be a winner. In the past few years, LSG's operations at Guarulhos have won prizes as best catering station worldwide from British Airways and Air France. In 2008, LSG São Paulo won the IATA's Catering Quality Assurance Award as the Caterer of the Year.


In a recent edition of FDQ: Food and Drink Quarterly, LSG's Vice-President of sales and program management for Latin America, Andréa Arakaki, spoke about what makes LSG São Paulo different from it's operations at the other 200 airports where it has facitilities. She considers the major difference to be the "hand-made" quality of food prepared at Guarulhos. “Due to the low costs of labor, we rely a lot on people and very few machines for food preparation,” explains Arakaki. “Moreover, unlike Asia, Germany, and the U.S., where LSG Sky Chefs has invested in large plants for the production of frozen food that is then distributed to bases throughout each region, in Latin America, food is still prepared using fresh ingredients. While in North America and Europe customer demand for frozen food is on the rise, the majority of airlines in Latin America still request fresh food. Consequently, at Guarulhos, for example, we have our own butcher, bakery, pastry area, etc. – it’s at these individual work areas that all our food is made.”

Ms. Arakaki also feels that Brazilian culture contributes to the quality of her company's food. She points out that food is an integral part of social culture in Brazil, and that air travel here, although becoming more common day by day, still has a slightly-glamorous cachet. As a consequence, Brazilians' expectations of airline food are higher than in other countries where air travel has had the "glamour" equivalent to bus travel for a very long time. Whatever the reasons, I personally have noticed that food from Guarulhos is a step-up from that from other airports. My usual flight Toronto-São Paulo-Toronto serves better food leaving Brazil for Canada than it does in the other direction. And food on domestic airlines in Brazil, though meager, still exists, along with free beverages, including beer. So it's still possible to say "bom apetite" in the skies of Brazil.

BREAKING NEWS - Brazilian Cookbooks Win International Awards

One of the most prestigious international awards for excellence in cookbook publishing is announced in Paris each February - the Gourmand World Cookbook Awards. Prizes are awarded in a number of categories, and this year there were entries from 136 countries.

Nine Brazilian cookbooks were honored this year,  including a special jury award, and two first place finishes.

The prize for "Best Cookbook Photography in the World" was won by Brasil a Gosto (in English, Brazil to Taste), written by São Paulo chef/author Ana Luisa Trajano, with photographs by Alexandre Schneider. The book is a compendium of regional recipes from 40 Brazilian cities, and the photographs are stunningly beautiful. Not having seen the competing books, I can only say that it would appear to be a prize well-deserved.



Author Edmundo Furtado won the prize for "Best Book in the World for Wine Professionals" with his book 
Copos de Bar e Mesa (Glassware for Bar and Table). This book presents the history and evolution of glassware and stemware for professionals, and includes complete technical details on more than 50 types of glasses, including exact dimensions, and explanations of suitability of each type for specific beverages.

The Special Jury Prize was given to Comida de Tradiçao para Crianças (Traditional Food for Children) from Brazilian publishing house Editora Esplendor, written by Eduardo Sganzerla.

A complete list of all prizes worldwide may be found here, and a list of winning entries from Brazil is here.

Açaí makes the New York Times

In it's February 23rd edition, the New York Times published an interesting article on açaí (pronounced ah-sigh-EE), a fruit of the Amazonian rain forest that has recently become, in the words of the article's author, Seth Kugel, a "Global Super Fruit." (Click here for a link to the article.) Due to its claimed health benefits, açaí is now an ingredient in everything from ice cream to face creams, from pizza crust to Snapple red tea.

In his article, Kugel discusses the rapid and explosive growth in the export market for açaí in the last ten years. In 2000, virtually no açaí was exported from Brazil (380 metric tons only), but by 2009 that figure had grown to 9,400 metric tons. Almost all of that quantity comes from the Amazonian state of Pará, and is exported through its capital, Belém.

Açaí has long been popular throughout Brazil, but it is only in the rain forest regions of Brazil's north that it has been a staple food. In other regions of Brazil it is normally eaten as a health food meal or snack. According to Kugel, it is in the rain forest where the international growth of the açaí market has become a double-edged sword.Açaí producers are finally able to realize a decent profit from the production of the fruit, but at the same time, increased prices make açaí more expensive for local inhabitants, who are often very poor.

When I first ate açaí in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, quite a few years ago, I fell in love with its earthy taste. I considered it one of those Brazilian gastronomic treasures that were hidden from the world outside Brazil, and thought it would stay that way. Today's article in the NYT shows me just how wrong I was. Açaí seemed poised to join Gisele Bundchen, Ronaldinho, the samba and flip-flops as one of Brazil's most popular exports.

BREAKING NEWS - The Caipirinha Popsicle Arrives

According to a recent article in the newspaper Folha de S.Paulo, at a recent food exposition in Madrid famed Spanish chef Fernan Adriá, ownder of El Bulli restaurant, showcased one of his newest culinary creations, the caipirinha popsicle (picolé de caipirinha in Portuguese). The caipirinha, of course, is Brazil's national cocktail, made from cachaça liquor, sugar, lime juice and ice.

In homage to this drink, and using his famous molecular cooking techniques, Adriá recreated the essence of a caipirinha in an inventive hors d'oeuvre. The popsicle is served in a frozen cocktail glass rimmed with crushed ice. The popsicle "sticks", about 1/2 inch thick and 1 1/2 inches long, are made from natural sugar cane and the ingredients of a caipirinha, cachaça, grated lime peel and demerara sugar, are frozen on the stick using liquid nitrogen, a technique invented by Adriá. Finally the popsicles are sprinkled with citric acid crystals, and placed in the frozen glass for serving. Guests are instructed to chew the sugar cane topped with the caipirinha ingredients to get the full flavor experience intended by Adriá.