Rodízio - A Guide to the Meats

One of the joys of dining at a Brazilian churrascaria that operates with the rodízio system is ogling the quantity and variety of cuts of meat that pass by your table. Passadores, as the meat servers are called, offer a seemingly unlimited number of cuts of meat, each presented on a large skewer and served to you for the asking. The only problem for non-Brazilian or the non-Portuguese speakera is that it's sometimes difficult to know exactly what's being offered. The passadores work rapidly so that the meat won't cool, and even if they had the language skills to name and describe what they have in French, or English, or Japanese, they don't have the time.

One option is to be brave and try everything that passes. The main problem with this approach is that one's limit of meat consumption is quickly reached, and some of the best choices might therefore go untasted. Another option is to stick to those cuts that are visually recognizable - a sausage is a sausage, and a skewer loaded with chicken hearts is unmistakeably what it is. Again, this limits your choices, particularly in cuts of beef since Brazilian cuts of beef don't correspond to North American or European ones. You'll never see a skewered T-bone or a Porterhouse sail by in a churrascaria.

To help a bit with this dilemma, Flavors of Brazil, with assistance and photos from Brazil's Gosto magazine, offers this visual and linguistic aid to some of the most common, and best, cuts of meats you're likely to find in a churrascaria that offers the rodízio system. This is only a sampling however, so be brave and try other things that look intriguing or smell appetizing. You may never find out what you ate, but you'll have gained a gustatory memory to take back home as a souvenir of your Brazilian churrascaria experience.

Churrascaria Cuts of Meat

1. Picanha - The most-desired cut of Brazilian beef, in or out of churrascarias. It's normally cut fairly thickly and skewered with three pieces pieces per skewer. It's sliced thinly and generally cooked from medium to well-done. Try to chose a piece that is still quite thick - if it's thin it's probably been returned to the fire a few times and will be less juicy.

2. Costela premium (prime rib) - The most fashionable cut currently in many churrascarias. It comes from the first five ribs of the animal and has a fine flavor because of the presence of bone. It has a very tender texture and is nicely marbled with fat.

3. Fraldinha (flank or skirt steak) - Formerly considered a second-grade cut of meat, this cut is now almost as valued as picanha. It is extremely juicy and is skewered on it's long axis which helps retain the juices. If you want your piece more well done, chose from either end of the cut where the meat is thinner. Chose a center slice for a piece that is more rare.

4. Bife ancho (rib eye) - Cut in the Argentinian style, this consists of two parts separated by a layer of fat. Always chose an exterior piece. The central portions are less juicy, but still have good flavor.

5. Costeleta de cordeiro (lamb chop) - All in a churrascaria is not beef. Brazilian lamb is juicy and flavorful and a small lamb chop is a nice change of pace in a churrascaria. Try to get a piece that is medium-rare to medium - well-done lamb chops can be overly dry.

6. Filet mignon - An extremely tender meat, as it comes from a muscle just below the lumbar vertebrae of the animal which contracts very little, even when the animal is moving. The only problem can be lack of fat, which makes the cut potentially dry. This cut should not be eaten well-done as it will then lose its charm.

Rodízio - An Etiquette Manual

For someone unfamiliar with how the rodízio system works, entering a Brazilian churrascaria for the first time can be an intimidating experience, especially if one doesn't speak Portuguese. The first impression is likely to be that the restaurant is enormous (some have as many as 400-500 places) and that there is a tremendous amount of noise and activity. There are diners bustling to and from the salad bars, there are wait staff serving drinks and clearing tables, and there are a number of men, known as passadores, who carry a large spear full of meat and a very sharp carving knife and who move from table to table slicing cuts of meat off their skewers at diners' request.

Those diners who are cognizant of the etiquette of rodízio already know exactly how to act and how to get good service in a churrascaria. For those readers of Flavors of Brazil who haven't already learned proper rodízio behavior, here is a small manual of etiquette to guide you through your first visits to a churrascaria. Within a short period of time, you should be able to dine with the churrascaria "experts" and never make a false step. There's no gold star to win, only the confidence to sit back, relax, and eat your way to meat heaven.

Rodízio - An Etiquette Manual

The Table - When you sit at the table in a churrascaria, you will notice a few differences from standard restaurant table settings. First, next to each place setting, usually on the left, is a small salad plate on which has been placed a pegador, a set of tongs similar to ice tongs. This utensil will be used to hold a slice of meat as the passador slices it off the skewer and then to transfer it to your dining plate. The passador has the skewer in one hand and a large carving knife in the other, so without the diner's help, the grilled meat will fall to the plate and create a mess. Therefore, it's essential to cooperate with the passador by using the pegador to help him. You might also notice a small round token, about the size of a beer coaster in an English pub, near your place at the table. It's green on one side and red on the other. There might be the Portuguese word for "yes" - sim - printed on the green side, and "no" - não - on the red side, but that's not always the case. This token is used to indicate to the passador whether you are interesting in being offered more meat, or whether you are either taking a breather or have finished. If you display the green side, you're still in the game, if you ahve the red side showing, he'll pass you by.

Proper use of the pegador

The salad bar - All churrascarias have a salad bar in addition to the meat provided by passadores. They vary enormously in size and variety of options, but there will inevitably be much more than you could possibly eat. Return visits to the salad bar are allowed, often encouraged. It's much better to take a smaller amount on your first visit, then return for seconds or thirds as long as your appetite holds up than it is to overload your plate on the first visit. It's considered impolite to leave uneaten food on your plate, so don't overdo it to start off. Take a small amount, then return for more later. Do not take your original, empty, plate back to the salad bar. This is considered rude. Leave it at your table, and while you're visiting the salad bar, it will be whisked away by a bus attendant. Use a new plate for every visit to the the salad bar.

Meat service - When the passador comes by he will offer you what he has on his skewer by name, in Portuguese of course. Usually the passador has only one cut of meat on his skewer - occasionally two, but never more. You can indicate by word, by smile, or by gesture if you want some. He will hold the skewer vertically, and begin to cut a thin slice, and then stop. He has stopped to wait for you to grab the slice with your pegador. Only when you've done so will he cut the slice loose. So if you've said yes, be ready with your pegador - otherwise the passador will stand there for a very long time waiting for you to spring into action. You can indicate by pointing to various portions of the meat if you'd prefer a piece that's more rare or well-done. If you have no idea what's being offered, but are brave and/or curious, indicate you want a small piece to sample. If you find it totally inedible, place it discretely at the side of your plate, and it will be taken away when your plate is removed. It's considered impolite to ask for a big piece of meat unless you're sure you'll eat it all.

Table service - You'll be seated at the table by a hostess or maître d' and that person will often take initial drink orders. Subsequently, a waiter or waitress will serve the drinks and take any additional orders. If you'd like to see a wine list, ask at this point. The waiter or waitress is also the person to ask when you want the bill or check (a conta) at the end of your meal. Passadores only serve meat, and will not handle drinks or the check. If there is any sort of problem, the table waiter or waitress is the person to speak to, or if necessary the hostess or maître d'.

Tipping - Tipping is handled the same way in churrascarias as it is in all Brazilian restaurants. A service charge, normally 10% is added to your bill, and this is the only service charge you need pay. It will be shared among all the staff, so it isn't necessary to tip waiters, waitresses, or passadores individually. If you pay in cash and receive some small coins in change, you may leave them on the table, but it's not obligatory to do so.

That's rodízio etiquette in a nutshell. It's really not complicated, but since so much of it is unwritten or unexplained, I hope readers of Flavors of Brazil will find it useful when they begin to discover the bounty of the Brazilian churrascaria.

Rodízio - The Way of the Churrascaria

If you were to look up the Portuguese word rodízio in my Michaelis Portuguese-English dictionary you'd find the following definitions:

1 water wheel. 2 shift, relay work, scheduling of work. 3 turn, rotation. eles trabalham em rodízio / they work in turns. 4 caster (wheel). 5 shady deal, sharp practices. 6 coloq gossip, plot, intrigue. 7 alternation of people, facts or situations. 8 bras a system of service in certain restaurants where barbecued meats or pizzas are offered abundantly, according to the client's taste. 

Clearly, of all these definitions, it's number 8 that most concerns Flavors of Brazil (although Flavors of Brazil also likes number 6). Rodízio is the system used in most churrascarias, restaurants that feature a huge number of grilled meats, to get their products from the grill to the diners' plates. I thought it would be interesting and instructive for Flavors of Brazil to learn a bit more about churrascarias and rodízio (incidentally, the word is pronounced ho-DEE-zee-oo) and pass that knowledge on to readers of this blog.

In recent years rodízio-style churrascarias have become Brazil's most successful exportation in the world of restaurants, and today churrascarias can be found from Paris, to New York, to Las Vegas, Singapore, Tokyo and Vancouver. The high-end Brazilian churrascaria chain Fogo de Chão, founded in Porto Alegre in 1979, now has more branches in the USA than it does in Brazil, by the score of 16 to 6. The typical churrascaria offering of a huge salad bar plus an unlimited quantity of grilled meats has proven to be internationally popular, just as it is in Brazil.

Although the Brazilian style of grilling meats, churrasco, is age-old, the rodízio-style churrascaria is a relatively new concept, and dates back at most 50 or 60 years, to the middle of the last century. But even though the concept is not old, it's origins are already lost in time, and no one is exactly sure how, when and where the idea of having troops of waiters carrying meat-laden spears wandering around the restaurant slicing off pieces of meats directly on to customers' plates originated. Many have claimed the honor of being the first to introduce rodízio but no one has been able to establish a definitive claim. Certainly the style originated in truckstop restaurants along the interstate highways in Southeast Brazil, in the populous states of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo and Paraná. And certainly, the proprietors of those restaurants came from the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul, where churrasco originated. Other than that all is speculation and/or self-promotion.

Vilma and Albino Ondarotto, 1975

The Association of Churrascarias of the State of São Paulo (acronmym: ACHUESP) has researched this topic and has formally crowned Churrascaria 477, located in Jacupiranga, SP, as the originator of rodízio, a title that the restaurant proudly claims to this day. Legend has it that on one particularly busy day when the restaurant was full of pilgrims visiting the nearby shrine of Bom Jesus de Iguape,an overstressed waiter began mixing up all his orders, serving the wrong meat to the wrong diner. The owner, Albino Ondaratto, to alleviate the confusion, told all the waiters to grab one of the large skewers full of meat from the grill and offer meat to any and all. Many other food historians, however, hotly dispute both the crown and the legend. The only thing that is certain is that Churrascaria 477 is still open in its original location in Jacupiranga and apparently does a nice rodízio.

In the next post here on Flavors of Brazil, we'll discuss exactly how rodízio works and offer an etiquette guide to churrascarias. There are unwritten rules of behavior in rodízio , both for waiters and for customers, and Flavors of Brazil is here to prevent its readers from mistakenly behaving poorly next time they visit a churrascaria, whether in Brazil or anywhere else in the world.