On the Road - Salvador - Pt. 7 - The SENAC Restaurant-School

In Salvador, one obligatory stop for anyone interested in Bahian gastronomy and cooking is the SENAC Restaurant-School, located in a historic colonial house on the Largo do Pelourinho, the sloped square which is the epicenter of the Bahian universe. SENAC is a national Brazilian institution which teaches vocational skills in centers throughout the country, and the Salvador Restaurant-School is part of SENAC's cooking faculty in Salvador.

The restaurant was opened in 1975, and since then has served as an introduction to classic Bahian cuisine to hundreds of thousands of tourists and as a review of the riches of the cuisine to local residents. The restaurant is open for lunch and dinner from Tuesday to Saturday, and is invariably very busy, although it's almost always possible to get a table fairly quickly. (One thing to note - there are, in fact, two SENAC buffets housed in the same mansions. On the street level is a small buffet that serves standard Brazilian dishes, those that can be found in almost any pay-by-weight restaurant in Brazil. The Bahian buffet is up two flights of stairs on the top floor of the house.)

As the restaurant fuctions as a teaching facility as well as a restaurant, the cooks, bartenders and wait staff are all students at SENAC working under the supervision of the faculty's teachers and professors. Because of its non-profit status, the school's charge for the unlimited-serving buffet is a reasonable R$40 (about USD $20). There are cheaper Bahian restaurants in town (and there are definitely more expensive, too), but at no other will you be able to sample such a wide variety of Bahian dishes in a single location. Every day there are at least forty dishes available on the buffet, including an amazing selection of traditional desserts, something that Bahian cooks have been noted for for centuries. The number of dishes one can sample is limited only by one's appetite and capacity. You'll find abará and acarajé, of course, but also almost a dozen types of moquecas - everything from traditional standards like fish and shrimp up to moqueca de fato (fato meaning entrails). There are numerous rice and bean dishes, steamed fish and vegetables, sweet potatoes, various treatments of manioc and three or four traditional Bahian pimentas (hot sauce). A word to the wise when it comes to SENAC's pimenta; the restaurant makes no concessions to non-Bahians' limited tolerance for hot peppers. SENAC's hot sauces are very hot indeed, so be careful.

The service staff is hardworking and earnest, though it must be said that as it is composed of students, the service isn't always what one might call polished or speedy. But what the waitresses and waiters may lack in velocity they make up for in charm and friendliness.

The food at SENAC is good, at times very good. It may never be the best Bahian food on the planet, but it is the spot for newcomers to Bahian food to discover which dishes they love, which ones they like and which they'd prefer not to return to. A visit to SENAC should be made early in one's trip to Salvador. Later, in other restaurants, armed with what you learned at SENAC, you can knowledgeably read a Bahian menu and revisit those dishes that particularly appealed to you.

On the Road - Salvador - Pt. 3 - The FIFA/McDonald's Scandal

It's hard to overstate the cultural value of the humble acarajé to the citizens of the Brazilian state of Bahia. This unprepossessing, fist-sized black-eyed-pea fritter has become the icon of Salvador in much the same way that the Eiffel Tower represents Paris, or Guiness represents Ireland. When tourists and returning locals exit the Salvador airport terminal on the arrivals level, they are immediately greeted by the unmistakable aroma of acarajé frying in a pot of dendê oil - the sidewalk in front of the terminal is home to several stands of baianas selling acarajé. That haunting aroma, the marvelous taste of the fritter and the traditional and ritualistic way in which it is sold are cultural touchstones of Salvador, and have been recognized by all levels of Brazilian government as important cultural patrimony worthy of protection.

So what does acarajé have to do with FIFA, McDonald's and the scandal referred to in the title of this post? As the governing organization for the 2014 World Cup of Football/Soccer, which will be held in Brazil, FIFA has control over many aspects of the Cup. Things like stadium capacity and required facilities, transportion of players and sponsorship of the Cup. Because the McDonald's corporation is one of the largest corporate sponsors of the World Cup, FIFA wants to prohibit the sale of acarajé within 2 km (1.2 miles) of Salvador's Fonte Nova stadium during the World Cup, in order to protect the interests (and hamburger sales) of McDonald's.

Could this....

become this???

This potential disruption of acarajé sales has created an uproar in Salvador. Rita Maria Ventura dos Santos, the president of Associação das Baianas de Acarajé e Vendedoras de Mingau (Abam), the official association of acarajé vendors, calls prohibiting sales of acarajé "absurd." She notes that at present there are eight acarajé stands within 2 km. of the stadium, and wonders what will happen to the women who own these stands when the Cup comes around. Community groups in Salvador are calling for a boycott of McDonald's to protest the move, and news of the prohibition and the boycott is spreading rapidly across all the Internet social networks.

The FIFA/McDonald's prohibition has not been confirmed yet by the Brazilian organizing committee or by Salvador's municipal authorities. The Bahia state Secretary in charge of World Cup arrangements has been quoted as saying no decision has yet been made, but will only confirm that the role of baianas and of acarajé in the World Cup is "under consideration."

On the Road - Salvador - Pt. 2 - The Joy of Abará

As Julie Andrews once warbled, "Let's start at the very beginning, A very good place to start...". So, we're beginning our reportage on our recent visit to Salvador, Bahia with the item that's always first (alphabetically, at least) in any list of traditional Bahian dishes - abará. It's hard to think of anything that might proceed abará in an alphabetical listing of dishes - except aardvark, and they don't eat aardvarks in Bahia.

 Abará  is one of the foods that is most closely associated with the Afro-Brazilian religion of Bahia, Candomblé, and it's also one of the items that can always be found for sale by baianas, the traditionally-dressed black women who sell Bahian food, most notably acarajé, on streets, squares and beachfronts of Salvador.

Iansã

In the rituals of Candomblé, which preserve the religious traditions brought from Africa to Brazil by slaves, abará is a favorite food of the orixá (divinity) Iansã, and offerings of food made to her invariably include abará. Iansã is the orixá of the River Niger in Africa, and of the wind, hurricanes and tempests. She is considered to be one of the most agressive of the female orixás and has dominion over the dead. In the syncretic tradition of linking orixás with saints of the Catholic church, she is identified with Santa Barbara and is worshiped as such in the Catholic churches of Bahia.

 There's nothing complex or complicated about abará - it's not a fancy or delicate food. But it does combine many of the most important ingredients of the Bahian pantry, which was large inherited from Africa. Basically, an abará is a soft batter made from black-eyed pears, flavored with bright orange dendê palm oil and cooked by being steams in a banana-leaf package. Sometimes ground dried shrimps are added to the batter for additional flavoring, but this isn't obligatory. Readers familiar with Mexican tamales will have a very good idea of what an abará is, as the two dishes are very similar. They differ in the mass used to create the dough - ground corn in the case of tamales and ground black-eyed peas in the case of abará. Although tamales are often stuff with a meat or chicken filling, abarás are not and resemble most closely those unstuffed tamales called "blind."

The list of ingredients that go into making abará is almost identical to acarajé. Both are based on the same batter, though in acarajé the batter is deep-fried in dendê whereas abará is steamed rather than fried and a small amount of dendê is stirred into the batter to flavor it. This makes abará slightly more healthy eating than acarajé, though it could never be considered health food.

In Salvador we sampled  abará at the famed Bahian buffet of SENAC, the public-private vocational school that can be found in any city in Brazil. In our next post, we'll look at the 40+ dish SENAC buffet in more detail. It's an edible encyclopedia of Bahian cuisine and an essential part of the Salvador experience.

(Click here for a recipe for abará  from an earlier posting on Flavors of Brazil).

Cira - The Best Acarajé

Cira's acarajé

Every year, the Brazilian newsmagazine Veja (think Time or Newsweek) publishes a gastronomic guide for each of the major cities of Brazil called Comer & Beber (Eat & Drink).  In 2011 there were 20 separate editions published, from Porto Alegre in the far south of Brazil to Manaus in the middle of the Amazonian rain forest, and from 50-year-old Brasília to almost 500 year old Salvador. In each edition, the best in the city are honored in three major categories (restaurants, bars, and snacks) and many separate sub-categories, such as the best Italian restaurant, the best Brazilian restaurant, the best seafood, the best steak, etc. For each edition, the jury also chooses a "chef of the year" for the city.

Being included in the list of Veja's best is considered a high honor, and recipients in each category receive a wall-plaque indicating their status. The plaque is almost always prominently displayed somewhere near the entrance of the establishment, as a notification to potential customers, and the most highly honored restaurants often have a wallful of plaques from previous years.

In Salvador, the capital of Bahia state, and the spiritual home of the Afro-Brazilian cuisine of Bahia, one of the most coveted honors is to be voted the best maker of acarajé in the city. Acarajé, a delicious and addictive street food, is to Salvador what the coney island hot dog is to New York - a culinary icon for the culture of Bahia. It's also Bahia's collective Proustian madeleine - acarajé's utterly unique taste and aroma are potent emotional reminders of all that Bahia is, and the first bite of a piping-hot acarajé for a Bahian returning from a time away, or for a tourist coming back to Salvador for a second or fifth or fifteenth time is a gustatory key to unlocking memories of of previous times in the capital.

By law, acarajé must be sold in the traditional manner, by a woman dressed with at least some reverence to traditional Bahian dress, and cooked on site on the sidewalk, in a square or in a park. The way acarajé is sold has been enshrined as part of Brazil's immaterial cultural patrimony, and the sale of acarajé by baianas (as these women are called) even has it's own national day of celebration.

In it's 2011-2012 edition, Veja's jurors for Salvador, who all live in that city, chose the acarajé cooked and sold by Jaciara de Jesus Santos, known to all as simply Cira, as the best in Salvador. In its guide, Veja justified its choice of Cira this way (translated by Flavors of Brazil):

Around 10 in the morning, when the dendê oil is just beginning to be heated up, the first clients of the day have already begun to position themselves around the tabuleiro (a small tray to hold all the ingredients required to prepare acarajé) that Jaciara de Jesus Santos, or Cira, inherited from her mother more than forty years ago in Itapuã. From lunchtime on, especially on weekends, customer traffic increases and the line-up lengthens, but no one seems bothered by the wait. The wait, in fact, is part of the whole experience for residents of Salvador and for tourists, who not uncommonly are already on the way to the airport and who stop to carry to a far-away relative or friend the best acarajé in Salvador, according to Veja's jury. With a texture that is crunchy on the outside and light and fluffy inside, Cira's  fritter made from black-eyed pea flour adds generous complements of flavor-balanced vatapá, chopped green tomato salad, and if the customer wishes, a large portion of reconstituted dried shrimp. An acarajé costs R$4 (USD $2.50) or R$5 (USD $3) if you wish to add the shrimp. As well as acarajé, Cira sells bolo de estudante ("students' cake) for $R2.50 and cocada sweets for R$3. From Friday through Sunday, the presence of Cira herself is guaranteed. Her daughter Jussara and granddaughter Aline are in charge of Cira's two other locations, at Largo da Mariquita and in Lauro de Freitas, respectively.

Cira's stand is located on Rua Aristides Milton (no number) in the seaside district of Itapuã, very close to Salvador's International Airport. If you arrive in Salvador by plane, you can make Cira's acarajé your first bite of Bahia, and before you fly away, you can repeat the procedure on the way to the airport. You'll not forget it, nor her.

PHOTO GALLERY - Foods of the Gods

As promised last Saturday here at Flavors of Brazil, this is the first of two posts containing photographs from the Brazilian newspaper Folha de S. Paulo. These photographs accompanied a recent articla in that paper about the intimate connection between the rituals of the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé as it is practiced in the state of Bahia, Brazil, and the state's much-lauded traditional cuisine. Many of the most well-known dishes of Bahian food come directly from Candomblé rituals, and other dishes are inspired by Candomblé.

Candomblé is an animistic and polytheistic religion, with a large pantheon of nature spirits or gods (known as Orixás or Orishas). Its rituals involve possession of the initiated by Orishas, offerings and sacrifices from the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms. Rituals begin with the offerings and sacrifice. Then the initiates begin to dance and chant, accompanied by rhythmic percussion that gradually increases in intensity until one or more of the initiated becomes possessed by the spirit on an Orisha. In a trance state, the initiate who bears the spirit of the Orisha takes on the characteristic mannerisms and traits of the Orisha. At the end of the ritual, after the intensity and tension of the possessions, things become more relaxed, and the process ends with an elaborate feast for all participants. The feast usually includes dishes prepared from the animals that were sacrificed and offered to the Orishas.

Here is the first set of photos, with translations of the original captions by Flavors of Brazil. (Remember to click the photos to see them full-size.

Young Ney da Silva Barbosa, aged 9, with dishes of food from the candomblé temple Ile Axé Iba Lugan, headed by mother-of-saints Dona Jacira de Santana Miranda.

Plate of Acarajé: black-eyed pea fritters with shrimps cooked in dendê oil, prepared at the candomblé temple Ile Axé Iba Lugan, headed by mother-of-saints Dona Jacira de Santana Miranda

Mother-of-saints Dona Jacira de Santana Miranda, 60, makes food for the Orishas (for human consumption) at her candomblé temple in Salvador, Bahia.

Mother-of-saints Dona Jaciara Ribeiro cuts okra during preparation of foods of the gods at her temple Axé Abassa de Ogum, in Paripe, on the outskirts of Salvador.

In his Umbanda center in Cosme Faria (a suburb of Salvador) "Father" Raimundo Troccli adds honey to complete a dish of pumpkin cooked with tobacco leaves and acaça to be offered to the Orishá Cabloco.

Mother-of-saints Dona Jaciara Ribeiro preparing okra at her temple.

Mother-of-saints Dona Jaciara Ribeiro adds dendê oil to a dish for the gods.

Food preparation (fried yams and black-eyed peas with dried shrimps) at the temple.

Volunteers at "Father" Raimundo Troccli's Umbanda center serve food after a ritual offering of foods of the gods.

Shredded okra with shrimps, onions and dendê oil (lower right), pumpkin cooked with tobacco leaves, garnished with honey and acaça (upper right), white corn with honey, flower-blossom water and olive oil (lower right), black beans and shrimps, seasoned with onion and olive oil, garnished with acaça; all prepared to be offered to the gods at "Father" Raimundo's Umbanda center.

At the Umbanda center of "Father" Raimundo Troccli, a volunteer stirs a mixture of okra and shrimp, seasoned with onions and dendê.

Abará - Bahia's Version of a Pamonha/Tamal

In yesterday's post on Flavors of Brazil, while discussing how important the black-eyed pea (feijão-fradinho) has always been in traditional Brazilian gastronomy, I mentioned that it was particularly associated with the regional cuisine of the state of Bahia, the center of Brazil's Afro-Brazilian culture. Salvador, the capital of Bahia, was the capital of all of Brazil during earlier colonial times, and was the center of a vast area of sugar-cane cultivation. The agriculture of sugar cane requires a tremendous amount of human labor, a need which was met with the transportation of millions of Africans to work in the fields as slaves. Among the things that arrived in Brazil in their meager belongings must have been some black-eyed peas, which were planted and which thrived in Bahia.

In addition to eating these legumes cooked but whole, the black cooks of Bahia learned to de-skin black-eyed peas, mash them, and use the mashed beans to create a number of dishes, some of which have become iconic dishes of Afro-Brazilian cuisine. The most famous, without a doubt, is acarajé, a fritter made of frying mashed black-eyed peas in dendê palm oil. (Click here to read about acarajé on Flavors of Brazil.) Another dish made with the same mashed beans is called abará, and it's related both to Mexico's tamales, and to the Brazilian cornmeal dish pamonha.  What all three dishes have in common is that they share the common technique of wrapping a moist paste in banana leaves, and then steaming them. This technique is common throughout Latin American, and these are not the only examples. But it does show how a shared method of cooking is modified and adapted to local conditions - in the case of abará, by substituting mashed black-eyed peas for cornmeal.

Like acarajé, abará is not just a well-loved traditional dish. It is also intensely associated with the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé, and in that religious tradition it is one of the ritual foods offered to the gods and goddesses of Candomblé, the Orixás, during ceremonial occasions.

Guerrilla Dining Comes to Brazil - São Paulo's Patuá

As Brazil becomes more connected to global culture, and foreign influences are increasingly imported into Brazil, the gateway for importation of these influences is more often than not São Paulo. This enormous, sprawling metropolis that is home to more than 20 million people has always been the most multi-cultural of Brazil's cities, and the most influenced by immigrant cultures. In today's sophisticated and worldly São Paulo, trends from other world style, fashion and culture metropolises show up very quickly.

In the past few years, in the USA, Canada, UK, and Continental Europe, a new type of restaurant has developed, usually called "underground" or "guerrilla." In a private home or other private space, such restaurants avoid many of the bureaucratic hassles of a street-front restaurant, and being unpublicized in traditional media, they can better control the quantity and quality of their patrons. Besides, being "clandestine" adds to the cachet.

It was probably inevitable that this trend would reach São Paulo, and according to an article in today's Folha de S. Paulo, it has. Interestingly, the restaurant discussed in the article is not avant-garde, or modish; rather it is a traditional Bahian restaurant, serving traditional food. The restaurant is called Patuá, and although the address is not given in the article, the newspaper locates it in a district called Bexiga, a central-city district known for art, culture and cuisine. The owner, cook, waitress and hostess of Patuá is Helia Bispo, known to all her patrons as Bá. Migrating from Bahia state to São Paulo  in 1989, Bá made her living selling acarajé in the evening on Av. 13 de Maio. In 2001, city regulations prevented her from continuing to sell her product on the street, and she began a catering business from her home. As the business grew, and the customer list too, Bá decided to do full dinners in her house for a selected group of clients, and thus Patuá was born. At Patuá, she of course offers acarajé as well as other traditional dishes of Bahian cuisine, such as  bobó de camarão.

Most of the clientele at Patuá  are regulars, and often reluctant to pass on contact information, but if you'd like to make a reservation, call  +55.11.3115-0513 and speak to Bá. If she likes the sound of your voice, she'll divulge Patuá's address and invite you for a meal.

A New Brazilian Holiday - Baianas Selling Acarajé

In recent posts, I've been discussing the Brazilian traditions surrounding the sale of acarajé by women called baianas. Click here and here for some of the posts.

In the posts, I mentioned that these traditions have received national recognition in Brazil, and have been granted the status of national treasures. But it seems that the Brazilian love and veneration for these humble bean fritters never stops. Brazil now has a National Day of Baianas Selling Acarajé.

Doing some internet research today, I came across a press release from Brazil's National Ministry of Culture, dated 20 January 2010. Translated, the announcement was as follows:

In its edition of this Wednesday, 20 January 2010, The Official Diary of the Brazilian Republic announced the presidential approval for four laws creating new days of commemoration in the Brazilian calendar. Among these, the National Day of Baianas Selling Acarajé will be celebrated annually on November 25.

Since 2004, the profession of these women who dedicate themselves to making and selling this traditional dish on the streets of the cities of the state of Bahia has been recognized. As such, as well, this tradition has already been registered as a national immaterial treasure by IPHAN,Institute do Patrimônio Histórico e Artístico Nacional.

Acarajé, which was developed as an offering in the worship places of Candomblé, is sold today by approximately five thousand baianas in Salvador, the capital of Bahia. Last year, these baianas were honored by the inauguration of the Memorial of Baianas of  Acarajé (Memorial da Baiana de Acarajé), in Salvador, which displays the history and traditions of the custom.

I've made a promise to myself to celebrate this new day of commemoration on November 25 in the best way possible - by eating  acarajé. Mark your calendars, and join the celebration!

MUSICAL INTERLUDE - A Preta do Acarajé

My interest in Brazilian culture is certainly not limited to matters gastronomic. Since my first visits to Brazil a long while back, I love the fact that Brazil has such a musical culture, and I love all types of music that are part of Brazilian culture -samba, choro, axé, forró, pagode, funk.

When my two passions combine - music about food - then I'm a very happy fellow. A Brazilian tune about Brazilian food - as they say in Portuguese "que maravilha!"

A short while ago, I posted several articles about acarajé, the street-food that exemplifies the Afro-Brazilian culture of the state of Bahia, and which has been given national heritage status. (Click here to read about acarajé).

A few nights ago, while I was walking along the seashore here in Fortaleza, and listening to my iPod on shuffle, I listened to a song called  A Preta do Acarajé (in English: The Seller of Acarajé) and I knew I had to post it on Flavors of Brazil. The song is an old one, written in 1939 by one of the most famous of the Bahian singer-songwriters Dorival Caymmi. It has been recorded hundreds of times, by such artists as Carmen Miranda, Maria Bethania, Dorival Caymmi himself, and Gal Costa. It was Gal Costa's version that I listened to on my iPod, so I decided to post that one on this blog.

Here it is. (Just click on the YouTube video to listen).


Here are the original Portuguese lyrics, in case you'd like to follow along. It's a beautiful song, very Bahian, and a marvelous performance.

A Preta do Acarajé
Dez horas da noite
Na rua deserta
A preta mercando
Parece um lamento
"Iê o abará!"

Na sua gamela
Tem molho e cheiroso
Pimenta da Costa
Tem acarajé
"Ô acarajé ecó olalai e ô ô"
"Vem benzê!
Tá quentinho!!"

Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
O trabalho que dá pra fazê é que é
O trabalho que dá pra fazê é que é
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Ninguém quer saber o trabalho que dá
Ninguém quer saber o trabalho que dá
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé

Dez horas da noite
Na rua deserta
Quanto mais distante
Mais triste o lamento
"Iê o abará!"

"Ô acarajé ecó olalai e ô ô"
"Vem benzê!
Tá quentinho!!"

Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
O trabalho que dá pra fazê é que é
O trabalho que dá pra fazê é que é
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Ninguém quer saber o trabalho que dá
Ninguém quer saber o trabalho que dá
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Todo mundo gosta de abará
Todo mundo gosta de acarajé
"Iê o abará!"

Click on "read more" below for a translation of the lyrics into English

Upmarket acarajé - Cabana da Negona restaurant

In recent posts, the traditional sale of acarajé on street corners and squares throughout Bahia has been discussed. In the most recent post on this subject, the close connection between acarajé and the Afro-Brazilian religion of candomblé was highlighted. However, not all acarajés are sold in this traditional manner, and this signature dish of Bahian cuisine shows up on restaurant menus everywhere in Brazil, from small hole-in-the-wall lunch spots, to white tablecloth fine dining establishments.

In more upscale restaurants, the traditional acarajé is more likely to be modified or altered; in the more traditional ones, it is likely to be served exactly as it is outside on the streets. Last night, I dined here in Fortaleza with some friends in a Bahian-style restaurant called Cabana da Negona. The name of this restaurant is particularly hard to translate into English. It literally means The Hut of the Large Black Woman. But negona, and similar Portuguese words derived from "negro" such as neguinho and negão, are familiar and affectionate and are even used in Brazil to refer to persons who are not black. So, you might say a better translation for the name of this restaurant is "Big Mamma's Hut."

Although the inspiration of the cuisine at Cabana da Negona is Bahian, the menu offers many non-traditional dishes. Their acarajé  is served as an appetizer, and consists of six mini-sized acarajé served with the traditional accompaniments of dried shrimp, hot chili paste, chopped tomatoes and onions, and vatapá. The platter served two perfectly, and remained true to the tastes of Bahia without the heaviness which often mars traditional acarajé. The chili paste was appropriately strong, and the shrimps were large, well cleaned and trimmed, and not overly-strong in flavor. As they say here in Brazil, it was uma delícia.

Food of the Gods - Acarajé

In my previous post about Brazilian certification of the selling of acarajé as a national treasure, I mentioned that there were strong links between the custom of baianas selling acarajé on the streets and in the squares of Salvador, Bahia, and the Afro-Brazilian religious traditions of  candomblé. Ubiratan Castro de Araújo, ex-director of the Center of Afro-Oriental Studies at the Universidade Federal da Bahia said in 2001, "The market of acarajé is a great market given by the orixás (gods and goddesses of candomblé) to the holy women of Bahia."

The tradition of public sales of acarajé has its origin in the universe of candomblé : the "obligation of acarajé" in which the priests and priestesses of candomblé authorized the production and public sale of acarajé by women initiated in the ritual traditions of candomblé , with the objective of covering the costs of their initiation. Following a ritual practice,  acarajé was traditionally sold from rounded wooden bowls, similar to those used in the rituals of candomblé to offer to the orixás and their followers this very same food.

Acarajé  is specifically connected to the cult of the goddess Iansã in the pantheon of the orixás. She is the goddess of wind, of hurricanes, of calming breezes and of storms, of things that pass with the wind, of ephemeral love, of anything that does not last forever. She is also identified with the River Niger in Africa. Her day is Wednesday, her number is nine, her colors are red, pink and brown, and her food, of course, is acarajé.

Today, many of the women selling acarajé in public are not connected with the world of  candomblé , nor are most of their clientele. However, even if they might be unaware, the clothes they wear, the utensils they use, the cooking techniques they employ, the arrangement of their selling table, and the food itself, are all intimately connected to the religious traditions carried to Brazil in centuries past by the slaves brought from Africa to work in Brazil's fields and mines.

RECIPE - Acarajé

One of the most iconic foods of traditional Brazilian cuisine, and undoubtedly the dish most identified with the African-influenced cuisine of the Brazilian state of Bahia, this humble fritter made from black-eyed pea flour, sold on street corners and in squares as a snack, has enormous appeal to the Brazilian palate, and is the object of much nostalgia for Brazilians and for tourists who have come to know acarajé but who are now far away from the streets of Salvador, Brazil.

Available locally in Salvador and elsewhere in Brazil for a few reais (about $3.00-$4.00) acarajé is unfortunately not easy to duplicate in a home kitchen. The problems involve both the difficulty in finding necessary ingredients (e.g. dendê oil) in locations far from Brazil and in the actual prodution of the acarajé which can be extremely time-consuming and tedious. I have successfully made acarajé at home, when I lived in Vancouver, Canada, but I probably would not attempt it again. It's definitely a challenge.

However, for those readers of Flavors of Brazil who feel up to challenge, those who are dying of saudade for the aroma and flavor of acarajé, or for those who are merely curious about how it's done, here is a recipe translated and adapted from Cozinha Regional Brazileira, by Abril Editora.
_________________________________________________
RECIPE - Acarajé

1 kg. of dried black-eyed peas
2 medium onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 Tbsp. salt
1 litre dendê oil (for frying)
-----------------------------------------------------------------

In a very large bowl, cover the peas with water and let soak for at least 24 hours to soften the peas and to facilitate the removal of their skins.
Drain water, re-fill the basin several times, stirring the peas to remove as many skins as possible. Rubbing  handfuls of beans vigorously between the hands assists in this process. After several changes of water, drain, and individually remove the skins from any peas that still have them. (Allow plenty of time for this.)

In batches, blend the skinless peas, the onion, the garlic and the salt in a blender or food processor until you have a light batter. Pour the batter into a large, dry bowl, and beat with a wooden spoon, lifting the mass from bottom to top until you have a airy mass that has doubled in volume.

Heat the oil in a large pan, or deep-fryer. Meanwhile, soak two very large wooden spoons in water, then use them to form fist-sized balls of batter. Drop them one by one into the hot oil to fry until they are bright orange and crispy, turning them over halfway through the frying process.

Remove from the oil, and let cool for a few minutes. Serve the acarajé with vatapá (recipe soon in this blog), hot pepper sauce, fried dried shrimps, and finely chopped green tomatoes.

A National Treasure - Baianas Selling Acarajé

Many countries have a official list of national treasures, or a museum which displays the best of the nation's artistic and cultural heritage. The Tower of London houses England's crown jewels, in Paris, the Louvre houses paintings by Watteau, the Musée d'Orsay displays the works of Manet, Monet and Gauguin, and the Centre Pompidou showcases the best of 20th Century art. Brazil has a national institute called the Institute of National Historic and Artistic Patrimony (Instituto do Patrimônio Histórico e Artístico Nacional), commonly known in Portuguese as IPHAN, which has been charged with selecting the best of Brazil's historic, cultural and artistic treasures. What is most interesting is that IPHAN has been charged not only with selecting paintings, buildings, palaces and churches, it has been charged with selecting those immaterial treasures that are central to the conception of Brazilian culture. This list of immaterial national treasures includes food and cooking, and though I am not sure if Brazil is the only country to so classify foods and preparation techniques, I'm sure it is one of a very few. It's as if the USA declared that Kansas City Barbeque or Cajun Jambalaya were national treasures, worthy of inclusion in the Smithsonian Institute, or if Canada bestowed such an appellation on Quebec's poutine.

Currently there are 15 items registered by IPHAN as immaterial national treasures of Brazil. They include traditional dances, country fairs, methods of making lace, musical instruments, and childrens games. IPHAN chose in 2004 to add acarajé to this list, and significantly chose to add not only the food item itself, but also the historically significantly way that it is prepared and sold on the streets of Salvador, Bahia, by women known as baianas. In the certification of  "Acarajé as Sold by Baianas" as a national treasure, IPHAN included acarajé itself and the way it is prepared, the traditional clothing of the baianas, which is linked to the rituals of the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé, and the customary layout of accompaniments on the baianas' streetside tables, called tabuleiros.

Most Brazilians, including those from the state of Bahia and those who are not, would agree that acarajé well deserves its place in the Brazilian cultural pantheon. Few are the tourists who leave Salvador without having tasted this treat at least once, and fewer still are those whose sensory memory of that baroque city does not include the utterly distinctive aroma of acarajé frying in dendê oil and the spicy complex flavor of the offerings of the "baiana de acarajé."

Click on "read more" below for a translation of the official IPHAN certificate of acarajé as a national cultural treasure.