The XV Festival of Culture and Gastronomy - Tiradentes, Minas Gerais

Tiradentes

The small hilltown of Tiradentes (pronounced cheer-a-DEN-cheese), located in the mountains of Brazil's Minas Gerais state, is known as one of the prettiest and historically most important of Minas Gerais' baroque jewels. Named after Brazil's revolutionary dentist-hero Tiradentes (meaning "tooth-puller" in English) the town offers visitors and tourists lovely examples of Brazilian baroque architecture, a delightful small-town atmosphere and a great collection of inns, small hotels, and restaurants.

For most of the year Tiradentes is a quiet, slow-moving town, even if the number of daily tourists often outnumbers the town's 6000 residents. However, once every year the town explodes in Brazil's best-known gastronomic festival - the Festival Cultura e Gastronomia Tiradentes. This year's festival, the fifteenth edition, is currently on and lasts nine days from August 24th to September 02nd.

The festival offers lectures, exhibitions and festive dinners, and features well-known chefs from Brazil and around the world. This year's star attraction among the chefs is Catalan chef Jordi Roca, whose restaurant El Cellar de Can Roca was recently named the second best restaurant in the world in this year's World Restaurant awards. In addition to Sr. Roca, chefs from Chile, Venezuela, and Peru will join their Brazilian colleagues in presenting demonstrations and special dinners.

The culinary focus of this year's festival will be the food and cooking of six out of Brazil's twenty-six states - Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais, Pernambuco, Amazonas, Ceará, and Rio Grande do North. One interesting innovation this year is a series of festive dinners created by pairs of chefs from diverse regions of Brazil, for example combining a chef from Pernambuco and one from Amazonas to create a five-course meal, or another with chefs from Rio de Janeiro and Ceará.

Because of the limited number of hotels, pousadas and restaurants in Tiradentes, the festival always sells out, and many festival-goers have to resort to staying in other nearby towns, returning each day to Tiradentes.

The festival has an excellent website, with full details of festival programs, menus of the festive dinners, and plenty of photos and videos (in Portuguese only.) Click here to visit the site.

We here at Flavors of Brazil have yet to experience the festival, but hope to attend the XVI edition in 2013. If we do, there will be extensive reporting on our adventures here on the blog.

SEPARATED AT BIRTH - Brazil's Coscorão and Scandinavian Rosettes

Scandinavian rosettes

For us here at Flavors of Brazil, one of our absolutely favorite Christmastide treats when we were growing up in northernmost Michigan in the USA were something called rosettes. Alongside shortbread and pfeffernuss, they were proudly served on the Christmas cookie platter and even though everyone was stuffed with other Christmas goodies, it was impossible to resist a rosette - especially knowing that they wouldn't appear again for another year. Rosettes are a traditional Scandinavian Christmas cookie, and they are common in areas in the USA and Canada where there are large communities which share Scandinavian ancestry.

Rosettes are something like a sweet, deep-fried waffle. To make rosettes you need a special decoratively-shaped iron, a thin flour batter, powdered sugar, and oil for deep-frying. Once the batter is ready, the iron is dipped into the hot oil to get hot, then into the batter, then back into the oil. When the waffle is nicely browned, you remove it from the iron and you repeat the process until you've used up all the batter. When the rosettes are cool, you sprinkle them with powdered sugar. They're then ready to serve.

We at Flavors of Brazil have recently been doing some research on the traditional foods of Brazil's Minas Gerais state, where one finds some of Brazil's oldest and most traditional food customs. Our searches led us the other day to the small town of Virginópolis, and its traditional holiday waffle, called coscorão. Which turns out to be nothing other than a Scandinavian rosette, though it has been thoroughly Brazilianized by substituting polvilho (a type of manioc flour) for Scandinavia's wheat flour. Other than that the two delicacies are identical - the thin batter, the decorative iron and the deep-frying.

Brazilian coscorões

Scandinavian rosettes are closely linked to the Christmas season, but the holidays which are connected to coscorões in Virginópolis are the mid-winter festivals called Festas Juninas, held at the end of June. During these festivals, street vendors set up stands on streets and in squares to cook and sell coscorões on the spot, and locals stroll by in the evenings, listening to live music, watching folk dances and sampling the wares of all the food and drink vendors - and one place that's an obligatory stop is the coscorão stand. We're sure that the aroma and the taste of a hot coscorão is as evocative of family and holiday times for residents of Virginópolis as rosettes are for the millions of descendents of Swedes, Norwegians, Finns and Danes in central Canada and the American midwest. But now we're curious - where's the missing link from Scandinavia to the isolated interior of Minas Gerais and from rosettes to coscorões?

Happy Carnaval 2012! - Feliz Carnaval 2012!!

Today, the 21st of February, 2012, is the culmination of Brazil's annual celebration of the carnal - food, drink, music, dance and sex. It's no linguistic accident that the words carnal and carnaval are only separated  by two little letters because both derive from the Latin word for meat - carnis.

Today, in the traditional Roman Catholic calendar is the very last day before the austerities of Lent are prescribed, and so it's only natural to make hay while the sun shines. To satiate all of one's sensual appetites one last final times before the long 40-day drought from Ash Wednesday to Easter.

Throughout the country there will be the sound of music, the rhythms of the drums, the aroma of grilled meats, the taste of heavy, greasy food, and the satisfaction that only comes from a gulp of ice-cold beer when the temperature is reaching 35C (95F) and you're surrounded by anywhere between a hundred and two million party-goers.

If you're in Brazil, have a happy and safe Carnaval. If you're not, come join the party in 2013, or 2014, or whenever you can. There's nothing else like it.

Rio de Janeiro's Carnaval Feijoada

Feijoada, the black beans and rise dish (or rather the meal) that has long been enshrined as Brazil's unofficial national dish, is eaten year round every where in Brazil, but normally only at mid-day or early afternoon, as it's just too heavy and filling to be eaten just before going to bed, and only on the the weekends, as even the thought of returning to work after a plate of feijoada is exhausting. (Click here to learn more about feijoada.)

Surprisingly, for such a rich and filling dish, in Rio de Janeiro feijoada is strongly associated with the Carnaval season and especially with the city's traditional samba "schools". During the build-up to Carnaval season, every samba school holds weekly rehearsals in the large hall that they call their home, normally on Saturday. The dancers, the chorus, and especially the approximately 200-strong percussion section expend hours and untold calories going over and over that particular year's samba until the rhythm, the lyrics, the samba steps and the melody are literally drummed into the brain and the body.

After the exhausting rehearsal it's party time at the samba school. Traditionally, in all the samba schools, the party starts with a massive feijoada buffet which feeds the revenous multitude, and continues late into the night with lots more samba music and plenty of free-flowing beer.

Feijoada - Othon Palace Hotel

 

But it's not only in the samba schools where one finds Carnaval feijoada. On the Saturday of Carnaval, which this year is tomorrow, February 18, restaurants all over the city serve a huge mid-day fejoada buffet to the city's Carnaval-crazed residents as well as to the hundreds of thousands of tourists who flock to Rio every year at Carnaval time. Local botecos will serve a simple feijoada for their regulars, more upmarket restaurants will offer a more luxurious version for their clientele, and the city's five-star hotels will present massive, and expensive, feijoada buffets featuring luxury ingredients and often a floor show of samba music. The price varies with the venue of course. In this Wednesday's Folha de S. Paulo newspaper, the journal listed some typical prices for feijoada during Carnaval 2012. The bohemian bar Mineiro, in artsy Santa Teresa district charges only R$30 (USD $17) for their all-you-can-eat buffet. A traditional restaurant in Rio's historic Lapa district, has two different prices. Men are charged R$120 (USD $68) and women R$80 ($42), again for all you can eat, which explains the price differential. The luxurious Rio Othon Palace hotel on Copacabana beach charges R$270 ($150), but their feijoada includes a floor show featuring the percussion section of the Salgueiro samba school. That's still not the most expensive Carnaval feijoada in Rio, however. At the tony and exclusive Jockey Club, local tycoon Ricardo Amaral hosts his annual Carnaval feijoada party/ball. There feijoada will set you back a cool R$500 (USD$300) per person - that is, if you can get in. The party is one of the most "desired" events of the year and is always sold out well in advance.

Feijoada - Bar Mineiro

So if you can't figure out how to get in to Amaral's ball, take the R$500 that you just saved, take a taxi to the Mineiro Bar and treat yourself and fifteen friends to feijoada. You'll be treated like a king or queen and will still have R$20 in your pocket for the cab ride home.

February Second - The Festival of Yemanjá

Yemanjá

Every year on February Second, some million or more people in the Brazilian city of Salvador, Bahia, walk in procession through the streets of the Rio Vermelho district of that city, all dressed in white, making their way down to the seashore and the small house that's said to be the home of Yemanjá, a powerful goddess (Orixá) in the Afro-Brazilian religion Candomblé. Yemanjá is the essence of motherhood, the protector of children, fishermen and sailors, and most importantly, she is the sea itself. When the celebrants reach the shore Yemanjá's they pass their baskets laden with gifts for the goddess to fishermen to take out to sea and leave them on the waters as offerings to the Orixá. Gifts for Yemanjá often include images of the goddess, flowers and objects of female vanity (perfume, jewelry, combs, lipsticks, mirrors). Later in the day, the festival of Yemanjá becomes a massive street party which carries on into the night.

In the synchristic tradition that blends the Orixás who traveled to Brazil with African slaves with the saints and holy figures of Christianity who arrived with the Portuguese,  Yemanjá is identified with certain aspects of the Virgin Mary, and February Second in the Roman Catholic calendar is the day of Our Lady of Navigators (Nossa Senhora dos Navegantes). The celebrants at Salvador's festival honor one divinity in two personages, the African Yemanjá and the Christian Our Lady, without thoughts of separation or difference between the two.

Gifts for Yemanjá

As with all the gods and goddess of the Candomblé tradition, Yemanjá is associated with certain foods, and these foods are offered to her on her special day as well as eaten by her devotees at the street festival that follows the ceremonical activities of the day. Yemanjá's colors, like the Virgin Mary's, are white and blue - obvious choices for a Rainha do Mar (Queen of the Sea). An Orixá's favorite foods are often visually connected with his or her image and chosen colors, Yemanjá's special food are white, or very light in color (there are very few foods that are truly blue). Yemanjá prefers sweet foods, making such dishes as honeyed rice and sweet corn puddings essential parts of her festival. She is said to be particularly fond of a sweet coconut-flavored milk jelly called manjar branco (the word is a cognate of the French-English word blancmange). She also enjoys puffed rice, and this snack is everywhere at her festival.

The following YouTube video was filmed in Salvador on February 02, 2011 during the festival of Yemanjá. The soundtrack is Brazilian singer Baden Powell singing his composition Canto de Yemanjá.


Tomorrow, Flavors of Brazil will publish a recipe for Yemanjá's manjar branco.

Carnaval 2011 - The Last Day

Today is the last day of Brazil's annual orgy of celebration, Carnaval. For the past four or five days (or longer, depending on where in Brazil one is celebrating) all the cares of the world have been shoved aside for the celebration of worldly joy that is Carnaval in Brazil. Tomorrow, Ash Wednesday, the pentitential season of Lent begins. But until then, Brazilians everywhere - in Brazil and overseas - don't want to hear about cares, woes or problems. The word on everyone's tongue is "alegria", which means joy, pure joy.

Flavors of Brazil will be in Rio de Janeiro throughout the Carnaval season, and in posts to come will try to provide some insight into the celebration. Frankly, however, Carnaval has very little to do with food, and less with gastronomy. Food, during Carnaval at least, is seen only as fuel to keep the body awake, alert and dancing. Drink, on the other hand, is an essential part of what Carnaval's about, and it's mostly beer.

For those who are curious about what Carnaval in Brazil is and isn't (there are many misconceptions about Carnaval), I recommend taking a few minutes to watch the YouTube video embedded below. Taken in Rio de Janeiro's Sambodromo, where for four nights during Carnaval the city's samba schools vie for the honor of being named the best of the year, the video gives a hint, though only a hint, of the flavor of Rio's Carnaval. The video shows the parade of one of the most famous and oldest of Rio's samba schools, Beija Flor. Beija Flor literally means "flower kisser" and is the Portuguese word for the hummingbird.


No matter where in the world you are today, or whether you're celebrating Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Fasching in Germany, Carnivale in Venice, or just another Tuesday in many corners of the world - Flavors of Brazil wishes all it's readers a Feliz Carnaval!

Brazil in Canada - Brazilfest 2010

I'm currently vacationing in my Canadian hometown, Vancouver. During the summer months of July and August the weather in Vancouver isn't significantly cooler or wetter than in my Brazilian hometown, Fortaleza, so the adjustment to Canada has been very easy for me. Maybe the beaches here aren't quite as tropicalas in Brazil, and certainly there are no beach bars serving cerveja and caipirinhas (Canada's strict alcohol laws prohibit the public consumption of alcoholic beverages on beaches) but when the sun shines, you can almost imagine that you're in Brazil.

This past weekend, Vancouver became significantly more Brazilian during the annual Brazilfest, sponsored by a number of commercial enterprises, the city administration, the Consulate General of Brazil in Vancouver, and the tourism department of the federal government of Brazil, and organized by the local Brazilian community here in Vancouver. This community has grown significantly in the past decade, and Brazilian culture has become part of the rainbow of cultures that makes up Vancouver. On the Brazilian social network site Orkut, one community for Brazilians in Vancouver numbers over 9000 members, and there are other Vancouver-based Brazilian social networks around the web. Vancouver annually hosts thousands of Brazilian students who come to Canada to learn English. During the summer in the center of the city one constantly hears Portuguese spoken in shops, on rapid-transit and in parks.


Brazilfest took place on one of Vancouver's principal downtown streets, which was closed for the duration of the festival. There was a large music stage at one end of the street (video above), and the street was lined with booths and stands. Some were selling Brazilian clothing and crafts, come were advertising tourism in Brazil, but by far the most popular, and to me the most interesting, were the food stands. One stand featured plates of Brazil's "national dish", feijoada, and for most of the afternoon, the line for feijoada stretched back a full city block. Other stands sold Brazilian pastries and sweets, like cheese bread (pão de queijo) and doce de leite, or snacks such as coxinha and pastel. The popular Brazilian soft drink guaraná was available at the exorbitant price of $3.00. All that was lacking to make it truly a Brazilian festival was beer. Oh well, that's Canada for you.

I spoke to several people who were lined up to buy feijoada. Whether they were Brazilians who immigrated to Canada long ago or students here for a summer of English language instruction, they all said they were lining in order to "matar saudades" of Brazil. They meant that they were trying to assuage homesickness for Brazil and Brazilian culture through eating one of it's most traditional dishes. Feijoada isn't easy to make for one or two persons, or in a small kitchenette, so these folks didn't mind lining up in the hot sun for up to an hour just to eat a plateful of "home." Over the years, I've attended numerous cultural festivals, in Vancouver and elsewhere, and one constant element of these fairs is "food from home." It's interesting proof of the centrality of traditional foods and recipes in creating cultural identity. Food from back home shrinks time and distance and brings one back to one's culture with each bite. Certainly that was the case for those Brazilians in Vancouver this weekend who ate feijoada and other Brazilian dishes. They all exclaimed how the tastes of Brazil connected them once again to their homeland, or even if they said nothing, the look of satisfaction on their faces as they ate told the same story.