RECIPE - Barreado

If you are planning to make this traditional dish from Brazil's southern state of Paraná, (read more about barreado here) you're going to need two specific things that might not be already hanging around in your pantry. First, the dish must be cooked in a large clay pot with a lid - the type of pot that's often referred to as a bean pot. Bostonians use them for cooking baked beans, as do Quebecers, so if you're in either of those categories you just might have one in the house. If not, you'll have to beg, borrow or steal one, as the dish really can't be made in any other pot or pan.

Second, you'll need to find manioc flour to make the thick dough that seals the pot. Not being able to source manioc flour doesn't mean that you can't make barreado however, just that it won't be completely authentic. You can make the same sort of dough with wheat flour and water. Manioc flour is also used to thicken the broth in a traditional barreado, but again you can substitute flour, although the result won't taste exactly the same.

One of the nice things about making barreado is that all the cooking can be done long before the dish is served. In fact, the dish tastes better this way. So when you want to do your cooking the day before you serve a meal, barreado is an excellent option.

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RECIPE - Barreado
Serves 4

6 lbs beef shank, cut into long strips in the direction of the grain
salt to taste
1 lb lean smoked slab bacon, cut into julienne strips
5 medium onions, chopped
5 cloves garlic, chopped
3 bay leaves
1 Tbsp dried oregano
1 Tbsp ground cumin
2 to 3 cups manioc flour, mixed with a little water to make a thick dough

For the pirão
cooking liquid from the barreado
1 cup manioc flour

sliced ripe banana to garnish
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Season the beef with salt to taste (remember the dish will contain bacon, so season lightly). Reserve.

In a large saucepan, fry the bacon strips until they have rendered their fat and are beginning to brown. Add the chopped onion and garlic and cook for 3 minutes. Then add the beef, the bay leaf, the oregano and cumin and continue cooking, stirring frequently, until the meat has browned.

Put everything from the saucepan into a large clay bean pot, then add sufficient water to cover. Reserve.

Make a thick dough with the manioc flour and water, and roll it with your hands into a long thick "rope." Cover the bean pot, then firmly press the rope around the rim of the lid to seal the pot entirely. Cook the dish over lowest flame or electrical burner for 6 hours. If steam begins to escape from the pot, use additional manioc flour dough to patch the holes, making sure the pot stays sealed for the entire cooking process. Let the pot cool completely, then break the seal to open the pot. (Be careful when opening as there might still be steam in the pot.)

Remove the beef from the pot, leaving the cooking liquid in the pot. When the beef is cool enough to handle, shred the beef with two forks.

Pour the cooking liquid into a clean saucepan. Heat over medium heat and when the liquid is hot, sprinkle manioc flour, by the small handful, over the surface then mix in. Continue to add manioc flour slowly until the mixture thickens to the consistency of gravy.

Reheat the shredded beef if necessary, then place some in the bottom of 4 deep soup plates. Pour some  pirão over - enough to moisten the beef and provide a bit of gravy, but not enough to drown the meat. Garnish with slices of ripe banana and serve with plain white rice.


Recipe translated and adapted from Cozinha Regional Brasileira by Abril Editora.

Barreado - Paraná's Iconic Claypot-cooked Beef

A sealed barreado pot

We've been talking a lot recently at Flavors of Brazil about pressure cookers, and how they are a common feature of contemporary Brazilian home kitchens. It turns out, though, that the tradition of using pressure and steam vapor to cook and tenderize tour cuts of meat in Brazil predates the invention of the pressure cooker itself.

In the southern Brazilian state of Paraná there is a well-known traditional dish called barreado that uses a hermetically-sealed clay pot to achieve the same results that a pressure cooker does. There are various theories about who created the dish and when, some saying it was native Amerindian tribes and other attributing the dish to tropeiros, colonial donkey-caravan traders. What is not in doubt, though, is that the technique is very old.

Barreado is basically a meat stew thickened with manioc flour and served with slices of banana. Barreado must be cooked in a clay pot for a long period of time over low heat - preferably the coals of a wood fire. To seal the pot, cooks first make a thick paste of manioc flour and water and then apply that seal to the edges of the pot's lid to ensure that vapor cannot escape. The seal is renewed as needed during the long cooking period, which can be as long as 12 hours. Some 19th Century recipes call for barreado to be cooked for at least 24 hours, though there is probably very little reason to extend the cooking time that long.

Because of the long cooking time in a moist environment even the toughest cuts of meats are rendered fall-off-the-bone tender. To serve barreado, the meat is lifted from its broth and is shredded, while the broth itself is thickened with manioc flour to create a thickened sauce called a pirão. The meat is served on a bed of pirão and is garnished with banana slices. Cachaça is the drink of choice when eating barreado.

Barreado is associated with the coastal region of Paraná, particularly the small community of Morretes located in the state's litoral. On weekends thousands of tourist from the state's capital, Curitiba, and from further afield swamp the small town of only 15,000 residents and fill its restaurants in search of a plate of barreado. For many of them it's a reacquaintance with a treasured dish from their past, for others it's a new experience that connects them to the culinary history of Paraná.

Next time round, we'll post a recipe for make-at-home barreado.

Ceará's Iconic Dish (since 1958) - Peixada Cearense

Jangada at Mucuripe beach

Map from 1629 showing Ponta Mucuripe

At the eastern end of Fortaleza's 3 km seaside promenade known as Beira Mar is a fishing community called Mucuripe. Although it is now located in the middle of a touristic strip of hotels, restaurants and bars, the harbor at Mucuripe still shelters hundred of jangadas - the primitive rafts on which Brazilian fishermen have gone to sea for centuries. There is a thriving fish market located right on the beach, there's a small Catholic church, and there are two of Fortaleza's oldest and most well-known seafood restaurants.

The first seafood restaurant in Mucuripe was opened back in 1958, when Mucuripe was a separate village, by Alfredo Louzada de Souza. He named the restaurant after himself, and in later years added the nickname he earned from the fame of his most famous dish - Alfredo, O Rei da Peixada, or The King of Peixada. The restaurant is still flourishing today, as is the next door restaurant owned by Alfredo's son, Marquinho. It's called, naturally, Marquinhos Delícias Cearenses.

Together, father and son have created a dynasty of seafood restaurants in Mucuripe, and in the process have made their common signature dish, peixada, the most famous and sought-after dish in the state of Ceará. Tourists in the millions arrive in Fortaleza every year, and many of them arrive already have already decided that they want to try peixada during their visit. Almost every restaurant in the city that offers seafood has peixada on the menu, but for the original recipe in its original location, one has to go to Mucuripe.

Alfredo didn't invent peixada out of the clear blue sky. Fish stews and chowders are common dishes all along the coast of Brazil, with local variations in every region. But it was Alfredo who codified the ingredients for peixada cearense, and today his recipe is almost universally recognized as ur-peixada.
Afredo's peixada is centered around thick-cut fish steaks from any of a number of local species cooked in a broth with a good dose of coconut milk, augmented by pieces of cabbage, tomato, potato, green pepper and whole hard-boiled eggs. Obligatory accompaniments are plain white rice and fish pirão.

Peixada is a substantial dish and a meal in itself. And for many who eat it, whether in Ceará or far away, it's the one dish that carries with it the history and flavor of the once-upon-a-time seaside fishing village that was Mucuripe.

RECIPE - Green Weakfish with Pirão (Pirão Gourmet)

This stylish and elegant re-imagining of a simple and traditional Brazilian dish of fried fish accompanied by pirão (click here to learn about pirão) was created by São Paulo chef Rufino Casal Treinta for his eponymous restaurant Rufino's. In his recipe, he uses a fish, common along the coasts of Brazil, called pescada cumbucu in Portuguese and bearing the scientific name Cynoscion virescens. The English name for this delicately flavored, white-fleshed fish is, rather unappetizingly, green weakfish. Perhaps this unappealing name was chosen by the fish itself in an effort to remove it from the commercial marketplace. There's something distinctly unsavory about the name - "Waiter, I think I'll have the green weakfish, please," just doesn't ring true.

The fish, name notwithstanding, is delicious. However, it's range is restricted to the tropical western Atlantic, and readers from North America and Europe are unlikely to find it in their markets. It is a member of the drum or croaker family of fishes and any member of that group will serve well as will any other non-oily, white-fleshed fish that can be filleted.

It's interesting to compare this recipe to the one in the previous post on Flavors of Brazil. The technique for making the pirão is virtually identical - it's the way it's presented and what it accompanies that lifts it from home-style staple to gourmet treat.
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RECIPE - Green Weakfish with Pirão (Pirão Gourmet)
Serves 4

fish fumet and pirão
2 heads, green weakfish or other medium-sized non-oily fish
1 large onion, chopped
1/2 red bell pepper, cubed
1 clove garlic, thinly sliced
1 cup (250 ml) dry white wine
2 Tbsp. tomato paste
2 bay leaves
2 stalks Italian parsley
1 cup manioc flour (farinha) - available in Braziliand and Latin American markets
salt and pepper to taste

fish
4 individual-serving size fillets green weakfish with skin (see above for acceptable substitutes)
4 Tbsp. extravirgin olive oil
salt and white pepper to taste

garnish
green bell pepper, cut into small cubes
red bell pepper, cut into small cubes

Prepare the pirão - Thoroughly wash the fish heads. In a large pan heat the olive oil, then add the onion and bell peppers. Cook until softened but not browned. Add the garlic, and continue cooking until the onion begins to lightly brown. Remove the vegetables and reserve them.

Deglaze the pan with the white wine over low heat. Add the tomato paste and cook over medium heat for a few minutes. Add the fish head(s) plus the reserved vegetables, and cook for a few more minutes. Add cold water to cover, along with the bay leaves and parsley. Bring to a boil over high heat, skimming off any foam or scum that may form.

Reduce the heat to simmering and cook for 30 minutes. Remove from heat, let cool slightly, then strain the liquid through a fine strainer. Return the liquid to the heat, in a new pan, and over medium heat reduce it by one half. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Reduce heat to simmering. Sprinkle the manioc flour over the surface of the stock, bit by bit, stirring constantly to avoid lumping. When all the flour has been added, cook for about 5-10 minutes over very low heat, until the pirão has thickened. Remove from heat, reserve and keep warm.

Prepare the fish - Season the fillets with salt and white pepper. Heat the oil in a heavy, preferably cast iron, frying pan until hot but not smoking. Add the fish fillets and fry, turning once, until the fish is just cooked and the skin is crispy.


Prepare the final dish - Pour hot pirão onto 4 heating dining plates until it almost covers the surface. Carefully place one fillet, skin side up, in the middle of the pirão. Sprinkle the fillet with bell pepper cubes and serve immediately, accompanied by white rice.

Recipe translated and adapted from Revista Gosto #16

Pirão - At the roots of Brazilian cuisine

In traditional gastronomy, in every corner of the globe, you'll find classic combinations of a protein-based main course with an obligatory carbohydrate-based side dish. In the minds (and stomachs) of those who consume these dishes, one dish without the other is unthinkable. For example, classic Lombardian osso buco is always served with risotto alla milanese. And what is the Parisian bistro standard steak without its frites? Or a proper English roast of beef without a light and airy Yorkshire pudding standing proudly at its side? Equally unimaginable for Brazilians is the idea of eating any one of the numerous regional variations of a fish or seafood stew unaccompanied by a serving of pirão. "It's just not done" as Brazilian cooks and eaters would all agree.

Pirão is uniquely Brazilian, and has been an integral part of the Brazilian way of eating for a very long time - how long no one knows. However, it is known that the indigenous population of what is now Brazil was eating pirão-like dishes long before Europeans arrived on these shores. Basically, pirão is nothing more than a gruel made by stirring manioc flour into a fish- or meat-based broth (in times of dire need, it can even be made with manioc flour and water alone). The manioc flour thickens the broth and provides the bulk and the nutrition that only carbohydrates can give.

Manioc is the staple food on which native Brazilian cuisine depended (and depends). Potatoes and corn (maize), two other New World staple crops were known to the native populations in Brazil, but didn't have the importance in native cuisine that manioc did.

Production of manioc flour (farinha de mandioca) was a long and arduous task, and in indigenous cultures was primarily women's work. After harvesting the roots of the manioc plant, the women would grate them on graters fashioned from wooden boards studded with sharp stones. The grated manioc had to be soaked first, then wrung dry in plaited nets called tipiti to rid it of its poisonous cyanide, dried over an open fire and finally ground into flour. When completely dried, manioc flour could be stored for up to one year, and thus provided stability and certainty to the nutritional requirements of the natives.

Manioc flour (like our Western wheat flour) can be used to create a great number of dishes and food products. One of the simplest is to add flour to a heated liquid, be it water or something more flavorful, then let the flour expand in the liquid to create a pap. It can be an thin as a light gruel, or as thick as a sturdy Scottish oatmeal. The thinner versions can be drunk, while the thicker varieties can be eaten with the fingers, or even with a spoon.

Today's standard-variety Brazilian pirão is neither thin enough to drink, nor thick enough to eat with the fingers - it's somewhere in the middle. It's a consistency that isn't common in European cuisines (at least not in the ones I'm familiar with). If you are familiar with Italian wet polenta and can imagine it even wetter, you have an idea of how a well-prepared pirão should appear. When poured onto a plate from a serving spoon, it should spread out, but not so much that it covers the plate. Getting the proportions of manioc flour and broth just right is something that only comes with time and practice.

In the next couple of posts here on Flavors of Brazil, I'll provide a recipe for basic, traditional pirão and another for a contemporary re-imagining of this dish that sits right at the base, the very beginnings, of Brazilian gastronomy.