RECIPE - Homemade Linguiça (Linguiça Caseira)

Making sausage at home, any type of sausage, appears at first to be a daunting task. Particularly the whole business of getting that mixture of ground meat, fat and spices into those tubes of (horrors!) cleaned-out intestines. The machines needed to do this work look positively infernal, and the sight of a rapidly filling sausage casing isn't for the weak of stomach.

However, the results can be very good indeed, and well worth all the fuss and bother, much better (and much healthier) than commercially made sausage. And if the idea of filling all those lengths of sausage casing seems to be too much work, the product can be formed into patties, like hamburgers are, which gives you all the taste without much work at all.

Brazilian linguiça is a style of sausage that's quite straightforward, and the recipe below will give you the authentic taste of Brazil's most popular family of links. If you want to form the sausages with using either natural or artificial sausage casings, there are many sources on the internet to help you with that process. Some good ones can be found here and here . The recipe is for the filling only - remember, you can always take the lazy way out and fry or grill patties. They'll still be delicious.
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RECIPE - Homemade Linguiça (Linguiça Caseira)
10 portions

5 lbs (2.5 kgs) ground meat - not too lean; beef, pork, lamb, or a mixture of beef and pork
3 Tbsp salt 
5 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 - 2 tsp cayenne pepper, to taste (optional)
1/4 cup
2 Tbsp finely chopped Italian parsley
2 Tbsp finely chopped green onion, green part only

In a large mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients. Using your hands, knead and mix the ingredients together until you have a firm and totally homogenous mass. Form the mixture into the shape of a ball, then turn out into a clean bowl. Cover the bowl with plastic film and refrigerate the sausage mixture for at least 24 hours for the flavors to blend.

The next day, remove from the refrigerator at least one hour prior to beginning the process of stuffing sausage casings. If forming patties, the mixture can be used straight from the refrigerator.

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

RECIPE - Roast Linguiça (Linguiça assada)

This super-easy-to-make dish of linguiça sausages, roasted with tomato halves and rings of red, yellow and green peppers and seasoned with fresh rosemary, makes a wonderful homestyle supper for family or for a casual dinner with friends. All that is needed to accompany this substantial dish is a loaf of crusty French or Italian bread to sop up the juices, a simple green salad to refresh the palate, and a hearty bottle of red wine to refresh the soul.

In Brazil, this recipe is made with linguiça sausages, usually either linguiça calabresa or linguiça toscana. You can make the recipe with any good quality fresh, uncooked sausages - preferrably artisanally made. If you wish to make a less fatty version, before you begin the recipe prick the sausages all over with a fork, then pop into boiling water for about 4-5 minutes. Then drain, rinse and proceed as below.
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RECIPE - Roast Linguiça (Linguiça assada) 
Serves 4

1 1/2 lb (600 gr) good quality fresh sausages, linguiça or similar
2 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 lb (500 gr) small ripe tomatoes, halved and seeded, but unpeeled
1 small green bell pepper
1 small red bell pepper
1 small yellow bell pepper
2 large onions
2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar (optional)
a few sprigs fresh rosemary
salt and black pepper to taste
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Preheat the oven to 375F (200C).

Heat a medium frying pan, add the oil then the sausages. Brown them on all sides, turning them frequently.

While the sausages are browning, seed the peppers and cut them into rings. Cut the onions into thick rings.

Arrange the pepper and onion rings, plus the tomato halves, cut side down in a glass or ceramic baking dish. Sprinkle the optional balsamic vinegar over, if desired. When the sausages are browned, place them atop the vegetables in the dish. Add the rosemary sprigs. Cover the dish with aluminum foil, then place in the preheated oven.

Cook for about 30 minutes, then remove from oven and season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve immediately, in the baking dish.

Brazil's Most Popular Sausage Family - Meet the Linguiças

Brazilian inherited their love of sausages from their European ancestors, whether those ancestors were Portuguese, Italian, German, Polish or any number of other nationalities. Most churrascos (barbeque parties) include a course of grilled sausages and in any self-respecting churrascaria with its constant parade of sword-bearing waiters passing by the table, one of those waiter's swords will be laden with sausage. One of the most popular bar snacks in the country is a plate of sliced sausages, fried with rings of onions and sparked up with squirts of fresh lime juice.

Many European styles of sausages and cold cuts are represented in Brazilian cuisine - from hot dogs, to bratwurst and on to pepperoni. But the most popular sausages of all must be the group that goes under the Portuguese name linguiça (pronounced lin-GWEE-sa). The name itself comes from Portugal and attests to the antiquity of this style of sausage - linguiça is related to the Italian word luganega, a style of Italian sausage. That Italian word is derived from an ancient tribe in the Italian peninsula, the Lucanians. Recipes for linguiça-style sausages can be found in cookbooks from classical Rome.

In 21st century Brazil, the linguiça family includes at least a dozen different styles of sausage. Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture regulations  define linguiça as:

A processed meat product, containing meat, with or without the addition of animal fat, and seasonings, stuffed into a natural or artificial sausage casing.

That definition is very broad and could fit any number of styles of sausages. However, the regulation goes on to define with greater precision, by name, the most popular types of linguiça:

Linguiça Calabresa - A product that contains exclusively pork meat and which must have the spicy flavor characteristic of the use of calabresa peppers, stuffed into sausage casings or not, dried and/or cooked, and smoked or unsmoked.
Linguiça Portuguesa - A product that contains exclusively pork meat and seasoning ingredients, processed by hot smoking. The traditional presentation is in the shape of a horseshoe and the seasonings include a large amount of garlic.
Linguiça Toscana - A product that contains exclusively pork meat, raw or cured, with or without additional pork fat, and seasoning.
Paio - A product that contains a mixture of pork and beef (maximum 20% beef), stuffed into natural or artificial sausage casings, seasoned and cured, and subject to hot smoking.

In addition to these traditional styles, Agriculture Ministry regulations permit the sale of the other sausages in the linguiça category: beef linguiça , pork linguiça , pork loin linguiça ,pork loin and fresh ham linguiça, and smoked pork linguiça.

For Brazilians, what type of linguiça to use in a particular dish varies from recipe to recipe. For example, feijoada recipes generally call for linguiça toscana and paio, the preferred topping for pizzas is linguiça calabresa, and garlicky linguiça portuguesa is popular at churrascos.

In the next few days, we'll offer up some Brazilian recipes for linguiça, as well as a recipe for making Brazilian linguiça at home.

A Dish Called Kaol

The counter at Café Palhares

In Belo Horizonte's bustling downtown sits a small diner by the name of Café Palhares. It's a small place, just  twenty seats around a U-shaped counter. Nothing much has changed since the diner was opened in 1938 by brothers Antônio e Nilton Palhares Dini. At lunchtime during the week, the diner's busiest time, a wait for a seat is inevitable, but no one lingers over a meal at Café Palhares, so the wait isn't normally too long. Most of those waiting to eat already know what they're going to order - exactly what most of those who are in the middle of their meal are eating - a dish called Kaol. There's a large sign on the diner's wall that states it quite simply: Ser mineiro é comer um Kaol. Translated into English it means "To be a mineiro (a resident of the state of Minas Gerais) is to eat Kaol.

Kaol doesn't look like a typical Portuguese word. In fact, until a few years ago, the official Portuguese alphabet didn't even have a K. But this dish is definitely Kaol with a K. It was baptized by a noted local bohemian and radical, and frequenter of Café Palhares, named Rômulo Paes. He created an acronym for the ingredients which make up the dish, starting with pre-meal aperitif, cachaça. Because he was a radical bohemian, he substituted K for the initial letter of cachaça, C. Next came A for arroz (rice), O for ovos (eggs) and finally L for lingüiça, a traditional Brazilian sausage. Cachaça, rice, eggs and sausage - Kaol.

Since the dish was first created at Café Palhares and baptized by Rômulo Paes it has become more elaborate, though the name hasn't changed at all. In the 1970s manioc farinha and a side of sauteed kale were added, and in the 1980s the kitchen began to throw on a piece or two of fried pork rind (torresmo). Today, the restaurant allows customers to swap lingüiça for other cuts of meat, such as roast pork, or even fried fish. Traditionalists will have none of that though, and swear by the original dish with its lingüiça.

The shot of cachaça is to be downed in one gulp before the arrival of the plate from the kitchen, but to accompany Kaol, a glass of icy-cold draft beer (chope) is traditional. Most diners don't find room for dessert after a full plate of Kaol, but there are a variety on offer.

The clientele at Café Palhares, to this day, is primarily downtown office workers and shoppers, though the fame of Kaol, and the growing number of gastronomic tourists in Brazil, mean that from time to time non-mineiros make their way into the diner. They may be non-mineiros when they arrive, but by the time they've finished their plate of Kaol, they've become mineiros at heart.

RECIPE - Virado à Paulista

In yesterday's post, which concerned the efforts of an informal group of young chefs to preserve the traditional cuisine of São Paulo, we mentioned that one of that city's councilmen has asked the municipal heritage committee to enshrine a dish called virado à paulista in the roll of São Paulo's intangible patrimony.

Should his efforts be successful, virado à paulista will join a number of traditional festivals, dances, and other foods considered worthy of preservation in the face of global homogenization. To be worthy of such august company you'd think that virado à paulista might be a complicated or extravagant dish. Nothing of the sort - virado à paulista is a common mid-day meal in thousands of downtown and suburban restaurants and lunch bars. It's often served as a restaurant's prato feito (blue-plate special). It's never expensive and sometimes it's downright cheap. But its supporters feel that it is worthy of preservation efforts due to its long history, and also to the emotional attachment that many paulistas have to this dish they've eaten since their childhood.

Basically, virado à paulista is a full-meal plate consisting of white rice, cooked beans, manioc flour, a slice or two of garlic sausage, a thin steak, sauteed kale, a fried plantain and sometimes a fried egg. Nouvelle cuisine this ain't. Satisfying and filling, a virado à paulista is fuel for the whole day - for the body and for the paulista soul.

Although there are innumerable variations on the basic virado à paulista theme, this recipe is a fairly typical rendition. Feel free to modify it as desired - everybody has their own favorite way to make virado à paulista.
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RECIPE - Virado à Paulista
1 portion

3 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 Tbsp finely chopped onion
1 clove garlic, crushed
3/4 cup cooked dried beans, with their broth (click here for recipe for beans)
1/3 cup farinha (dried, toasted manioc flour)
4 oz. (100 gr) sliced garlic sausage (kielbasa, linguiça or similar)
8 oz. thin beefsteak (round steak or other)
salt to taste
7 leaves kale, destemmed and cut into thin strips
1 ripe plantain, peeled and sliced
cooked white rice
1 fried egg, sunny-side up (optional)
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In a medium saucepan, heat 1 Tbsp of the olive oil, then saute the onion and garlic until transparent and softened but not browned. Add the beans and their broth and heat through. Mix in the manioc flour, adding a bit at a time and mixing each batch in completely before continuing. Reduce heat to very low and cook for about five minutes, or until the manioc flour is softened. Remove from heat and reserve, keeping warm.

In a small frying pan, heat 1 Tbsp olive oil and fry  the sliced sausage until browned and crispy. Remove the sausage to a small plate and reserve, keeping warm. Season the steak with salt to taste, add the final Tbsp olive oil to the pan in which the sausage was fried and fry the steak to the desired degree of doneness. Reserve the steak, keeping warm. Still using the same frying pan, briefly stir-fry the kale - just until it takes on a brilliant emerald color. Seaon with salt and reserve. Finally, fry the plantain in the same frying pan.

Assemble the plate - put a scoop of white rice and a scoop of the beans on a large deep plate. Place the steak to one side, and top with the sausage slices. Add the kale and banana slices, and if desired, top it all with a fried sunny-side-up egg. Serve immediately.

RECIPE - Rich Whore's Rice (Arroz de Puta Rica)

Italy has its slutty spaghetti (spaghetti alla puttanesca) and France has its lovely little pastry called pet de putain (We'll leave this one up to you to translate on your own or with Google translator), so why shouldn't Brazil have a recipe called Rich Whore's Rice? There's no reason why it shouldn't and in fact it does have exactly such a recipe.

A traditional dish from the interior state of Goiás, this combination of rice, smoked and preserved meats, olive and palm hearts supposedly got its name because it was the favorite dish of one of the most successful and richest madams in Goiás and of both the girls and the customers in the high-class brothel she ran. According to food historian Caloca Fernandes, though, the dish was probably a very simple plate of rice and sausage in its early days and was so basic and cheap that is was called Poor Whore's Rice. Only when better meats and extravagant vegetables were added did the poor whore in the title become a rich one.

This recipe, translated and adapted from Sr. Fernandes' book Viagem Gastronômico através do Brazil, makes a great one-dish meal - meat, rice, vegetables and seasonings all combined in one big pot. You know the expression "Dine like a king". Now you know how to dine like a rich whore, too.
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RECIPE - Rich Whore's Rice (Arroz de Puta Rica)
Serves 8

4 thick slices bacond, chopped
2 Tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 link Italian sausage, hot or sweet, crumbled
2 boneless chicken thighs, cubed
1 lb (500 gr) kielbasa or other garlic sausage, sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
3 cups white rice
salt and pepper to taste
6 cups water
1 cup fresh or frozen corn kernels (thawed if frozen)
1 cup fresh or frozen peas (thawed if frozen)
1/2 cup green olives, pitted and chopped
1/2 cup chopped palm hearts
1/2 cup seedless raisins
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Heat the olive oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Add the bacon cubes and fry until crisp and browned. Add the fresh Italian sausage meat, the cubed chicken and stir-fry until all the meat is browned.

In a pan or kettle, bring the 6 cups water to the boil. Reserve, keeping at a slow boil.

Add the sliced garlic sausage and garlic. Fry briefly but don't let the garlic brown. Add the rice and fry until all the grains and coated with oil and are transparent. Add the boiling water, stir, add salt and pepper to taste. When the mixture returns to the boil, cover the pan and cook over low heat until the rice and meats are tender and the liquid is absorbed.

Add the corn and peas, and cook for another minute or so, or until they are heated through. Stir in the chopped olives, the palm hearts and raisins. Toss everything together and transfer to a deep serving bowl. Serve immediately.

São Paulo's Municipal Market - A Mountainous Mortadela Sandwich

The mezzanine floor of São Paulo's Municipal Market houses a number of restaurants, open only for lunch, whose clientele ranges from shoppers in the market to market employees to discerning diners who come to the market solely because of the quality of the food. They all share a large open space and their tables extend in front of their bar/counter and are easily identified by color, table linen or by ropes dividing the space. All of the restaurants have menus posted and available to peruse, so it's easy to pick the restaurant that suits your mood, your appetite and your budget.

One of the most well-known dining establishments in the market isn't on the mezzanine, however. It's on the main floor and is called Bar do Mané.  Its fame rests largely (and I do mean largely) on one particular menu item - a mortadela sandwich. Mortadela is the Brazilian version of the Italian cold cut mortadella which dates back to the romans, and which Italian emigrants have carried around the world. A specialty of Bologna, mortadella evolved in the USA into the famous American bologna (or baloney) sausage. In Brazil, where it's hugely popular, it has remained basically unchanged from its original Italian recipe.

What makes the mortadela sandwich at Bar do Mané such a culinary celebrity is its bulk. The sandwich, served in a French roll, packs 250 gr - over half a pound - of thinly-sliced mortadela between its two halves, guarnished with tomato and lettuce. The mortadela is folded and stacked in the roll, making a mountainous mouthful.

Legend has it that the sandwich was created one day when a regular customer complained that his mortadela sandwich was somewhat lacking in mortadela. Someone in the kitchen staff decided to call the diner's bluff and loaded the sandwich to the ceiling with mortadela. When the diner was served his sandwich his eyes popped out of his head, but within a short time he'd finished the sandwich. The next day he returned and ordered a sandwich "just like yesterday's." Other diners saw this beast of a sandwich passing by and asked for the same thing. Eventually the bar had to put the sandwich on the menu, and it remains their most popular menu item to this day.

Other Municipal Market restaurants now offer the same sandwich, but when something is as closely identified as the mortadela sandwich is with the Bar do Mané, go for the original. See if you can polish one off. Depending on the options chosen (like cheese) the price for the mortadela sandwich ranges from R$11 to R$15. That's about USD $7.00 to $9.50. It won't break the bank, but it just might ruin your diet!

RECIPE - Spicy New Year's Sausage (Virada Picante)

New Year's parties in Brazil tend to be buffets, with food available for snacking throughout the evening. Early on, the table might be filled with salty snacks, savory dishes and finger foods. As the evening progresses, sweeter foods and desserts take the place of the snacks and appetizers. This recipe for spicy sausage is a traditional New Year's dish from the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais, and livens up any buffet or cocktail platter on which is is served. The quantity of peppers can be modified to suit one's taste and capacity for spicy food.
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RECIPE - Spicy New Year's Sausage (Virada Picante)

1 lb. (450 gr.) homestyle linguiça (other artesanal sausages with garlic may be substituted)
1 Tbsp. neutral vegetable oil
2 cups red onion, coarsely chopped into cube shapes
1 Tbsp. dried, flaked red pepper (or fresh Thai red peppers)
2 Tbsp. finely chopped Italian parsley
2 Tbsp. finely chopped green onions (green and white parts)
4 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil
1 loaf baguette or other French or Italian bread, warmed briefly
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Prepare the sauce: If using fresh Thai peppers, crush into a paste with mortar and pestle. If using dried peppers, place in mortar. Add olive oil, then parsley and green onion. Crush lightly with pestle, but do not over-mix. Let sit at least four hours for flavors to blend.

Slice the sausage into bite-sized pieces. Fry in the vegetable until thoroughly cooked and browned. Add the red onion, and cook for about 5 minutes, until the onion is transparent, but still slightly crunchy.

Place the sausage slices and red onion on a serving platter, Drizzle the sauce over. Serve with slices of wam bread.

(Translated and adapted from Cozinha Regional Brasileira by Abril Editora)