Brunch at VAGAFOGO

So... This weekend I travelled with my girlfriend to a small village in the Brazilian countryside named Pirenopolis. It is located in the State of Goias, which is well known for its unique cuisine, that includes local ingredients (such as the baru nut or the pequi fruit) and traditional dishes (Galinhada - chicken with corn, pequi and rice).

Around Pirenopolis, there is a well-known farm named Vagafogo. From 9h to 16h30, a generous brunch is served to the visitors. It was highly spoken of to me, so it was an obvious destination. It is really worth the visit if you are in the region, because everything there is locally made and tastes very fresh. Many recipies are exclusive from the farm owners and cannot be found anywhere else in town.

 My table in the beggining of the brunch: diversity and quantity teaming up...

Three kinds of bread were offered: whole grain, honey bread and milk and butter bread. The bread was served with a wide variety of jams, marmelades and chutneys, some of wich were made out of typical fruits from the region, such as cagaita, pitanga, pequi, starfruit, jabuticaba among others; some of them mixed with pepper for a sweet-spicy taste. There was also three different kinds of creamy cheese, "Minas" type cheese and home-made chanclich. Scrambled eggs were served as well. There was also some meat, preserved in olive oil with spices.

However, my favourite toppings were the dry ambrosia, made out of caramel milk and the "farofa cearense", made with cassava flour and old butter. The visit was really worth it!

Meat and chutneys 

Malaysian Food Festival

As far as I know, there is no Malaysian Restaurant in Brazil (maybe in São Paulo or Rio de Janeiro; the largest cities). Thus, I was really looking forward to try this country's cuisine when I learned about a gastronomic festival held by the Malaysian Embassy.

So, there I was in a hot saturday afternoon ready to try anything that would come my way. And so I did. The menu was extremely diverse, with a wide variety of dishes. Many vegetables, meat, chicken and fish were available with exotic sauces.

The peanut and coconut sauce was particularly savoury. It made a perfect combination with the curry puffs filled with potatoes and vegetables, very similar to Indian samoosa. The prawn fritter was very good as well. There was also a sauteed beef with spices (lemongrass and star anis, I think), a sweet and sour fish and a shrimp salad named "Ulam with Sambal Belacan". All of thoise had me coming back for more... I tried the traditional "Roti Canai"-malaysian pancakes, very similar to a pancake my grandmother used to make when I was a child. It was really delicious.

Roti Canai

The pink cake is made out of rice flour. As for the yellow one, I have no idea what it was. 

For the dessert, there was a wide variety of cakes, including the "ant-hill cake" (kek serang semut), which has drawn my attention for being a very common cake in Brazil as well. This is probably a common portuguese heritage?

Finally, they served their traditional tea, the "teh tarik", wich means litteraly "pulled tea". It is a mixture of black tea with milk, with a smooth and foamy texture because of how it is made: the person quickly pours the tea from one jar to another repeatedly, untill it gets the desired constitution. Hence the name "pulled tea".  

Ilex Paraguariensis

...is the scientific name of the plant known as "Erva Mate" (Mate tea). It is a shrub that grows in southern and central area of Brazil, being found in Paraguay, Uruguay and Argentina as well. The Guarani indians used to mix leaves and other parts of this plant with water to make a bitter-tasting tea out of it.

Legend states that the plant was offered to an old indian hermit by a stray emissary of God, in exchange for generous shelter and food offered by his host. The plant, named "Cáa Yaráa" would be a past time for moments of solitude, as a healthy and tasty beverage could be made from it.

According to the tradition (drinking mate is a true ritual), tea can be consumed hot, inside a recipient named cuia. In this case, it is known as chimarrão (from the spanish word cimarrón-wild cattle) and the herb used is very powdery and lush-green. When consumed cold, it is better known as tererê. It is served inside a guampa-a slice of a bull's horn with a wooden bottom. The horn has 3/4 of it filled with a roughly cut herb (slices of leaves and wooden sticks). After filling it, one has to lay it horizontally, covering the open part with his hand. Thus, the herb will be disposed in a way that water can be poured in. Finally, one has to place the "pump" (bomba), a metalic straw-like tool used to filter and drink the water.

Cold tererê inside the guampa. Ready to drink!

You cannot move the pump once it is placed or the herb may block the passage of water, making it difficult to drink. The one who prepares the tererê drinks the water until a loud noise can be heard, meaning it is empty. This act is called "making the guampa snore". Then it is filled again and shared between friends. This usually happens in the countryside, where cattle herders get together around the fire at night to tell stories, sing, eat and drink.

A drop of tea.

In Brazil, tererê is very common in the Central Region, specially in Pantanal. It is also widely consummed in Paraguay. As for the hot variety, chimarrão, it is more common in Uruguay, Argentina and the Southern part of Brazil. I am more of a tererê drinker myself, though I appreciate a hot chimarrão from time to time...

That's how the erva mate for tererê looks like.

The Great Clogger

Brazilian food is not exactly healthy. If you take for example some of the most popular dishes in the country - feijoada, acarajé, churrasco - they'll all present highly above-average levels of cholesterol/fat. Also, brazilian people tend to like extremely salty or sweet food (at least for international standards).

In the South, they have a typical hamburger wich they call "X-Gaúcho" or "Hamburguer Gaúcho". The "X" stands for "cheese", which is how this letter sounds like in portuguese. Thus, in Brazil, we have the "X-Salada", meaning a hamburguer with cheese and salad, and the "X-Tudo" (lit. X-Everything). The particularity of the Gaucho-burger is its size. The bread is almost as big as a regular dessert plate. It always comes split in halves, for it's almost impossible for one person to eat one of those alone. As for what comes inside, besides the hamburger meat you will find corn, green peas, cheese and mayonnaise, in its simpler version. There are lots of varieties. Near my house, they sell a really big one named "X-Campeiro" (Cheese Countryside). Curious about the stuffing?

- A Hamburguer

- 2 slices of cheese

- Some mayonnaise

- One fried egg

- A slice of ham

- Green peas

- Corn

- Minced bacon

- Minced Calabresa sausage

- Minced chicken hearts

- Tomatoes

- Chopped lettuce

I swear it is HUGE (and as delicious as it looks)! If you have heart problems, you'd better run away from it!

(Photographs coming soon!!!)

Extra Large food!

This is not the gargantuan X-Campeiro, it is just a regular sized X-Bacon

A delicious way to get your arteries clogged

Juicy!

Brazilian Food #1

A long time ago, the wife of a Chief indian gave birth to a snow-white girl, who she named Mani. Seeing the baby was pale as the moon, the Chief decided to kill her the next day. That night, a white man came to him in dreams and convinced him into not commiting the crime: his daughter was a gift from the Gods. The girl grew up to become a beatiful and smart child but did not live for very long. Mani died during her sleep, in a night illuminated by the full moon. She was burried inside her hut and all the people mourned the loss. Their tears watered her body underneath the earth and, days later, a strange plant appear. As it grew, its roots tore up the earth and the indians decided to cut them. Noticing the white core, they named it Manihuaca (Flesh of Mani or Horn of Mani)

Manihuaca

Manioc or cassava (in portuguese known as mandioca, aipim or macaxeira, depending on the region) is, according to my father and a famous Brazilian chef, the main component of Brazilian cuisine. It is the only ingredient widely used from North to South, by all people and to all purposes. The roasted manioc flour is a very common "side order" and people usually  mix it with rice and beans in their plate. A variety called "farofa" consists of this roasted flour with some other ingredients, usually eggs, bacon, minced onions, garlic and bananas all mixed up together. It is a real treat!

Crop of manioc

 In June and July, it is commonly served baked or fried with all kinds of meat during festivals called "Festas Juninas". The cake made up from the manioc flour is also a very common dessert sold during these festivities.

Festa Junina about to begin in a parking lot - Bird's eye view.

Grilled manioc and pork meat topped over rice

Manioc cake

Being one of the the most usual components in Brazilian cuisine, there wil be a lot about this root in upcoming posts.