São Paulo – it grows on you

Last weekend Mrs Eat Rio and I went to São Paulo for some quality time away, just the two of us – no friends, no family, no chores or computers. This was my sixth or seventh visit to Brazil’s largest city and I loved it! In fact each time I visit São Paulo I like it more than the last.

São Paulo doesn’t immediately hit you as being a beautiful (or even a particularly nice) place to be. On my first couple of visits the weather was misty, cold and grey, the buildings were mostly nondescript and covered in pixação and the people seemed to lack the easy-going, friendly outlook I had grown used to in Rio.

However, São Paulo has been growing on me. On my third visit I stayed with friends and they had built up a list of places they wanted to show me – suddenly I was discovering funky little jazz clubs and bars that served modern, innovative food at reasonable prices.

On our most recent visit I finally got to see São Paulo in the sunshine and it looked good! We only had 24 hours, but in that time we ate in 2 world class restaurants (see below), went to an excellent art gallery (Pinacoteca) and enjoyed the ever-excellent Mercado Municipal.

Mercado Municipal

If you’re into food, Mercado Municipal is a fun place to spend an hour or two. Browse stalls selling a wide variety of tasty items, not forgetting to pick up the obligatory pastel de bacalhau or heart attack-inducing mortadella sandwich.

Nice healthy snack!

I love that sign! “Have a taste, yes! Eat your lunch, no!”

Mocotó

We had heard very good things about Mocotó, both from friends and in the press (this unassuming restaurant ranked 16 in the list of 50 best restaurants in Latin America). We were not disappointed – killer rapadura caipirinhas, velvety smooth mocotó and torresmo (pork rinds/chicharron) that blew our minds! We also go lucky with the notoriously long queues – we showed up around 5pm on a Saturday, waited 10 minutes at the bar and were then moved to a table.

Pork perfection – the outer layer was light, crunchy and deliciously salty; the inner layer was rich and fatty.

Aska

Hat-tip to Ferro e Farinha for the recommendation – Aska served up the best ramen I’ve eaten in my life (by some margin) and at R$15 ($6 US) for a huge bowl, the prices were equally delicious.

It might not look like much, but this was heaven in a bowl. The meat was perfectly tender, falling apart with minimal effort from my chopsticks; the noodles were soft and full of flavour. But the real star was the broth – every spoonful was a delight: rich and perfectly seasoned; it would have made an excellent soup all on its own.

Again, Aska is very popular and when we showed up at lunch time on Sunday, there was a 40 minute wait for a table. We put our names down on the list, did half an hour’s shopping and then came back – 10 minutes later we were sitting at a table.

In the heart of Liberdade, São Paulo’s most Japanese neighbourhood, Aska delivers the restaurant-goer’s holy grail: amazing food at very low prices.

I once met an Australian in a hostel in Peru who took glum delight in telling me that he had visited London and thought it “sucked”. It turned out he was there for 3 days and just slunk from one tourist dive to another, without making any effort to find the really good spots. Of course there are some cities that just jump out at you and win you over immediately (Rio springs to mind), but other cities require a little effort. From my experience, if you put some effort into São Paulo, the rewards are immense. I’ll leave you with a selection of my favourite São Paulo street art shots from the weekend.

DON’T MAKE ME HUNGRY!!! This is what happens when we spend too long shopping and not enough time eating!