Before I get going I just want to acknowledge an uncertainty that I’m sure you English teachers out there can help me with. I feel instinctively that it’s OK to write “quails eggs”, but part me feels that it should have an apostrophe, like this: quails’ eggs. You know, eggs belonging to multiple quails. But then I’m not really talking about possession here, it’s more like “eggs of quails” than “I took the quails’ eggs”. Help me out here people! Anyway, until I hear differently I’m going to go sans apostrophe – let’s move on!
In Portuguese, the word for quail (the bird, not the verb) is Codorna. As I’m sure you all know, these tiny little birds lay tiny little eggs.
One of the joys of my life in Rio is the beautiful apartment that we have been renting for the last 2 years. It is in quite an old building with 3 stories and we are lucky enough to have the top floor which includes an incredible roof terrace with an even more incredible view (sorry, this is not meant to sound like bragging – but if you’ve got something nice, it’s good to appreciate it right?).
Lucky me – an ever-changing view that never fails to impress.
As well as the views, having the outside space also gives me the chance to grow some plants. People who follow the Eat Rio Facebook page may have seen that not so long ago my little jabuticaba tree delivered its first fruit.
A proud moment – my little jabuticaba tree’s first fruit! To see what a fully grown tree looks like, click here!
Well a few days ago, I discovered something else nestled amongst the branches of my jabuticaba tree. Something altogether less appetising.
Every decent sized supermarket in Brazil has one – an aisle containing all the salted meats and pig parts. In the image below you can see (from the left) pigs ears, salted pork, pigs trotters, vertebrae, pigs tails, more unidentified salted meat and finally sausages!
All the items are just piled up in the open air – there’s no need for refrigeration when the meat is salted like this.
Cuts such as these are traditionally used in feijoada, Brazil’s ‘national dish‘. The commonly told story is that feijoada was invented by slaves and made with the offcuts (ears, trotters, tails, etc) that the masters didn’t want. Although almost everyone believes and retells this story, according to various culinary historians it is almost certainly apocryphal: back in the early days of Brazil’s colonisation, not even the slave owners were rich enough to turn their noses up at certain parts of the animal.
https://i0.wp.com/eatrio.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/cassoulet.jpg?fit=1600%2C1064&ssl=110641600tomlemeshttps://eatrio.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/eat-rio-logo.pngtomlemes2013-06-03 14:12:532024-03-04 09:03:28Pig Parts and Feijoada
Hemmer call it Moho Inglês but with the fancy subtitle “Tipo Worcestershire”.
As someone who enjoys the spicy, tomatoey goodness of a Bloody Mary, I learned pretty soon after I arrived in Brazil that Worcestershire Sauce is sold here under a different name: Molho Inglês. This translates as ‘English Sauce’ which strikes me as an utterly sensible name considering:
1. “Worcestershire” is a bit of an awkward mouthful, even for native speakers. For anyone who doesn’t know, the proper pronunciation is: ‘WUSS-ter-sha’ – that final syllable does not rhyme with “hire”!
2. Why should anyone in Brazil care if this sauce originated in Worcestershire, Leicestershire or Westward Ho!? For people living more than 5,000 miles away, “England” seems accurate enough.
Well, not long after I made the Molho Inglês discovery, I made another one, but this time the shoe was on the other foot! On my first visit to a Brazilian street market I saw that the nuts I had been calling “Brazil” all my life were in fact named after one of the large states in the Amazon region, Pará.
The enormous northern state of Pará – second largest in Brazil.
The full name is Castanha do Pará, which, from a Carioca at least, sounds like ‘cash-TAN-ya doh pa-RAH’ – (“Castanha” means chestnut).
“Interesting” I thought, “so while the rest of the world just calls them Brazil nuts, the Brazilians get a little more specific and name them after the state of their origin”. That seemed like a reasonable conclusion at the time, but I’ve since learned there is a little more to it than that.
Phew – Friday at last! It’s been a busy couple of weeks hence the paucity of posts, and after yesterday’s slightly ‘dense’ offering, I thought I’d follow up today with something a little lighter.
On my way to work this morning I was sharing a bus with one of those people who play music through the speaker on their phone. Oh man, who doesn’t hate that?
Anyway, it turns out I was the winner because this guy’s selfish behaviour prompted me to play my own music (through headphones, claro) and I stumbled across a joyous piece of music by this man:
Paulinho da Viola. Doesn’t he just look like a really nice guy? I know they say it’s wrong to judge people by appearances, but it doesn’t seem so bad when you’re making a positive judgement, right?
From an early age, Paulinho was surrounded by legends of Brazilian music such as Pixinguinha and Jacob do Bandolim. In turn Paulinho went on to become a legend in his own right, famed for his sophisticated melodies and gentle singing voice. His career as a Sambista, composer and musician has spanned 50 years and during this time he has released 27 albums and toured worldwide. On top of all that, by all accounts he is a really good guy.
OK, so back to that song that cheered me on my way to work. It’s a simple, cheerful tune though, somewhat typically of Brazilian music, the lyrics tell a rather sad tale of a guy who has decided he won’t play his guitar anymore because someone has made him unhappy. Well, the words might be sad, but listening to this makes me happy! I hope you like it too – have a great weekend.
https://i0.wp.com/eatrio.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/paulinho_da_viola.jpg?fit=600%2C320&ssl=1320600tomlemeshttps://eatrio.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/eat-rio-logo.pngtomlemes2013-05-24 13:06:192015-10-01 14:31:59Paulinho da Viola
