Eat Rio Blog - Page 72 of 106

Rio+20: Indigenous Brazilians come to town.

22/06/2012/11 Comments/in Art and culture

You know how it is – you’re waiting on the platform for your morning train, when half a dozen indigenous people in full tribal dress wander past. I am talking about brightly coloured feather headdresses, body paint, spears, bows and arrows.

Índios, checking out the jewellery shop in the station.

As the train pulled in, it looked like around 30% of the passengers were indigenous, mostly dressed up and looking pretty amazing. I should point out that this is not the normal way of things – indigenous people (AKA Índios) make up just 0.4% of the Brazilian population. Clearly something was going on.

Fruit confusion

19/06/2012/22 Comments/in Food and drink

First we had questions over the various types of banana available in Brazil. Then more recently there was a great lemon-lime confusion. Today we need to talk about the fruit that has no rhyme: the orange. A few days ago I found myself browsing around ‘Zona Sul’, a fairly fancy supermarket that stocks a good variety of fruit and vegetables. I decided that I needed to try one of these Limas da Persia that apparently go so well in a caipirinha. As I found this mystery ‘lemon’, my eyes wandered to the right:

On the left you can see Lima da Persia. But what is this to the right? Laranja Pera?! A ‘Pear Orange’?!

Eu quero tchu…

17/06/2012/9 Comments/in Art and culture

Every so often a song comes along that is so annoying, you just have to do something to get it out of your system. During the year of my Latin American travels the song was the Black Eyed Peas’ I’ve got a feeling. It was everywhere – in clubs, bars, bus stations, you name it – there was no escape. Very quickly it would take just the opening notes of send everyone groaning in pain. The problem wasn’t just that it was a fairly crappy song. The problem was that like it or not, you would find yourself humming it constantly. And if you weren’t humming it, someone else nearby would be humming it and guess what – 30 seconds later you would be humming it again.

Well right now in Brazil we are suffering another of these torture songs. If you’ve been subjected to it already then all I need to say is “Eu quero tchu…“. You will roll your eyes and reply: “Eu quero tcha” and then I will go “Eu quero tchu tcha tcha tchu tcha…”. Like all the best/worst of these songs, it comes with a dance and in this case it even features a celebrity footballer.

This is Neymar – a hugely skillful footballer who plays for Santos and Brazil. Apparently his goal celebration inspired João Lucas and Marcelo to score their hit Tchu Tcha Tcha.

Rio rocks

16/06/2012/5 Comments/in Things to do

You know how it is – you turn a corner, start crossing the road and glance to your right:

Hmmm, ugly buildings, tree covered hills – nothing unusual here.

You glance to the left:

Going over to the sweet side

15/06/2012/15 Comments/in Food and drink

There may be hope for me yet people! There is a fairly decent Kilo restaurant near work which has become my regular lunchtime haunt (largely because of the excellent chilli oil they serve alongside the arroz e feijão). Recently I have noticed that after a particularly spicy lunch, I find myself craving chocolate. And as I was queueing to pay yesterday, I saw this:

Mmmm, sparkly wrapping = good. Pão de Mel (honey bread) = yum. Artesanal = I doubt it, but still, a good aspiration. Com recheio de Brigadeiro (with Brigadeiro filling) = Nooooo!