A Few of my Favourite Things

Most of you know that I love to cook and have home-made meals. So eating out for the past five months for us has been about desserts and drinks, which is something Brazilians do really well. The bakery, a few minutes away from the house, is one of the perks of living in Barrinha and probably a bane for all the chocolate lovers in the house. It's just so hard to resist when someone brings home a moist, decedent cake as a treat for everyone before they head home or just return with something delectably delicious. So these are a few of my favourite sweets...in no particular order.

Doce de Leite

I have to say that this is the secret ingredient to a good deal of the deliciousness of many Brazilian sweets. This stuff is so good!! No matter what you do with it, whether it's spread on a slice of bread, drizzled over soft, moist chocolate cake, or just eaten on it's own, it is pure heaven! What is it? Essentially it's a combination of caramelized sugar and milk, heated until it's a sweet, creamy, spreadable, consistency. The quintessential Brazilian sweet- the Brigadeiro, is a chocolate truffle made of coco, doce de leite, and butter rolled into a ball with chocolate sprinkles on top. We had home-made doce de leite at Thais' father's place, and liked it so much, that on another day he even made us a batch to take home. My only complaint is that Ramanan ate ninety-nine percent of it!!!

Milk Shakes

When a group heads to the bakery, it's usually for milk shakes, said with the “e” clearly emphasized. It all begins with their ice cream, rumoured to be made in-house. You decide the ice cream flavour you want, whether it be Ferrero, Nutella, Belga or Brownie, and then wait for one of the girls to bring you a tall glass, brimming, drizzled with fruit syrup or chocolate syrup...so good!

Brownie

Ramanan likes to complain that when I buy sweets, I neglect to eat all of it right away, so he is forced to eat more than his share. How awful it must be for him! When we bought an entire slab of brownie from the bakery, I honestly thought it would be too much, since I can't really eat too much sweet stuff at once. This time I managed just fine :-)

Churros

We don't have churros like these in Toronto but someone should definitely make it happen. These are not the standard tiny pastries that are coated in sugar- the pastry is softer, rolled in sugar and cinnamon, then filled with doce de leite. You can find churros stands everywhere there are large crowds of people. The largest (also really good) churros we've had were in Copacabana on the night of the final game, but the best so far is in Barrinha, by the school. With a constant flow of customers there, the man selling them makes them just the right size, the doce de leite is perfectly creamy and the pastry is always warm and fresh.

Tapioca Croquettes

Every Sunday, there are ladies selling acaraje and other Brazilian delicacies near Pepe Beach. We usually go to the Sunday market first, just past Pepe's to buy fresh fruits, vegetables, spicy peppers (they have so many different kinds) for the week, have a chilled coconut water, then head to the acaraje ladies. At the stand, beautifully laid out are all types of traditional tapioca and coconut cakes and sweets. We've sampled the coconut and tapioca cakes, which are really tasty but my favourite are the croquettes (this is my name for it, because I cannot seem to remember the actual really long Portuguese name for them). It's warmed, almost slightly charred on a grill, and served with a healthy drizzle of sweetened condensed milk. The inside of the croquette is warm, just the right amount of sweetness, with chunks of coconut, and with the combination of the condensed milk, all the flavours work together beautifully.

Fruit juices, Batidas and Caipirinhas

I'm not sure if Brazilians eat their fruits but they juice them for sure. There is no shortage of juice places here and even though I don't really want to know how much sugar goes into them, they are fabulous. We tried eating Caju fruit in Salvador, and I can understand why some fruits are just better juiced. There are so many flavours to try, but I think my top three are guava, watermelon, and passion fruit. The fruit juices here are also turning me into an alcoholic! Bar do Oswaldos, a landmark in Barrinha, is known for their batidas, drinks made with fruit juices and cachaca. They have all kinds, coconut, chocolate...my favourites are the passion fruit, and acai. Batidas are so delicious, and dangerous! It's the perfect blend of sweetened, pulpy juices that you can't really taste the cachaca! Well I can't anyway, which lends itself to my earlier comment :-) It's the same story with caipirinhas. The standard being lime, but you can also get pineapple, strawberry, kiwi, strawberry-kiwi, passion fruit, watermelon, and really any combination of fruit you want. The fruits are delicately crushed or pureed, add sugar and cachaca, you have a sophisticated and simply delicious drink!