From fine dining to street food, if you enjoy eating out
then Brazil is a country that should definitely be part of your travel plans.
And if you can enjoy a good meal after a day on one of the country’s beautiful
beaches, then so much the better! Whether you’re relaxing in Rio, or sunbathing
in Salvador, you’re sure to find something to tempt your tastebuds…
Brazil Beach Brazilians don’t tend to make a big deal of
breakfast - in fact the Brazilian Portuguese for ‘breakfast’ literally
translates as ‘morning coffee’ and that is definitely the central feature.
You’ll usually get some toast or maybe a croissant as well, but either way by
the time lunch rolls around you’ll be ready for something a bit more
substantial. Luckily, Brazil won’t disappoint you!
One very popular lunch option with Brazilians is to visit a
por quilo restaurant. These are enormous buffet-style places where you pick up
a plate on the way in, serve yourself with whatever you like, and then weigh
the plate at the end. The more it weighs, the more you pay – so it’s a good way
of watching the pounds as well as the pennies. Most buffet restaurants have a
huge range available: you’ll typically find dozens of cuts of meat and fish,
but also a huge array of vegetables and salads, along with the rice, potatoes
and pasta. It’s particularly handy if you’re vegetarian on holiday in Brazil,
as you can see exactly what you’re eating before you choose it, and even if
you’re a meat-eater it’s a great way of ensuring you get your daily vitamins.
If you’d prefer something cooked to order, then traditional
lunch restaurants will usually offer a set lunch menu, where you get a starter
(often a soup) and then a main course for a fixed fee. There might be a choice
of mains, but more usually there is just that day’s choice, so although it can be
a bit restrictive, you know that what you’re getting is freshly prepared and
cooked that day, and it’s usually really good value as well. Particularly if
you’re visiting coastal cities like Rio or Salvador on your Brazil holidays,
there’s nothing better than sitting down to a fish that was caught and landed
that morning, personally chosen by the chef and then served straight to you.
In the evening, one thing you should definitely do as part
of your Brazil holiday is visit a churrascaria. This is usually translated as a
‘barbecue’ restaurant but the word in English doesn’t really do justice to it.
This isn’t just a case of a few grilled sausages or burgers: in Brazil they
marinade and then spit-roast huge cuts of beef, pork and lamb, which they then
offer to you from giant skewers – you just have to point to the part of the cut
you want and the waiters will carve it off for you at the table. Most
churrascarias are all-you-can-eat as well, so you can just sit there, ordering
more and more succulent meat until you’re fit to burst. There will usually be a
really good salad bar as well, but that hardly seems the point…
If you’re not feeling up to a meat feast, then you’ll be
pleased to know that plenty of other options are available. As well as
traditional Brazilian staples, large immigrant communities who are originally
from Italy, Japan and the Levant mean that Brazil has some of the world’s best
Italian, Japanese and Lebanese food. In particular, the Liberdade area of Sao
Paulo offers arguably the best Japanese food outside of Japan and is well worth
a visit. You can find Italian and Arabic food everywhere as well, and it can be
a great antidote to the delicious, but admittedly meat-heavy Brazilian national
dishes.
And to accompany your meal? Well, Brazilians don’t drink a
great deal of wine, so that can be expensive, but they have a good range of
crisp, light lagers which are well-suited to the tropical climate. They also
have one of the world’s best cocktails – the caipirinha. This delicious mixture
of cane rum, sugar, lime and crushed ice has made it all around the world, but
there’s no argument that it’s at its best sipped whilst watching the sun go
down on another tasty day in Brazil…
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