Sofia Lex, Exploration of Energy and Electrification: Brazil Summer 2023
Much like the US, Brazil is a melting pot. It has large African, German, and Japanese populations, among others, who have blended their food and culture into the country. For that reason, the cities in Brazil have restaurants for almost every cuisine imaginable, as well as their own specialties. Thus, even as a tourist, finding a restaurant should be easy as there is always something familiar amidst all the new foods to try..
During my program, we stayed in hotels without kitchens, so all of our meals were at restaurants except for breakfast. The Work + Hotel, one of the hotels we stayed at, featured lots of flavored breads, eggs, cut fruit, and juices for their breakfast. One of the foods that Brazil is known for, pao de queijo – a cheese filled bread, was part of the spread. It is a popular snack to have, especially with coffee and it was one of my favorite Brazilian foods.
Most lunches were included with the program and held in buffet style restaurants, either using a flat rate fee or kilo system to charge for the food. With the kilo system, your plate is weighed after you fill it at the buffet to charge by the weight, or kilograms, of food. The buffets were a way to try as many Brazilian style foods as possible and typically included the national dish, feijoada – a black bean stew topped with farofa, and many desserts like tortas de bolachas – a dreamy pudding dessert.
Once the days were complete, dinner was our task. While this could seem daunting, as we Ubered and were buying our own dinner most nights, the cost of Uber and food was surprisingly cheap! On average the cost of an Uber ride was R$ 10-20 and meals R$ 40-60. The R$ represents the Brazilian currency, the reai, which is 1⁄5 of the US dollar. With that in mind, the rides were $2-4, and that’s before splitting them, and meals $8-12. This made travel and food very affordable, and even then, you could choose to be thriftier as needed.
One of my favorite dinners was in Sao Leopoldo at a restaurant called Zimbabwe. As a tribute to the blend of African and Brazilian cultures, the restaurant served Afro-Brazilian foods and was interestingly decorated with artifacts of each culture. This was my favorite meal of the trip for both the food and atmosphere. I ordered kabocha cream soup which was a creamy soup with shrimp and curry flavors. This soup had encouraged me to try other shrimp dishes, like risotto, at other restaurants which always proved delicious.
The pinnacle of my Brazilian food journey, however, was found in acai. Since Brazil hosts a series of tropical and sub-tropical climates, it is home to many types of fresh fruit like acai and bananas. I had acai before traveling to Brazil and already loved it, but it was so fresh that I ate it almost every day there. It could be a whole meal, a side, a dessert, anything!
Overall, eating should not be a problem. There are so many foods to try and many reliable fall backs that you may be more comfortable with. One thing to note is that the diet is rather meat and bread heavy, as breakfasts were mostly breads and many dishes included meat without necessarily advertising it. If you do have a food allergy or are vegetarian, I would be certain to note that options could be limited unless you specifically ask for a dish made without an allergen or meat. While Brazil is known for their barbeque, or churrascaria, and caipirinhas, their national drink, my favorites and my top five foods I tried were:
- Acai
- Coxinha
- Risoto de camarao (shrimp risotto)
- Guarana (soda pop)
- Pao de queijo (cheese in bread)
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