Que voce recomedaria...

What do you recommend? 

Yup, still can't say it correctly. Luckily that didn't stop us from trying some traditional Brazilian foods.

Cafe da manha

Brazilian style

Papaya, mystery melon, pineapple, cheese, cold cuts, and bread, bread, bread. Sweet bread, cheesy bread, sliced bread, bread rolls. And these divine fried, sweet bread donut things. They have it all. And under the bread category was cake. Not like coffee cake that in a sugar-fairy world can count as breakfast, but sliced and diced, no-pretending-about-it-cake. Chocolate cake, coconut cake, lemon cake. But since there was no frosting, I was ok with eating if for breakfast (not that extra sugar has ever stopped me
before).

Almoco

This was at our first self-service (aka buffet) restaurant, even though we ordered a meal at the table. This is some Brazilian beef dish. And yes, that's a whole hardboiled egg in there. Warm and delicious, it was the perfect way to pass a rainy afternoon in Manaus, especially with a Brahma beer.

 Jantar 

In Manaus, our guide recommended two restaurants. We went to the first (the self-service above) before the tour, and decided to try the second after the tour to try the fabled Tambaqui (it's a fish). Apparently, restaurants in Brazil don't even open before 7 pm. So when we went there at 6:00ish, it wasn't open. No problem, we turned around and returned to our neighborhood bar for a capirinha while we waited. We arrived shortly after 7 to find ourselves the first, and only customers. An old man greeted us. After awhile, an older woman came to take our orders. When we asked for a recommendation (again, not so good with the Portugeuse), she told us she didn't speak ENlgish and went to get her son. Turns out her son was about 16 or 17, spoke excellent English thanks to Bon Jovi and Pearl Jam, and I wouldn't be surprised if he snuck into our suitcases to come back to America. He talked to us how about how Brazil is so corrupt and full of lies and he wanted out. His father returned during dinner with Jack Kerouac's On the Road. It turns out this fmaily had read every American classic. When we asked our new Brazilian friend what was good, we ended up with the Tambaqui and another mysterious fish. And this was where the manioc saga began...

In the jungle, we had learned about cassava, called manioc in Brazil. It's a very common crop that can be used to make flour, beer, and in several dishes including flavored with onions etc and called farofa. When I saw manioc on the menu, it was time to try it. I was excited. It was listed as a side dish, and I tried to ask our waiter friend about it. He said most visitors don't like it, it's too dry and plain. I asked how it's supposed to be eaten. He said it's usually mixed with rice and he'd bring some to try. Well he brought A LOT to try. Imagine crunchy, unflavored, dry bread crumbs. Really crunchy. Like grapenuts. And we had plain white rice to mix it with.

Yes that bowl in the middle is the manioc, and Robin is attempting to mix it with the rice.

Abd the restaurants in Manaus were even health concious and looking out for our health. We listened to their plea to reduce salt, and washed it down with a beer.

Manioc: take 2. The conference hotel was in Barra do Tijuca, which had probably 5 restaurants within a 10k spread, and two of them were in hotels. So when we found a restaurant that was fresh, open 24 hours, and had a great vegetarian selection for Leon, we found ourselves there twice. On the second night, I had a real Brazilian dinner. Chicken, rice, beans, and manioc! This time it was better.But it was still a pile of dried breadcumbs. At least this time they had some flavor. And the best part of our "favorite" Rio restaurant was the Acai. Known as Oprah's superfood, this frozen purple treat is divine after a hot, humid day. And it's even better when we had seen the acai palm trees where it comes from.

On the last night, I did finally have some real farofa/manioc on the streets of Ipanema. It was mixed with veggies and other things and wasn't dry at all. We also had some manioc pancake things (best when filled with a fried banana). I guess it's not all crunch and breadcrumbs.

Sobremesa

This Brazilian chocolate thing was the most delicious, melt in your mouth, rich chocolatey yumminess. Don't be deceived by the chocolate sprinkles. It was high class all the way.

Beber

And no holiday would be complete without sampling the local beverages. We sampled aged cachaca, some more caipirinhas, Brahmas, and even an aqua de coco.

 

Those things on the left are some authentic pastels, pastries will all sorts of fillings. Don't ask me what was in mine. The menu was in Portuguese of course, and I picked the most confusing one.

 Saude!