Eat Like a Paulista!

Brazil is famous for quite a few foods: national dish feijoada, sweet treat brigadeiro, and of course, the famed churrasco. But what about the regional varieties on offer? Pull up a chair and grab a knife and fork, as we take a look at São Paulo’s most famous foods.

• Virado à Paulista

A truly historical meal dating back to the early 17th century in colonial Brazil, this dish consists of a platter of well-seasoned beans, a pork chop, eggs, kale, pork rind, fried sausage and fried plantain. It is a complete and hearty meal that has become popular across Brazil, and is served over 500,000 times a week in São Paulo capital alone.  

• Cuscuz Paulista

This couscous dish has origins in Indigenous, Portuguese, Italian and Spanish culture, with the main ingredient of couscous itself found first in the north of Africa, and arriving in Brazil in the 16th century. In the paulista version, cornflour is the star of the show, and is accompanied by tomatoes, some tinned products such as olives and sardines, cooked egg and seasonings. Some people also add another protein source, such as chicken or shrimp. All the ingredients are cooked together and formed into a dense and decorative ring. The dish can be consumed hot or cold, and is most typically found during special occasions such as Christmas and New Year’s.  

• Pastel

One of the most popular fast-food and street-food dishes around, the pastel is believed to have been adapted from Chinese immigrants’ spring rolls or wontons, using a similar sort of pastry to hold the fillings. A pastel is a hand-held food item, typically rectangular or semi-circular, and can be filled with a wide variety of flavours, some of the most popular being ground meat, cheese, palm hearts, cod, and some sweet options too. It is also a very affordable option for a quick lanche (snack), usually costing between 12 and 20 Brazilian reais.  

• Pão na Chapa

Breakfast time! This dish literally translates to ‘bread on the grill’, and that’s essentially what it is. A short bread roll known as pão francês is cut in half and covered in butter, before being cooked on a pan. Many choose to spread popular cheese spread requeijão on top and wash it all down with a cup of coffee.  

• Sanduíche de Mortadela

Tracing back to the iconic Municipal Market of São Paulo, specifically Bar do Mané, which is still considered to make one of the best mortadella sandwiches in the business, this simple sandwich is a very popular choice amongst paulistas. Alike the pão na chapa, pão francês is the vehicle for a generous helping of pan-fried mortadella (a whopping eleven ounces worth at Bar do Mané) which can then be topped off with some cheese if the customer wishes. A hearty lunch by all accounts.  

• Bauru

Last up, it’s another sandwich in our staple pão francês. This one has got a melted cheese, roast beef, tomato and pickled cucumber filling, and was first documented in 1934 when a student gave a local eatery specific directions for the sandwich he fancied, and soon after, the bauru sandwich became a hit. The name actually comes from the student’s nickname, as he was from the city of Bauru in São Paulo, and is now forever immortalised in Brazilian culinary history.  

So there it is: six traditional São Paulo delicacies. From meaty sandwiches to sweet pastries, the paulista culinary scene has a lot to offer. The only question is, what are you going to try first?  

Author: Lucy Singer

Photo by Frederick Medina, available on Unsplash