🇬🇧 Fruits and Brazilian Desserts

Today I'm going to talk about a topic that I spent some time without writing about. Food. Mainly about fruits and desserts common in Brazil. The desserts I will try to speak only of the typical ones of the country, but as I live in a mixed country, full of people of the most varied origins, it may be that some of these sweets are typical of another place and adapted here.

One of the rarest fruits in the world is abundant in Brazil: jabuticaba. And we have many other typical fruits in several regions. I'm not sure what typical fruits in the south of the country would be, as the ones I normally see are common in temperate countries. But across the country we have, among others, pequi in the cerrado (I already mentioned it in a specific text), soursop, umbu, acerola, cocoa, passion fruit, pitanga, cashew, avocado (which we normally eat with sugar for breakfast and not salty as  in guacamoles), pineapple, kiwi, pear, apple, pitaya, guava, peach, nectarine, pine cone (or earl's fruit), various species of oranges and lemons, mandarin (or tangerine or mimosa, depending on the region you are in),  strawberries, plum, persimmon, papaya, coconut, sour coconut (very common in the cerrado), jambo and many others. In a country of continental dimensions, we have fruits from different climates and vegetation.  And many dishes that use these fruits.

In the state of Minas Gerais, in addition to the dulce de leche in different consistencies, we have many sweets of various fruits. Canjica (dessert with milk and white corn) and sweet rice (also called milk rice) are also common. Most fruits become desserts in syrup. Guava can become guava in syrup, creamy guava (like a jelly) or cut guava. It can also become juice or ice cream. Papaya is eaten with sugar for breakfast, but it can turn sweet from papaya rings in syrup, when the fruit is green, papaya candy or juice, in addition to being part of more elaborate recipes. Pequi, as I said in the other text, is usually eaten with rice for lunch and dinner, but it can become ice cream. The sour coconut is a delight to make juice, popsicles and ice cream. Corn becomes mush (sweet or salted, in some regions. Commonly sweet) and also popsicles, ice cream, cake, and many other delicacies. From the sugar cane, the juice is extracted, which is drunk pure and cold (or, in some places, mixed with lemon and other fruits, but I prefer pure), and can also be transformed into rapadura and batida (which is a very sweet  similar to rapadura, very tasty). Figs can also become a syrup or candied fruit candy. The coconut becomes varied sweets, juice (very good) and ice cream. The pineapple can become juice, popsicle, ice cream, sweet in syrup, be part of pies and cakes, among other options. The pineapples in the city of Monte Alegre are famous for being very sweet. Here in Curitiba the pineapples taste too soft. These are some of the most common sweets in Minas.

I really like to consume fruits in the form of juices, ice cream and sweets, and also in some pies, like my apple pie, which has no dough, like the American one. Mineiro desserts are very good for those who like very sugary sweets. The sweet mush is an exception, as it has a milder flavour.

In other states we have sweets with a softer sweetness. For juices, I recommend trying umbu, cocoa, coconut and other regional fruits. When thinking about ice cream, my first choice is to take açaí, a fruit sorbet that comes from the north of the country, mixed with guaraná syrup. In the north of the country people usually eat açaí as an accompaniment for lunch or dinner, not as dessert as we do in the south and southeast. My favorite popsicle is sour coconut, but I never saw it marketed. I did it at home, in childhood, preparing the fruit juice and freezing. But I don't know where to buy sour tart outside Montes Claros. If you know, comment!! 🤩

In addition to the sweets from Minas Gerais, Pernambuco and Bahians are my favorites. Baianos do wonders with coconut. The typical sweets and cakes from Pernambuco, such as the Souza Leão cake and the bolo de rolo, are an extraordinary experience. Here in the south it is possible to find bolo de rolo recently, but few are like the ones I tasted in Recife, where the dough is so thin that we hardly notice its presence. Some here look more swirling, with a thinner dough, and you can really taste the dough, which makes the experience frustrating for those who have already eaten real bolo de rolo.

Fruits are also part of the coverage of some sweet pizzas (pizza is something typical of Italy, but sweet pizza is something very Brazilian).

The breakfast in Brazil is very abundant, with breads, cakes, cheeses, cookies, coffee, milk, jams, guava, ham, juices and other delicacies according to the taste of each family.  Many include fresh fruit, which we also find in hotels, for breakfast.

What are your favorite desserts and fruits in Brazil?

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Nycka, the Nomad