TapiocaFlour

Bem Casados

Weddings in Brasil are always a big affair. Friends of mine in the United Kingdom are very surprised when I tell them that couples in Brazil get married in the evenings as this is unusual in the UK. The later the wedding in Brazil the bigger the social statement you are making.

Then there’s the Reception and everything else that comes with it. I will not go into detail but what I wanted to make you aware of are the little ‘Wedding favours’. They are little in size but very, very plentiful! These ‘Wedding favours’ which are a must in every Brasilian wedding are called ‘Bem Casados’ which is translated as ‘Perfect  Matches’.

Each of them consists of a two part sweet treat joined by soft toffee and as the toffee dries off it sticks the two halves together. As simple as it might sound, the making of the delicious Bem Casados is an art form. The dough is very delicate, even ‘temperamental’, and one must approach it with care.

All over the country there are small companies that make them but they are very often a family run business which has a recipe which has been passed down through generations.

When choosing the venue for the reception the bride and groom can do a ‘tasting’ in the various catering houses in order to choose the ones with the best ‘Bem Casados’. These catering companies not only apply an art to baking them but also apply an equal effort into ‘dressing them up’. The packaging is very important and at the actual wedding reception there will be a special area designated for the display of these ‘wedding favours’ as they are no ordinary sweets.
The guests are meant to help themselves to only one each on their way out of the reception but many guests have been known to take more that!

The picture above and on the left are by Vera Costa, a lady who owns a company in Salvador, Bahia which specializes in Cakes and receptions. Each company adds its own touch to the bem casados.

In São Paulo they have two companies which are rather nice too:

Caramelada  is a company that I specially like as they do the most beautiful displays. There is also Conceição  who have been making Bem Casados for more than 35 years and is known to cater for more upmarket weddings.

I will leave a simplified recipe here in case you would like to give it a go:

5 eggs

125g sugar

125g flour

Pinch of salt

½ teaspoon baking powder

Couple of drops of vanilla essence

 First sift the flour with the baking powder on a bowl and reserve. Beat the egg whites until soft peaks form. Add the egg yolks and beat until it becomes a light cream. Add the vanilla essence, then add the sugar gradually and continue beating for another minute. Fold through the mixed flour and baking powder gently.

Line a baking tray with greased baking paper and using a piping bag fitted with a round tube make small circles with the dough. Leave some space between them as they tend do spread a bit.

Bake them until they become golden and cool them completely on the baking tray. Once cooled take one of them and spread some filling on it before joining the other half. Do the same with all the remaining ones.

The filling is often toffee like. You can make it at home by immersing 1 large tin of condensed milk in boiling water, and boiling for five hours. You will need to top the pan up with plenty of water every so often.  If you choose to use a pressure cooker for that cooking time will go down by 1/5. Alternatively you can use a jam of your choice.

Wrap them up as desired.

Below is a picture of unwrapped and wrapped bem casados by Renata Boechat who has also provided the recipe above. Enjoy!!

 

Brigadeiro

I have been having a tough time choosing the topic for my posting number 2. It is not that we as a nation do not have a varied enough confectionery list to choose from. On the contrary, the list is long.

In the end I have decided to go for the nation‘s favourite, Brigadeiro. Would you need an English translation? Brigadier should be close enough. All I know about the origin of the sweet is that it was named after an Air Force commander, Brigadeiro Eduardo Gomes. This dates back to the forties. Whoever he was he made the country a great service by giving us this wonderful, naughty confection.

It falls in the category of ‘docinhos’ which are little sweets that can be found all over the country. I think that its great secret is the chocolate element and the beautiful, gooey texture given by the condensed milk. Condensed milk takes a central place in the nation’s confectioner culture. Nestlé arrived in Brazil over one hundred years ago, back in 1890 and condensed milk has has become a very Brazilian ingredient.

Where you can get hold of brigadeiros? Just about anywhere. It holds a special place in children’s birthday parties and everyone’s kitchen. Suffice to say that it is a favourite of children and grown-ups alike. Anyone – and I really mean anyone, can prepare it. Even my dad. I dare you to get it wrong.

Ingredients:

30 brigadeiros or more depending on how small or big you roll them up.

1 can of condensed milk

1 tablespoon of unsalted butter

3 tablespoons of chocolate powder

Chocolate strands, enough to coat them

 
Take a medium non-stick (preferably) saucepan and throw the condensed milk in it, together with the butter and chocolate powder. Keep the heat as medium and keep stirring non-stop until you can see the bottom of the pan – approximately 10 min. You will notice the mixture becoming thicker and thicker until it looks as if you are lifting it with the spoon. I am talking really thick and big patches of the pan becoming visible.

 

Pour the thick sauce on a plate and spread it with the spoon. Leave it to cool.

 

 

On a separate plate pour the chocolate strands.

When the mixture has cooled off coat your hands with vegetable oil, take a teaspoon and start getting small amounts of chocolate and rolling it into a ball. Roll it over the chocolate strands and place it in a paper case.

 

Throughout my adolescence it was comfort ‘food’. My friends and I would make some and eat nearly the whole thing with a spoon once it had cooled off. There was no need to roll it up. You would arrange to watch a video with friends and some brigadeiro would materialize instead of popcorn.

Cheese Rolls, cheese bread

Cheese rolls, cheese bread,...well, it makes no difference really.

‘Pão de queijo’ as it is widely known all over Brasil is one of the most typical Brasilian snacks. I say it because it has crossed all our state borders. You might be north, south, southeast.. and all Brasilians will claim it as the nations favourite.

By origin it is from the state of Minas Gerais. We still talk about ‘the real cheese bread rolls’ and by that you mean the one made out of a ‘Minas recipe’. We still hold a strong belief that no matter who you are, what cooking skills you have or lack, if you were born in that state you ought to have ‘the’ recipe.

I once registered with an online food community called ‘Man, I am just mad about cheese bread rolls’’. Currently it has 207151 members. People who might or might not visit it regularly but who once joined in the hope/belief that they might find a recipe which would just be it. I confess that I for one joined the site as I wanted to find a recipe that would be the winner of the Michelin for ‘Pão de Queijo’. I wanted to amaze my friends from different corners of the world with this wonderful recipe.

My fellow Brasilians do miss ‘pão de queijo’ so much when they move abroad they are known to learn to make it so that they can keep their addiction alive.

The ingredients are: tapioca flour, eggs, milk, vegetable oil, a pinch of salt and cheese. I use Parmesan cheese as I live in England
and I cannot find ‘cura’ cheese, a variety widely used in Brazil.

  The preparation varies. There are traditional recipes where you boil the milk with the oil and pour it over the tapioca flour and then mix it all with your hands after adding the eggs to it.

I would love you to give it a go. The recipe below is the one I use all the time. It is just simpler than the traditional ones as I just could not be bothered with the whole palaver involved. The author is a chap called Luis Luiz. You can freeze the cheese rolls once rolled as you will end up with as many as 65. I believe that as much as you might fall in love with it 65 might be wee too much to have at once.

Pão de Queijo do Luis Luiz

Ingredients

500g tapioca flour

200g grated parmesan cheese

2 eggs

1 ½ cup milk

½ cup vegetable oil (I recommend corn or even peanut oil)

1 dessert spoon of salt

 

Put the tapioca flour and salt in a non-metallic bowl, mix and set aside. Put the oil, milk and eggs in a blender and give it a whizz for one minute in medium speed. Add the grated cheese and blend it very quickly, just long enough to mix all the ingredients. Gradually add the mixture to the flour and mix it all with a wooden spoon. It might be a bit hard at first but I promise that it gets better and the mixture becomes smooth. Make little cheese balls with your hands and bake them for 20/25 minutes – oven temperature 200◦C or slightly higher. It will be slightly golden on the outside. Remove it from the oven and let it cool on a rack.

The cheese balls can be rolled and frozen on a tray and only once frozen should they be put in bags and stored in the freezer. When baking the frozen rolls they should be initially placed at the bottom shelf of the oven and only moved to the middle shelf half way through their baking time.

I love having them with coffee but I used to like having them with pineapple juice. Some Brasilians have them with milk shake even – odd if you ask me. Whatever takes your fancy really.