Foods of Brazil, Part I

Let's go straight to the pictures:

Tara eating what they call a "crepe" in Belem, which is actually a stick of cheese fried in butter on a special little George Foreman grill contraption (though without the angle that would cause the fat to run off):
I have become somewhat addicted to fruit nectar in South America. It is way cheaper and more common than in the US and peach nectar especially is amazing. For those that don't know, nectar is some small percentage of the fruit juice and then tons of sugar.

They like to sell cake on the street in Brazil. Huge cakes, you walk up, and they cut you a piece. This was some kind of coconut one. They are all very moist and not bad. This one only cost about 75 cents. Tara later paid $1.50 for a cashew one that wasn't worth it.

For those that don't know Tara, she loves prunes. Yes, she is an 80 year old trapped in the body of a 29 year old. She was so happy when she found these for an almost reasonable price...

These are Brazil nuts in their shells. I couldn't get an action shot, but the way they open them is by holding the shell in one hand and whacking it with a giant machete with the other hand. Surprisingly, I didn't notice any of them missing fingers. The art is apparently to keep the nut whole when you whack it.

We bought a giant bag of Brazil nuts for about $1.50. They have tons of different grades and sizes. We went with the ones that were broken in pieces about the size of half nuts. That apparently made them cost 1/4 the cost of whole nuts.

Brazilians love meat on a stick. This is good, as I do, too. They set up small grills everywhere and sell this amazing tasting meat. The going rate is 50 cents per stick, but these were a little lower quality, so they were 3 for $1.00! Seriously, I don't understand why they cook meat so much better than Americans, but they do.

Tara loves her coconuts, and they are everywhere in South America. They chill the whole thing on ice and then crack a hole in it and put a straw in for you to drink the coconut water. We have bought them for as little as 25 cents, but most are more like 50 cents. I don't love them (despite loving coconut).

Dried shrimp is huge in Brazil. At least in Northern Brazil. They have it at all the markets and it seems cheap. Neither of us likes shrimp, but I like the picture.

Tara has been trying all kinds of yogurt flavors not available in the US. Here she is with a drinkable wheat (or maybe oatmeal) one.

Pineapple is super cheap here. We have seen whole pineapples for 50 cents. But we don't have a knife, so we were happy to find ready to eat half pineapples for 40 cents.

I had to finish off the juice after, of course.

This one is still a mystery. It was sweet and gelatinous. It was not good, but Tara forced herself to eat all of it.
Who knew that cashews actually have a huge fruit on them? They use the fruit here in a lot of things. It is rare to see the nuts still attached, but in Salvador we have seen a few places.
Some of the Salvador streetfood is African in origin. This is apparently from the west coast of Africa. A fried thing made of kidney beans filled with palm oil goo, green stuff, and other unidentifiable fishy sauces. Tara liked it.
I had my own gelatinous mistake. This one was coconut with condensed milk, but wasn't very tasty.
That's all for now!