How about adding a Brazilian touch to your Christmas dinner? We will help you, highlighting local ingredients and recipes that are good for tropical weather. Check this extensive menu with classics like farofa and salpicão salad and authoral recipes from the chef Ana Luiza Trajano such as shrimp in crunchy baskets and pumpkin salad with pupunha and molasses vinaigrette. And merry Christmas!

 

See also:
7 farofas for year-end holidays
4 recipes using raisins 
Salpicão (Chicken salad), potato salad, roasted duck with red cabbage, filled chicken, chocolate pavê , french toast


Coalho cheese with molasses
10 portions

 

Ingredients:

1,6 kg coalho cheese (typical curd cheese)         

0,1 kg sugarcane molasses       

0,1 l olive oil         

45 wood barbecue sticks cut in half

 

Directions: 

Cut the cheese in rectangles of 4,5 cm height, 2 cm length and 1,5 cm thick. Grill all sides.  

 

Preparation: 

Before serving, skewer each piece of cheese and top them with molasses.

 

Shrimp shell with dendê’s farofa

10 portions 

 

Ingredients for shrimp cream 

1,3 kg small Brazilian shrimp        

100 ml heavy cream      

0,1 kg onion                              

0,1 kg  peeled tomatoes 

20 g garlic                                

3 Brazilian red peppers            

1 bay leaf                                      

1 bunch of thyme                              

100 ml olive oil                            

200 g spring onion               

200 ml dendê (palm oil)              

Salt and pepper                                            

 

Ingredients for dendê’s farofa:

4 kg manioc flour       

1 l dendê (palm oil) 

600 g onion                      

200 g garlic                            

Salt and pepper                           

 

Ingredients for the “shell”: 

2 packs of filo pastry 

0,5 kg butter 

 

Directions: 

For the shrimp cream: 

Cut the shrimp in small pieces and saute them in palm oil with the chopped onion and the garlic. Let release some water and add the fresh mashed tomatoes. In another pan, boil the heavy cream with the bay leaf, the thyme and the Brazilian red peppers. Then mix the two parts, add salt and pepper, let it boil until it becomes a thick cream and add some more chopped red pepper.

 

For dendê’s farofa: 

In a hot pan, put the palm oil to saute the garlic and the onion, add the manioc flour and let it get a crunchy texture. Add salt in the end.

 

For the filo shells: 

Open 1 sheet of filo pastry, spread butter on it then add another sheet on top of it. Use a curling ring to cut circles of dough, add more butter to it and place them into pie molds. Bake it at 180oC for 2 or three minutes, until it gets crunchy.

 

Assembly:

Heat the shrimp cream, fill the shells and cover them with dendê’s farofa. Garnish with spring onions.

 

Pumpkin salad with pupunha hearts of palm and molasses vinaigrette 

10 portions 

 

Ingredients for the salad:

200 g cress                                                   

200 g sliced pumpkin                               

200 g pupunha hearts of palm                                      

400 g sliced Canastra cheese 

Salt and pepper                                                                         

 

Ingredients for molasses vinaigrette: 

200 ml balsamic vinegar     

100 g sugarcane molasses       

100 ml extra virgin olive oil 

 

Ingredients for parsley and spring onion pesto

50 g parsley   

50 g spring onion 

200 ml extra virgin olive oil     

Salt and pepper                                                

 

Directions

Salad:

Mix all the ingredients and season with green leaves pesto, salt and pepper.

 

Molasses dress: 

Heat the balsamic vinegar in a pan until it reduces  to a third of the original volume. Let it cool, add the molasses and blend it, drizling olive oil slowly. Season with salt and pepper.

 

Parsley and spring onion pesto: 

Blend all the ingredients until smooth.

 

Assembly: 

In a bowl, place the dressed salad, the molasses and garnish with the slices of Canastra cheese.

 

Roast turkey stuffed with giblets farofa and Brazil nuts

10 portions 

 

Turkey ingredients:

1 turkey with around 4 kg                     

300 g celery                               

300 g leak                       

100 g onion                             

100 g carrot                            

0,5 l white wine                       

200 ml molasses                               

100 ml water                                  

Salt and pepper                                  

 

Farofa ingredients:

250 g coarse corn flour  

300 g raisins                  

200 g candied fruit         

300 g butter                         

600 g peru giblets                  

500 g cashew nuts               

500 g Brazil nuts             

Salt and pepper            

 

Directions: 

Turkey: 

Cut the greens in small pieces and use them to season the turkey. Add salt, pepper and the wine and let it marinate for 12 hours.Stuff the turkey with the Brazil nuts farofa and close it with a string. Roast it at  180°C for one hour and 40 minutes. Before serving, grease with a mix of molasses and water and  serve with the farofa.

 

Nuts farofa: 

Saute the onions and the giblets in butter, add the nuts, the corn flour and toast it in medium heat. Add the raisins and reserve it. 

 

Assembly: 

Garnish a plate with banana tree leaves and serve the turkey with nuts farofa.

 

Brazil nuts farofa: 

10 portions 

 

Ingredients:

250 g coarse corn flour 

300 g raisins                      

200 g candied fruit            

300 g butter                           

600 turkey giblets                   

500 g cashew nuts               

500 g Brazil nuts              

500 g baru nuts                

Salt and pepper 

 

Directions: 

Saute the onions and the giblets in butter, add the nuts, the corn flour and toast it at medium heat. Add the raisins and reserve it. 

 

Pork loin roasted in its juice 

10 portions

 

Ingredients:

4 kg pork loin                  

200 g celery                    

200 g leek            

200 g onion                  

100 g carrot                 

2 bunches of thyme               

100 ml white wine          

3 l water                       

100 g butter             

500 ml corn oil          

Salt and pepper 

 

Directions: 

Dice the veggetables. Season the pork loin with the vegetables, salt, pepper and the wine and let it marinate for 12 hours. In a pan, at high heat, add oil and sear the pork loin in all its sides. Reserve it. In the same pan, put the vegetables from the marinade, let it golden, add the liquid and the seared pork loin. Add water little by little, let it cook for two hours at low heat, until the meat is softened. 

 

For the sauce:  

Sieve the vegetables from the broth in which the tenderloin has cooked. Let it reduce until very thick, add the butter to glaze. 

 

Assembly:

Cut the pork loin in thin slices moisten with its own juice and serve it with Christmas rice. 

 

Christmas rice 

10 portions 

 

Ingredients:

1kg cooked rice                             

100 g cashew nuts                

100 g baru nuts               

100 g Brazil nuts               

100 g candied fruit              

100 g raisins                       

200 g butter 

50 g chopped garlic 

100 g chopped onion                   

100 g chopped parsley           

Salt and pepper 

 

Directions: 

Cook the rice in your tradicional way and reserve it. Stir fry the onion and the garlic in butter, add the nuts and the other ingredientes and finish with salt and pepper. Spread parsley all over it and serve. 

 

Coconut pudding with cashew syrup 

6 portion 

 

Ingredients for the custard: 

1 l milk                        

300 g sugar             

200 g dried coconut          

500 ml coconut milk     

5 egg yolks             

100 g cornstarch    

 

Ingredients for the syrup:

1 kg of fresh cashew                    

1,5 l cashew juice              

200 g sugarcane molasses      

1 stick of cinnamon               

1 clove                           

2 bay leaves              

50 ml ginger juice    

20 g mint leaves                     

 

Directions: 

Pudding:

In medium heat, mix all the ingredients till it thickens. Turn off the heat, pour in a tube cake tin and let it cool down in the fridge for 4 hours.

 

 Syrup: 

In medium heat, heat the juice, the molasses, the cinnamon and the clove and reduce it to half of the volume. Low the heat, add the small pieces of the fresh cashew and, finally, the ginger juice and the mint leaves. Reserve it.  

 

Assembly: 

Cut the custard in slices and pour the syrup over it. 

 

Milk pudding with nuts and vanilla syrup 

9 portions 

 

Ingredients for the pudding:

300 ml condensed milk                          

300 ml whole milk                                      

4 eggs                                  

100 g sliced Brazil nuts 

100 g sliced cashew nuts

 

Ingredients for vanilla syrup:

300 ml whole milk              

200 g sugar         

20 g cornstarch                 

100 ml heavy cream    

2 vanilla beans or 40 ml vanilla essence 

 

Directions:

Pudding 

Blend all the ingredients. Pour it in a tube cake tin and take to a preheated oven at 120ºC in a water bath for 30 minutes or so. 

 

Syrup: 

Put all the ingredients in a pan at medium heat, stirring constantly. Take out the vanilla beans and save it. Add the heavy cream. Let it cool and serve it with the milk pudding.

 

 

 

 

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