Food History of Rio de Janeiro

Key eras

1565 to 1763, a Portuguese port on Guanabara Bay

Founded in 1565 as the seat of a Portuguese captaincy, Rio de Janeiro became capital of the State of Brazil in 1763. Its cooking grew from Portuguese, Indigenous and African roots, and the Portuguese share still shows in the bacalhau and chicken dishes served daily in older restaurants.

1808, the royal court arrives

The Portuguese court landed at the Largo do Paço on 8 March 1808 and made Rio the seat of the monarchy. On 13 June that year the prince regent, the future Dom João VI, ordered a garden by the Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas to acclimatise nutmeg, cinnamon and black pepper from the East Indies: today's Jardim Botânico.

1874 to 1894, cafés, chope and confeitarias

Café Lamas opened on the Largo do Machado on 4 April 1874, Jacob Wendling's Zum Schlauch, later Bar Luiz, began pouring ice-chilled chope in Centro in 1887, and the Portuguese immigrants Joaquim Borges de Meireles and Manuel José Lebrão founded Confeitaria Colombo in 1894.

Late 1800s to the 1920s, Pequena África

In the Pequena África around the port, quituteiras, many of them African women from Bahia, sold sweets in the squares. Tia Ciata (1854 to 1924) worked as a doceira on the Rua da Carioca, always dressed as a baiana, and Pixinguinha, Donga and João da Baiana gathered at her house for rodas de batuque.

1930s and 1940s, dishes named for regulars

The diplomat Oswaldo Aranha lunched in the 1930s and 1940s at the Restaurante Cosmopolita in Lapa, a politicians' haunt nicknamed Senadinho, and the high-cut steak with fried garlic, batatas portuguesas, rice and egg farofa he ordered there took his name; Café Lamas, where he asked for the same plate, added it to its menu.

From 2003, the Northeast in one pavilion

Migrants from the Northeast ran an open-air fair for years around the Campo de São Cristóvão, the largest gathering of Northeastern traditions outside the region. In 2003 the city moved it into the 1962 exhibition pavilion, now the Centro Luiz Gonzaga de Tradições Nordestinas.

Immigrant influences

• Portuguese: Portuguese settlers and later immigrants left bacalhau, chicken dishes and the confeitaria tradition: Confeitaria Colombo's 1894 founders were both from Portugal.
• Syrian and Lebanese: Traders from the Ottoman Empire settled around the Rua da Alfândega in the early 1900s, the Saara today, and made kibbeh, esfihas and tabbouleh part of everyday Carioca eating.
• Afro-Bahian: Bahian quituteiras such as Tia Ciata sold sweets on the streets, and Bahia's influence brought moqueca, acarajé, bobó de camarão and caruru to Rio's restaurants and street stalls.
• Northeastern Brazilian: Northeastern migrants built the São Cristóvão fair, where forró stages share the pavilion with stalls of regional cooking.
• Japanese: Japanese cooking, adapted to local taste, spread across Rio's neighbourhoods as yakisoba stalls, temakerias and sushi rodízios.

Signature innovations

• Filé à Oswaldo Aranha: steak with fried garlic, potatoes and farofa, named for a regular at the Cosmopolita
• Biscoito Globo, the polvilho biscuit brand exclusive to the city of Rio, sold at its tourist spots
• Açaí blended into a cold cream with fruit and cereals, served in a bowl or cup with granola and banana
• Feijoada carioca, served in botecos on Fridays and Saturdays alongside the rodas de samba
• Mate gelado, iced mate tea sold from street stalls across the city
• Picadinho carioca and Sopa à Leão Veloso, listed with Filé à Oswaldo Aranha among the capital's typical dishes