Brazilian Vatapá. Traditional homemade recipe from Brazil
Today we travel to Brazil to make a super traditional dish from northeastern Brazil called vatapá, and it's a spreadable cream with a mixture of very aromatic ingredients that you're going to love.
- A piece of bread
- 200 ml of coconut milk
- 40 grams of roasted peanuts
- Half a small onion
- 1 clove of garlic
- 1 teaspoon of fresh ginger
- 2 tablespoons of palm oil (but it's better to use sunflower or another vegetable oil)
- 2 tablespoons of fresh cilantro
- Half a lemon
- 50 ml of water
- Shall
- We start by cutting the bread into pieces and letting it rest for 10 minutes with about 100 ml of coconut milk so that it absorbs everything.
- Heat the oil in a pan over medium heat. The original recipe calls for palm oil, which is awful, but I recommend using sunflower oil. Add the finely chopped onion and cook for 5 minutes.
- Add the chopped garlic and grated ginger and cook for another minute.
- Add the bread and peanut mixture and the remaining coconut milk. Cook over low heat for 10 minutes, stirring constantly, until thickened and creamy. If it becomes too thick, gradually add water or a little more coconut milk.
- Stir in the chopped cilantro, adjust the salt, and cook for another minute. Remove from the heat and add a few drops of lemon juice. Mix well and serve hot.
I tried this dish at a Brazilian restaurant here in Madrid, one of those meat rodizio types, and I was very surprised by its flavor, so today we're learning how to prepare Brazilian vatapá.
The truth is, it has a mix of ingredients that, when you see them, you'll say, "Wow, that flavor is amazing!" It's a recipe from northeastern Brazil with African origins, since there's a lot of African influence in that region.
And if you don't know this recipe, I'll leave you with one of the most important ones in Brazil, which is feijoada, which is one of those wonderful stews that many of us, I tell you, would love to have on a nice warm Sunday.
