NATURALIST IN BRAZIL 



from the ground. The leaves of the palms are pinnate by nature, 

 but the banana-leaf is reduced to the pinnate condition by the wind. 



Rich as the tropics are in fruits, they have few useful vegetables. 

 True, southern Brazil has our peas and cabbages and the like, but 

 northern Brazil possesses, as a genuinely tropical vegetable, only the 

 quiabos ; long, green, pointed fruits, which in flavour are like tender 

 green peas. They are rather slimy in consistency, but to me they 

 were always welcome. A vegetable of the most delicate flavour, far 

 excelling our asparagus, is the palmito or palm-cabbage, prepared 

 from the shoots of various palms. The best is prepared from the 

 Palmitojussara (Plate 13), which is common in Sao Paulo. This 

 excellent vegetable is eaten either baked or boiled. 



The most important of the Brazilian vegetables is the black bean, 

 which is said to be more readily digested than ours. It is the basis 

 of the national dish, feijoada. This floury bean is cooked with xarque — 

 that is, dried meat — which gives the dish a strong and peculiar 

 flavour ; or in the Sertao carne do sol is employed — that is, meat dried 

 in the sun. Many other ingredients are added : above all, herbs and 

 pepper. No Brazilian meal is complete without a jar of small green 

 and red pepper-pods steeped in vinegar, which acquires and increases 

 the excessive pungency of the pepper. My friends used to tell me 

 that when I was able to eat this pepper without stumbling out of 

 my chair with streaming eyes, I should be a true Brazilian ! 



In the tropics, where virility develops earlier than in Europe, and 

 declines more rapidly, such pungent herbs and spices are greatly 

 valued. It seems, however, that spiced or peppered dishes agree with 

 one better in the tropics than in Europe. In India, for example, 

 curry is indispensable, especially in the national dish of curry and 

 rice, or "rice-table," as it is called in the Dutch Indies. Personally, 

 I prefer the latter to feijoada. First one is given a helping of white 

 rice; then four curried dishes are offered — flesh, fish, game and 

 vegetables — and a spoonful of each is laid on the edge of one's 

 plate. One then mixes them all together with a spoon, with the 

 addition of a little mango chutney, and sprinkles coconut meal over 

 the whole to soften its pungency ; after which one eats the mixture, 

 which can be varied a little every day, with the result that one never 

 tires of it. 



Just as the Italian sprinkles grated Parmesan cheese over his food, 

 so the Brazilian sprinkles farinha — mandioca meal — over his. It is 

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