Churrascaría and Caipirinhas

Before leaving Rio we wanted to sample the most typical local food and drink. So on our last night we visited the Carretao churrascaría in Ipanema, another of the famous beach suburbs of the south zone of Rio where the better off part of the population live.

As a culinary experience this was unique.  We were recomended to this type of restaurant by our Brazilian friends Kevin (who lives just round the corner from us in Spain) and Isabela (from pwc in London) and we were not disappointed by either the quality or quantity of food.

What happens is basically this: there are no menus and a guy comes over to seat you, take your drinks order and tell you that the "salad bar" is self-service.  The salad bar is groaning with all kinds of salad but also paella, fish and varios other hot dishes which are presumably there on the off chance that someone turns up who doesn't want meat.

We sat down with a plate of salads and started to eat. Within minutes the first of the skewers of meat arrived and the waiter carved it at the table. Then came another and another and another and another. We had flank, rib, brisket, sirloin and several other lots of beef barbecued on skewers in different ways.  We are not talking about kebabs here but whole joints of meat that have been roasted on a spit.  Then there was the chicken, the pork, prawns, a couple of types of sausage and even wild boar.

Neither of us have ever eaten so much.  The turnover of tables is incredible and the restaurant, which must sit well over 200, was full. The vast quantity of meat comes out at a bewildering pace and when we checked the bill at the end it told us we had been there for all of 57 minutes!  Getting up to go to the toilet (or salad bar, but that was unlikely to be happening given the volume of meat on offer) meant risking running into squads of waiters bearing hot meat on sword-sized skewers!

In order to recover we walked back to Copacabana and spent another hour or so sampling that other great Brazilian institution - the cocktail Caipirinha which is made mostly of lime, ice and of course a local spirit.

We sat at a simple bar within metres of the waves lapping on the beach watching a couple of families go out into the sea with fishing nets to catch some fish to eat. Having finished our drinks we left them to cook the fish on a fire in the sand.  A fine way to say goodbye to Rio.