Augusto Ivan de Freitas Pinheiro and Eliane Canedo
Research and contributions: Cristiane Titoneli
Bread yes, tapioca no: Europe in the tropics
“The entire city was soon in an uproar, in the greatest and liveliest contentment (...) with Portuguese and British men o’war anchored in this beautiful bay, adorned with thousands of fluttering banners and pennants in many different colors (...) and together with the fortresses also hoisting their flags, they saluted the Royal Standard with a salvo of 21 shots.”20 Although delighted by this enthusiastic reception and fascinated by its lush tropical vegetation, the Portuguese Court soon realized that it would be hard to accept the conditions offered by the city and adapt to the habits of the local population.
Visibly unhealthy at that time, Rio de Janeiro was surrounded by bogs, wetlands and pestilential lagoons. With almost no sidewalks, its narrow and unhealthy streets were packed with enslaved workers dodging loose livestock. According to English merchant John Luccock, there were so many black people in the city streets that "a foreigner happening to cross the city at midday might almost believe that he had been transplanted to the heart of Africa”.21
The new European residents found no theaters or cafés here, far less the musical soirées of Lisbon. They even had to get used to different eating habits, as the main meal was a soup made from sundried beef, vegetables and beans, with bread replaced by coarse-ground tapioca or cassava flour. Using wheat flour to make bread began only in 1813, and then only for the wealthier classes, as reflected in newspaper announcements of that time, collected by Delso Renault:
In 1816 there were only six bakeries in Rio. Using wheat flour instead of ground cassava turned this profession into a luxury industry. Costing 4 vinténs a pound, eating bread was a privilege reserved for the Portuguese and other foreigners. Small amounts of wheat were shipped up from Rio Grande do Sul State, with only two flour mills in the city that year. Two years after the coronation of the king, inflows of foreigners – mainly French – prompted the appearance of countless French, German and Italian bakeries, which were abundant throughout the city by 1829.
Caring little about baking the bread that they sell, Brazilian bakers are brilliant (...) at making savory crackers, doughnuts, biscuits and cookies. It was only in 1820 that the first cake and confectionery stores began to appear: “the owner
of one of them, at Rua Direita 13, says that he will start having coffee and tea for gentlemen having lunch, dinner or supper.”
There are several advertisements from professionals in this field: “a Frenchman who is a skilled baker” wishes to work in the “city, or the countryside, or even upstate”. As bakeries began to spread, French rolls replaced biscuits, scones and cornbreads made from cassava, manioc or maize. (...) However, home deliveries of bread were regulated in 1868: “A Frenchman newly arrived in this country, an excellent cook who can also bake doughs, seeks a position in a private home.”22