The origin of 10 delicacies that we love and eat on a daily basis (has a hamburger, fries and brigadeiro!)

Who can resist a warm cheese bread in the middle of the afternoon? Or a stroganoff prepared with all love? Crispy breaded steak? Hmmm… did you paint Sunday night? Must have pizza!

These and other delicious foods we love aren’t just full of flavor. They have incredible stories and we don’t even realize them when we order a milk pudding for dessert or steal a brigadeiro at the little party before congratulations time.

We, here at awesome.club, we were also curious and went to research the origin of various delicacies that we cannot live without. And in the end, one special bonus about a dish that has very different preparations in various regions of Brazil.

Stroganoff is Russian and its first recipe appears in the book A Gift for Young Housewivesby chef Elena Molokhovets, launched in 1871. The original preparation, created in honor of the rich Stroganov family, takes cubes of meat breaded in flour, mustard sauce, vegetable broth and sour cream (milk beaten with lemon).

The recipe was modified until it reached the present day and the Brazilian version, with the addition of tomato sauce (or ketchup), mushrooms and the practical cream of milk, in addition to the onion in the stew. Brazilians also can’t do without a portion of straw potato to go with it.

Who introduced the stroganoff in Brazil was the Austrian Baron von Stuckard, who served the dish at the Vogue nightclub, opened in Rio de Janeiro in 1947. At the time, it was a sophisticated and expensive food. Today, anyone can prepare delicious stroganoff in the blink of an eye.

The name says it all: Milanese steak is related to the city of Milan, Italy. But there are controversies about its origin. The Austrians say that the invention is theirs, from the city of Vienna, where the wiener schnitzelprepared in a similar way: breaded meat with wheat flour, breadcrumbs and egg.

Some historians believe that this type of breaded steak is of Byzantine origin and was first taken to the Iberian Peninsula, before becoming famous in Italy. But the Italians really seem to get the better of the dispute. Historian Pierro Verri, author of history of milancites a document from 1148 in which breaded veal appears, described as lombus cum panitio🇧🇷

The very traditional recipe is prepared with veal, but with the arrival of Italian immigrants to Brazil in the 20th century, it was improvised at will. Today we make milanese with a variety of meats, chicken, shrimp and even banana and provolone cheese.

There is a dispute between Belgium and the Netherlands over the creation of french fries. One of the stories is that fishermen on the Meuse River (which passes through both countries) had the custom of frying fish. In winter, when the waters were frozen and fishing was scarce, they cut potatoes in the form of small fish, to break the branch. That was back in the 17th century.

But historian Paul Ilegems, curator of the French Fries Museum in Bruges, Belgium, believes that the Spaniards are the best in this fight. He assures that the first woman who fried potatoes was Santa Teresa D’Avila (1515-1582). It makes sense: Spain was the first country to grow potatoes, discovered in South America, precisely at the time of Santa Teresa.

Documents are missing to prove who was the first person to throw fresh potatoes into hot oil and then rave about their crispness. But we have to agree on one thing: this was a “holy” idea!

The hamburger is believed to originate from the steak Tartar, a delicacy based on raw meat, taken to regions of southern Russia invaded by the nomadic Mongols in the 13th century. The meat was kept under the saddle of the horses in the army of the conqueror Genghis Khan and ended up turning into a paste after so much hazing. Despite being subjugated, the Russians liked and adopted the dish.

The connection between the name of the snack and Hamburg is not casual. This city in Germany was one of the main European ports from the 17th century, receiving a large number of Russian ships, which would have taken there the revenue of the steak Tartar🇧🇷 At the end of the 18th century, the English cook Hannah Glasse described in her book the hamburgh sausage, ground meat seasoned with various spices, but roasted and served on a slice of toasted bread.

Hamburg also left most of the European immigrants to the United States, at the end of the 19th century, with New York as their first destination. Quickly the hamburger steak it has become a very popular dish in American city restaurants. The oldest known reference is that of Delmonico’s Restaurant, which included the hamburger on the menu in 1873.

Tasty, cheap, fast and convenient, the hamburger soon won all over the United States and, in the 20th century, it spread throughout the world. In Brazil, who introduced this delight was the American tennis player and businessman Robert Falkenburg. He opened the first Bob’s store in 1952 in the Copacabana neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro. At the time, there were people saying that that fad would not catch on…

Unfortunately, not much is known about the history of cheese bread. However, almost every Brazilian agrees: this delicacy, which goes so well with coffee, was born in Minas Gerais. Historians of our gastronomy believe that the recipe has existed since the 18th century.

You might ask yourself: “Why cheese bread, if it isn’t exactly bread?” The lack of ingredients in colonial Brazil explains this charade. As wheat was still very rare around here at that time, cassava derivatives were used as substitutes, which the Indians knew very well how to process.

The creature who had the idea of ​​mixing manioc flour with cheese and baking it in the oven, however, forgot to write the deed in his diary. Centuries later, those who really popularized this wonder were the children of Arthêmia Chaves Carneiro, the lady with glasses who appears on the logo of Casa do Pão de Queijo. They opened their first store in São Paulo, in 1967, and today the chain is spread across all Brazilian states.

Italian? Not so much… It is true that it was in Italy that pizza gained the style that conquered the world, but other peoples had been preparing the recipe for much longer. In the 6th century BC, Persian soldiers made their “pizzas” on shields, topping them with cheese and dates. There is archaeological evidence of similar delicacies in various corners of the world.

In Naples, Italy in the 16th century, a round bread already known as pizza was eaten in the streets. But it was with the arrival in Europe of tomatoes, typical of America, that everything changed. The Italians went crazy with the novelty, taken from Mexico by the Spanish conquerors, and perfected its use. Including the pizza sauce, of course. The oldest tomato-based recipe book was published in Naples in 1692.

Naples continues to be the great reference for pizza — it was where the margherita recipe was born, for example, with mozzarella, tomato and basil, created in 1889 in honor of the queen of Italy. At the beginning of the 20th century, immigrants brought pizza to Brazil. After becoming popular in the State of São Paulo, it won over the country, in the most diverse adaptations of ingredients and seasonings.

It is common to hear the story that slaves created the Brazilian feijoada by mixing less noble pieces of pork (feet, snout, paws, ears) with beans, which would be discarded by the masters. Scholars of food in Brazil disagree with this thesis, because in the colonial period there was a shortage of meat and even landlords did not have the luxury of dispensing with any part of the animal.

The most accepted hypothesis is that feijoada is an adaptation of traditional Portuguese stews, which mixed white beans with ingredients available in each region. The Portuguese who arrived here found black beans, original to our continent, and had to make do with them.

The first document mentioning the dish is an advertisement published in 1827 in the Diário de Pernambuco, in Recife, informing that Thursday was the day to eat feijoada at Locanda D’Águia de Ouro. Today, in some regions of the country, the custom is to serve it on Wednesdays and Saturdays. But a good dish of “feijuca” goes well anytime that hunger strikes!

We are used to thinking of pudding as a sweet dish, but there are savory versions. There’s even kidney pudding or pudding made from animal blood. The English love it and it was from them that we “stole” the word pudding, which would have its origins in French, boudin. It’s a generic name for several recipes, but one thing is certain: the pudding needs to be soft, easy to bite.

It is very likely that the milk pudding, the one we love the most, has Portuguese origins. The delicacy has been popular in the land of Cabral since the 16th century, when Infanta D. Maria listed seven types of puddings in her culinary manuscripts. In Brazil, the recipe for custard pudding officially appears in The Imperial Cookthe first gastronomic book published here, in 1840.

In the 20th century, condensed milk established itself as the main ingredient in our pudding, due to its practicality and the taste that drives sugar fans crazy. It’s a calorie bomb: a can of condensed milk “fattens” as much as 12 roasted chicken thighs with the skin on. But who can resist snapping up a shiny pudding, even more so with burnt sugar syrup on top?

Quindim is another sweet that originated in Portugal, where preparations with many egg yolks were common in convents. There until today it is called Brisas do Lis, typical of the region of Leiria. It was created by the nuns of the Convent of Santana and traveled to lands under Portuguese possession, such as Angola and Brazil.

The original recipe calls for chopped almonds to form the crunchy base, which contrasts with the soft dough formed by the egg yolks. Here in Brazil, where did the colonial Portuguese find almonds? It is believed that, due to the influence of African peoples, coconut was defined as the best substitute.

The word quindim has African origin. To this day, in Bahia, it means sweetness, affection, dengo… What better way to express these feelings than offering a quindim?

The brigadier is ours! He has no Portuguese, Russian or German origin. He was born in the city of São Paulo in 1946, raised by supporters of Brigadier Eduardo Gomes, candidate for the presidency in the elections of that year for the National Democratic Union, which was opposed to the government of Getúlio Vargas.

It was an especially lively political period for women, who for the first time could vote without restrictions. Since 1936, voting was limited to married women who had their husband’s permission, single women who worked and widows….