Kitchens of the big houses

Let’s talk a little about history and food.

Between the 16th and 19th centuries, wheat flour was an expensive ingredient in Brazil. Imported from Portugal, it was known as “flour of the kingdom” and was far from being part of the daily diet of most of the population.

In the kitchens of the big houses, enslaved women had to feed entire families using the ingredients available. When wheat was lacking, they resorted to other flours, such as cassava or yam, adapting recipes according to the possibilities of each region.

It was in this context that various fried preparations emerged, passed down from generation to generation, among them the so-called “bolinho das negras” (little cake of the Black women), pointed out by some researchers as one of the ancestors of today’s bolinho de chuva (rain cake).

The recipe varied according to available ingredients: flour, eggs, milk, sugar, and, later, baking powder. After being fried, the little cakes were sprinkled with sugar and cinnamon.

One of the popular explanations for the name “bolinho de chuva” (rain cake) says that the sound of frying resembled the falling of rain, making the recipe especially associated with cold and rainy days, when families remained gathered inside the house.

At the same time, on the other side of the Atlantic, we find a close relative: the beignet of New Orleans.

Brought by French Acadian immigrants (the Cajuns), the beignet is prepared with a fermented dough, light and soft, fried and covered with a generous layer of powdered sugar. It became one of the greatest symbols of Louisiana cuisine.

But there is another equally important story in that city.

Calas were fried rice cakes prepared and sold on the streets by enslaved women. There are records of women who managed to buy their freedom with the money obtained from selling these recipes, transforming calas into a symbol of economic autonomy and resistance.

Although they have different histories, the beignet, the cala, and the bolinho de chuva share culinary trajectories that dialogue with one another. They all were born from the encounter between European traditions, local adaptations, and the culinary knowledge developed by enslaved populations in the Americas.

There is yet another Brazilian relative: acarajé.

While the bolinho de chuva occupied domestic kitchens and the beignet sweetened the cafés of New Orleans, acarajé went out into the streets by the hands of the baianas de tabuleiro (Bahian street vendors). It was not sweet. It was dendê (palm oil). It was ancestry.

It also represented economic autonomy, because the sale of acarajés allowed many women to build their own forms of livelihood and, in some cases, also conquer their own freedom.

In the Brazilian imagination, perhaps no character has immortalized the bolinho de chuva like Tia Nastácia, from Sítio do Picapau Amarelo.

Regardless of contemporary discussions about Monteiro Lobato’s work, the character ended up becoming one of the best-known symbols of the cook in Brazilian cultural memory. Her little cakes represent much more than a recipe: they evoke care, affection, and knowledge transmitted between generations.

Perhaps that is precisely why certain recipes awaken such deep memories. The smell of sugar with cinnamon. The hot oil.

The dough being prepared while the rain falls outside.

Food also embroiders memories.

Each recipe is a way of preserving experiences that would hardly fit into a written document.

The folklorist Luís da Câmara Cascudo dedicated part of his work to recording these culinary heritages, reminding us that cuisine also constitutes cultural heritage and a historical document.

Despite the differences in origin, the bolinho de chuva, the calas, the beignet, and the acarajé reveal a common characteristic: they show how different peoples transformed simple ingredients into food, identity, and memory.

Because cooking is also a way of preserving. And, sometimes, a recipe can hold the history of an entire people within a small piece of fried dough.