Oh, Brazil. Your flag claims order and progress (though a tour guide recently told me this phrase was France’s idea and not Brazil’s – totally believable). Burocracia e estagnação seem more accurate. I continue to wait for research permission from CONEP, the Comissão Nacional de Ética em Pesquisa. But really, what’s 6 months – or a year – when you’ve got nothing better to do than finish your Ph.D., get a job, and begin the Sisyphean task of paying off student loans?
What’s for lunch?
Meanwhile, I conduct ethnographic study (totally permitted!) in the form of sampling regional food. The local market in Portel offers a variety of delicious – and purportedly delicious – items.
I do believe this is a tire rim being used as a barbecue grill. Who cares! The grilled fish is delicious.
Among the actually delicious items for sale at the local market is a palm fruit called pupunha. They’re about the size of a plum and have the texture, when cooked, of a potato. The flavor is buttery, and nutty, and slightly bitter. In other words, gostoso!
A local vendor of pupunha, tapioquinhas, coffee and beer
Maria Julia peels a pupunha, hopefully headed for my side of the table
Another actually delicious item at the market is called a tapioquinha, which is a bit like a Brazilian crêpe made from tapioca flour and filled with butter, cheese, or occasionally fruit jelly.
Someone else’s picture of a tapioquinha filled with butter (mine never last long enough for a photo)
No report of regional food in Portel do Pará would be complete without a description of açaí (pronounced ah-sigh-EE). Açaí is a type of palm tree that produces the açaí “berry,” which is actually not a berry but a “drupe.” (A drupe is a fruit that has a fleshy part outside a pit or stone. Olives and peaches are drupes. Thanks, Wikipedia!) The pulp of the açaí “product” is pureed and mixed with a little water to form a sort of thick soup. It’s most often served with farinha, toasted manioc. Lots of people add sugar as well, but I am a purist.
Açaí is sold by the liter or half liter in clear plastic bags. I felt like a true Parense when I could bite off a bottom corner of the bag and fill a pitcher without spilling any.
A pile of açaí seeds outside a shop selling it at a really good price. Too bad I buy my açaí from another guy.
Waiting for the water to boil . . .
Now, for the potentially less delicious market offerings. Guess what this critter used to be before becoming someone’s (not my) lunch? The first person to answer correctly wins its cranium! (For those few of you for whom this prize is surprisingly un-enticing, I’ll think of something else.)
Life with Its Teeth Out 
That looks like a sloth. I hope they prepared it in a slow cooker. Ha!
You all are TOO good! It is indeed a sloth. Guess I need to add another sloth cranium to my shopping list . . .
is that a sloth cranium?
How did you figure that out?