Brazil Travel – Visiting a Favela by Chelsea Schmidt

From Wikipedia

A new, unique Brazil travel experience is to tour the favelas of Brazilian cities. Is this type of “slum tourism” helping or hurting the local people? Find out yourself by reading this great blog post by Chelsea Schmidt from Backpackers.com

http://2backpackers.com/12230/south-america/brazil-travel-visiting-a-favela 

Cooking like Brazilians! Salpicão Recipe

Brazilian Chicken Salad – Salpicão

pic from:http://bit.ly/VCyQdZ

Whether you are going to the north, south, east or west of Brazil, you will find this easy and delicious chicken salad dish with a Brazilian twist. Except that Brazilian will not call it Chicken salad, so you should learn the real name: “Salpicão”.

This recipe, like many such recipes for salads and cold dishes, is just a guideline – feel free to substitute and modify. If you want the final product to be original Brazilian Salpicão, you may NOT omit the packaged shoestring potatoes. They’re what makes it salpicão and what prevents it from just being chicken salad. Enjoy!

RECIPE – Brazilian Chicken Salad (Salpicão)

1 whole chicken breast, boneless and skinless, poached, cooled and shredded
2 medium carrots, peeled and grated
1/2 cup fresh or frozen corn kernels, cooked and cooled or canned corn kernels
1/2 cup fresh or frozen peas, cooked and cooled, or canned sweet peas
2 small green apples (Granny Smith or similar) cored, peeled and cubed
1/3 cup seedless raisins or sultanas, or dried apricots or dried figs ( make sure to cut them into small pieces)
1 small red onion, finely chopped
1 1/2 cup good-quality commercial or homemade mayonnaise
1 standard package shoestring potatoes
1/2 cup of olives
1/2 cup of heart of palms (cut in cubes)
1/2 cup of shred ham (optional)- I dont always use ham.
Salt and pepper

In a large mixing bowl, combine all the ingredients, stir well with wooden spoon to combine. Taste for seasoning and add salt and pepper to taste (remember that the shoestring potatoes and already salted, so be careful not to over salt). Put into a large serving bowl, or onto a serving platter, and sprinkle the shoestring potatoes over the top. You should be

You should find the shoestring potatoes at the Supermercado Brasil-Brazilian Market in Culver City (http://bit.ly/XkEB5E – you can buy it online), or any other Brazilian market around you. Please let me know if you can find the shoestring potatoes anywhere else besides the Brazilian markets, I always have such a hard time finding it.

Thanks for reading it!