Açaí, a Global Super Fruit, Is Dinner in the Amazon
Adriana Brasileiro/Bloomberg News
Açaí is a fast-growing export from Para State, Brazil. The açaí market in Belém, the capital, where much of what is sold is headed overseas. More Photos >
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Published: February 23, 2010
CAMETÁ, Brazil
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Feeding a Fad CLUSTERED high up in the slender, tilting palms of the eastern Amazon, the little purple orbs known as açaí look mighty, like blueberries that took a very wrong turn out of Maine. These are no mere muffin makers, though.
Virtually unknown outside the Amazon two decades ago, and until 2000 not exported from Brazil — its major producer — açaí (pronounced ah-sigh-EE) is now an international celebrity, riding the wave of the antioxidant craze and rain-forest chic. On the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, surfers seeking an energy boost spoon açaí smoothies from bowls. In the United States, companies touting its antioxidant powers blend the fruit into Snapple red tea; Red Brick Pizza’s frantically trendy multigrain, whole-wheat artisan crust; and everything from dietary supplements to beauty products.
But for families who live here along the winding, interlaced rivers at the hub of açaí production, the fruit has long been a vital part of their diet, a cheap way to fill up and a taste of home. And now, for some, it is a source of newfound prosperity.
In places like Cametá, a town of about 117,000, and Belém, the capital of Pará State, a bowl of açaí pulp is a filling side dish especially valued by poorer families.
Unlike the pulp used in Rio’s smoothies, the kind here is not presweetened or frozen, but fresh from cylindrical machines known as batedores de açaí, “açaí beaters,” that remove the thin layer of fruit from the pit. Most every neighborhood has stands or small stores where customers get a daily or weekly supply.
Belém’s most famous açaí market, the Feira do Açaí, near the city’s 17th-century periwinkle-colored Ver-o-Peso market building, bustles before dawn as wholesalers stack baskets of the fruit on the cobblestone square.
By 9 a.m., the countless stands around the city have opened for business, processing the fruit into thick, medium or thin varieties depending on how much water is added.
When the merchants are ready they hang red signs to indicate that açaí is for sale. As in towns throughout the region, in Belém residents pick up pulp by the liter to have with lunch or dinner.
Even some chain supermarkets have in-house açaí counters. Diego Lopes, a 21-year-old açaí processor at a Lider supermarket in Belém, says he has açaí with lunch and dinner every day.
“Think of it as a cheeseburger,” Mr. Lopes said, explaining to an American reporter. “You can’t have a meal there without a cheeseburger, right?”
Açaí’s international reputation as an energy booster and diet aid tickles those who grew up with it as a caloric side dish.
“I find it funny,” said Letícia Galvão, a psychologist who was having a lunch of seafood and açaí with her husband and 1-year-old daughter at a restaurant called Point do Açaí. “Generally, when you have açaí here, you take a nap. There, it’s an energy drink.”
Her husband, Cid, added: “After this bowl, I’m going to try to watch the soccer game. But I’ll fall asleep, almost certainly.”
Ms. Galvão said that her brother, a doctor living in the southern state of Paraná, wasn’t a big açaí fan growing up. But these days he asks anyone visiting him from Belém for a liter of the fresh stuff.
“Açaí has the taste of our land,” she said. “It’s a way of reconnecting. It’s a taste of childhood.”
Although açaí smoothies are rare in Pará, deep purple açaí is a popular flavor at two big ice cream chains based in Belém, Cairu and Ice Bode, and the white-and-purple swirl of açaí and tapioca is especially refreshing. You can also find açaí candy in gift shops, and açaí tarts in bakeries.
Sugar is an issue, though. Many locals who insist it should never be added to the fruit — a crowd that trends older and more rural — crave unsweetened açaí as other traditionalists love their coffee black, their single-malt Scotch neat or their chocolate at 80 percent cacao. And like black coffee, straight Scotch or bitter chocolate, unsweetened açaí takes some getting used to.
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