Feira de São Joaquim!

05 Nov 2009
Today we went to the Feira de São Joaquim, a local farmer's market that is open every day but has the freshest produce on Fridays and Saturdays.
They sell things from fruits to artisan baskets to religious products. I'll go through some of the things we saw and if you want to look the fruits and what not up in Wikipedia you can click on the word and it'll send you there, but I will most likely spend posts talking about the individual foods later :)

This farmer's market is huge and overwhelming, like my mãe says, it takes several visits to actualy see everything. I think this and another big farmer's market (it sounds like there are only two big ones in Salvador) is where my family gets all our produce once a week.

It is easy to get lost in it. Which is what happened to us. But it has its organization. The market is relatively organized in sections.
So here is a part of the basket and cage section:

Then of course the largest section is the produce section.

umbu fruit right above and below.

graviola

amendoim (peanuts)

óleo de dendê

I'm not really sure what these roots above are.

spices and honey

olho de cabra

curry
large cinnamon sticks
Now I know where my mom got gets her caruru dried shrimp.
rapadura are like little blocks of cane sugar. Usually used in cooking for special occasions.

jenipapo

Then we come to the religious section which has a lot of things for candomblé and syncretic folks.

These herbs are a major part of the candomble faith because it is a religion very in touch with and respectful to the natural environment.
some Candomblé beads.

Orixá statues.

these bowls are used for placing the said herbs.

scented oils and waters play a part in the ceremonies as well.


Then there is the artcrafts and woven stuff section. I love this effective little fan.


Then, as usual, we got the munchies and visited this Lanchonete. I actually really wanted a burger... but... I had just eaten. There's nothing like Latin American street burgers! oohh yum!

But I ordered an acai juice with other fruits blended into it.

the famous mandioca
some more open-air area.
Oh my friend who is very prone to sun burn is here with a stick of aloe vera, getting prepared for our trip to praia do flamengo planned for tomorrow.
Little chiles! But don't be fooled they can be very very spicy.
Maxixe (center-ish) and jiló on the bottom
Then there is a whole CANDY section! there are like 20 stands all with mountains and mountains of candy.

Then there is a meat section. Most of us could not enter because of the meat smell. But I'm sure they had quite a variety of meat.

Oh we were exhausted after this but it was very fun, and people are always willing to answer questions about fruits and other things. Go on a Saturday! or Friday!