Apparently, Valentine's Day here is Brazil is celebrated sometime in June. Not many of our party remembered the signicance of the day to Americans though there were occassional wishes for a "Happy Vday". This was also the day of the rehearsal dinner which wasn't so much a dinner as an all day party at Luciana's dad's yacht club - though I'm not real sure that he actually owns a yacht. The party started at noon and the club had an amazing pool we all got to play in for the majority of the day. It had a tremendously cool slide - like one of those you see in a water park, all twisty and turny with a continuous jet stream of water to help your accelleration to the pool. I got a very cool pic of Stepan coming down on his belly. As always, we ate well at the party. A deliscous barbeque was cooked on the outdoor grill with sausage, chicken harts, ribs, and beef. There was also a version of potato salad that was pretty good and this grainy meal that Brazilian dip their meat into. For desert they had a huge stock pot (about the size of the one Kathleen uses for large family gatherings) filled with a wonderful fruit cocktail that was probably made with fresh fruit....I don't even remember how much of that I ate! After lunch, a tour boat took some of us out for a river tour. It was amazing seeing the city from the river which isn't at all utilized as a recreation facility. I think we only saw one other tour boat and the few other boats on the river was just little row boats with fishermen throughing nets off the bough. It was also amazing passing Pointe Cero - the location of the main stage during Canival. We had walked by there a couple of time during Carnival but there was no way we would have recognized it - the place was nearly deserted...no bands, no dancing hoards - it was a very different place from what we remembered of it. That night, on the advise of Doug's effusive praise, we went to a tiny little alley restraunt called Sopa Quinte (Hot Soup) for dinner. The place was tiny with accomodations for only about 20-25 people. The group of us (I believe we had 7 in our party though we were later joined by Ricardo, Luciana's brother) ordered 4 soups which were served in crocks with everybody getting their own bowl (duh!). My favorite was the potato soup and the chicken/corn soup. I think Stepan liked the shrimp/pumpkin the best. The fourth soup was a shrimp soup. All were yummy and really creamy. I enthusiastically endorse Doug's recommendations for this restraunt though you should definetly go with someone in know since it isn't at all an easy place to find.
Posted by jfer at February 17, 2002 2:31 PM