The City of Foz do Iguaçu

Foz do Iguaçu

  After 3 consecutive days of waterfalls, we decided to take a rest day.  We slept in a couple hours and then headed to the bus station to spend the afternoon in the city of Foz do Iguaçu- this is the Brazilian city closest to the falls.  The bus runs every hour and we were told it stops at the Argentinean border and waits for you while you go through border control.  What we were not told is that the bus will not wait for you at the Brazilian border... border control here takes about 2 minutes, but you have to wait another hour for the next bus :/

  Fortunately, our bus driver mentioned this when we got on and let us get off to ask for a refund.  We weren't really too jazzed about the idea of spending an extra hour each way waiting at the border for another bus.  After getting the ticket refunded, we "splurged" for a taxi across the border.  The 30-minute ride comes out to $15 USD and the taxi will wait for you at the border.  (The bus would have been $3 USD/person).  

  The night before, we texted our Brazilian friend (who now works in Chile) for tourist tips in Brazil.  She was so eager to help she googled a variety of restaurants and bars for us to visit.  She also listed out a bunch of foods to try... and thus our self-made food walking tour of Foz do Iguaçu was born.

An Açaí Slushie- Brazil is the home of the Açaí fruit and it makes for a refreshing treat in the afternoon heat!

  After a refreshing Açaí Slushie, we stopped into several stores asking for "Coxinha do frango com catupiry".  We weren't quite sure what this was, but our Brazilian friend assured us it was good.  Store clerks were very friendly and after popping into 4 stores and stumbling through some language barriers, we finally found some!  

  The bakery where we found the Coxinha had an interesting payment system.  Upon entering we each had to take a plastic tile and walk through a turnstile- much like a pay-parking garage.  Then, when we went to the bakery counter to order anything, they scanned our tile barcode.  When we were ready to leave, we went to a counter to pay with our tiles.  Finally, to exit, we had to insert the plastic tiles into another turnstile, which then let us exit.

Coxinha do frango com catupiry, Quibe frito, Coxinha do carne seca com catupiry.

  These may look like light snacks, but don't be fooled, they are DENSE.  The outer two are the "coxinha", which turns out to be a deep-fried manioc dough with a bundle of chicken or meat with cheese inside.  Karen thinks the seasoning made them taste a bit like chicken nuggets.  The dough had a glutenous texture and was very tasty.  The middle item is Quibe frito and it was divisive.  It's a deep-fried nugget of bulgar and meat with a minty seasoning.  Matt hated it... it had a bit of paté inside that he found unsavory.  Karen, on the other hand, thought it was okay, but preferred the coxinha. 

 Mbeyú

  Mbeyú is a manioc-based pancake filled with sliced ham and cheese.  We had it as an appetizer before dinner.  Overall a bit dry, but interesting crunchy texture.

Picanha, or Sirloin Cap

  The favorite cut of steak in Brazil is Picanha, or Sirloin Cap.  It's everywhere and it's got lots of flavor!  It's a thin cut, but they manage to keep it red in the middle and it packs a lot of good, gamey flavor.

We also hit up a supermarket and saw these items:

Atemoia- a hybrid of the chirimoya and sugar apple.  They weren't ripe, so we didn't get to try them, but the texture is neat.

Goiaba- this wasn't ripe either, but our Brazilian friend likes them a lot!  They're frequently used to make a preserve and eaten with cheese.

This handle of Brazilian hard liquor only comes with a bottle cap!?  I guess if you're drinking it you're supposed to go hard.

Karen bought these thinking they were chicharron.  Chileans don't really eat this chip-style of chicharron, so she was excited to have the chance to indulge!  Unfortunately, we were disappointed when we opened the package- they are particularly chewy and hard.  It turns out you're meant to cook them 

Grape-Avocado Ice Cream

  If you haven't suspected by now, we didn't have the chance to eat *all* of these items on our afternoon excursion to Brazil.  We did try a few on the Argentinean side of the falls since there's some cross-over.  We'll have to come back to try the rest :)