Churrasco Gaúcho

Well, the brazilian barbecue, as know as "churrasco" is one of the most famous food in Brazil. Unlike everybody thinks, our barbecue is totally different from the american way, and the most tradicional process to prepare it came from the south of Brazil, that means Rio Grande do Sul (the state where I proudly live). The concept of a churrascaria is a far cry from the steak house, where you pay for one single meat and still hungry. The way real gaúchos makes it is like... rough. I will explain why. Gaúchos used to make a bonefire, impale a huge piece of meat and let it cook. Sometimes it takes like 12 hours or so to get it ready to eat, but when you bite it, it feels tender as butter. A churrascaria is restaurant where the waiters walk around tables, serving lots of different meats from metal sticks. Some of the churrascarias have the green/red card system: a card that stays on the table and you flip it, green for "I am hungry!" and red for "I am stuffed". Most of times they offer you a "caipirinha" (I am pretty sure you've heard about it), that fits really well with a churrasco.

That is like the whole cow.

Three expert gaúchos getting ready to cook.

Can you see those huge ribs? Those bones come out easily.

A little bit about Gaúchos

First of all, let me introduce myself: the name is Carlos Augusto Pakulski da Silva, a real gaúcho, from Porto Alegre - Rio Grande do Sul - Brasil. I was born here, in a hospital that I can't remind the name, but anyways, I was born a fat and healthy baby. As I already said, the name is Carlos and while I was growing up I spent my time doing what all kids do, getting in trouble, making pranks and becoming bandaid's best friend. Then i passed through a lot of adventures (that someday I might wrote about depending on my memory) and after 27 years, here I am, writing on this blog.

This is me being a baby.

Ok, now that you know something about me, let this aquarius guy explain what gaúcho means and it's origins.

Actually as I was trying to figure out the origin of gaúchos, I discovered that there are a bunch of veins and theories about it, so I decided to make my own.

Once upon a time there was a lady called Gaú (gha-oo). She was a brave warrior from her tribe, killed thousands and thousands men until she met this one guy named Cho (sho). He was as brave as her, a conquer who discovered lands, and made some other cool stuff too. So they met and felt in love with each other. Then they had their only son, but as much as they were brave, they weren't creative, and called the kid Gaúcho, the brave-jr. 

Rumors say this was Gaúcho, The brave-jr asking for milk.

Years passed and Gaúcho grew up. Became a warrior (no kidding) and a reference for all. One day, Gaúcho was walking on fields, having a thoughtful time when he saw slaves, thousands of them, and they were being punished by some bad guys. Gaúcho started to run against those evil pests and slain them all. The slaves were so thankful and made The brave-jr their God. They also started to call themselves as Sons of Gaúcho.

And that's where the name Gaúcho came from. A God, a warrior, a brave-jr, a saver.

Todays, from heritage, we call ourselves Gaúchos.