Affective cuisine seeks to transmit the comfort of grandmother’s food away from home

It was inspired by the recipes of his grandmothers, one from Minas Gerais and the other from Pará, that chef Rodrigo Isaias created the menu at the restaurant Benedita, in São Paulo.

Cooking has always united Rodrigo’s family, who liked to have meals together. “Food was always there in the middle, linking it all together.”

For him, affection was transmitted on these occasions, when the preparation was left to the grandmothers. This is the feeling he seeks to convey in the restaurant, which evokes nostalgia for childhood flavors.

Benedita’s food reflects the table of all regions of the country and has recipes created by Rodrigo’s family members. Among the options, Vó Zenaide’s vatapá (R$ 64) uses palm oil, shrimp, coconut milk and is thickened with rice flour.

Influenced by the family’s spirituality —the owner was raised Catholic—, Benedita celebrates religious festivals such as Círio de Nazaré.

According to Marcella Sulis, professor of gastronomy at UFRJ (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro), affective cuisine values ​​the origins of Brazilian food, with typical dishes and affordable options, which are precisely reminiscent of grandmother’s food.

For Marcella, affection also makes up for isolation in everyday life, especially in urban centers, where people seek to reconnect with homemade food even far from home.

In addition to the appeal to Brazilianness, this cuisine integrates the personal history of the chefs with that of the restaurants, creating intimacy with the customer. “They focus not only on having good food, but on content and the creative process focused on issues related to culture and tradition”, says Marcela.

Dandara Batista, chef at AfroGourmet, in Rio de Janeiro, uses African cuisine and ancestry to awaken affective memory.

She says that, although historical erasure has clouded the origin of Afro-Brazilian cuisine, the palate recognizes the flavors of the continent. “It’s a food that brings back memories that people don’t even know they have.”

Dandara approached African cuisine due to her paternal family’s Bahian roots. She grew up surrounded by the influence of the state’s cuisine, which she considers to be the main exponent of Afro-Brazilian food.

To learn about African cuisine, Dandara traveled to countries such as Angola and São Tomé and Príncipe.

At AfroGourmet, she prepares dishes based on family references. One of them is the South African oxtail stew (R$ 42), a reinterpretation of the maternal grandmother’s recipe, which includes, in addition to the oxtail, vegetables, saffron rice and raisins.

Affective cuisine restaurants use yet other elements to create nostalgia.

At Maracujá, in São Paulo, the brigadeiro is served in a small pan, just like the one made at home. The coconut cake comes wrapped in laminated paper, like at children’s parties.

Chef Elisa Fonseca bought the house in 2012 and began adapting it to embrace affective cooking. She included family recipes on the menu, such as the mineiro mexidinho, which she learned from her mother. The dish (R$54) is made with rice, beans, filet mignon, cabbage, coalho cheese, corn flour and fried egg with soft yolk.

The welcome extends to the relationship with customers — the most loyal customers appear in photos on one of the walls. “I want the restaurant to have the warmth of a grandmother so that people recognize it as an extension of their own home.”