Dishes to share help you explore more flavors, but the bill can go up

A new type of meal is becoming popular on restaurant tables in the capital of São Paulo. These are menus made up only of dishes to share, listed without the traditional division between starter and main course.

The difference is that these menus are made up of small portions to share, unlike the more established idea of ​​hearty recipes like a parmigiana for four people.

The idea behind this model, which is a trend in recently opened restaurants in São Paulo, such as Virado and Jacó, is to try a little bit of everything. The recommendation, in most restaurants, is to order four to six dishes to satisfy the hunger of two people.

“It works like a more casual tasting menu, without all the protocol,” explains Nando Carneiro, chef at Nomo restaurant in Vila Madalena. “It’s as if all the dishes were appetizers, in smaller portions so people can move through the entire menu,” adds Patricia Werneck, the restaurant’s sommelier.

“The bill is around R$150 per person [sem bebidas ou taxa de serviço]. There’s no way this is cheaper, it’s just different. You don’t save money, but you get a more interesting experience,” says Cintia Goldenberg, partner at Ghesta, a consultancy specializing in bars and restaurants.

The positive point, she says, is the possibility of trying a wider variety of recipes.

To try all 11 recipes on Nomo’s menu, for example, you’ll need to shell out R$629, not including drinks and service. For two people, it would cost R$314.50 each.

You can order recipes such as wood-smoked hump, served with meat sauce, potato mousseline, fried garlic and pinhole (R$110) and creamy sweet corn polenta with eryngui mushrooms, porcini broth and grana padano (R$48).

The menu of small dishes to share was the format chosen by chef Bel Coelho to restart Clandestino, a project closed during the pandemic and reopened as Clandestina about a month ago in Vila Madalena.

There, the chef focuses on Brazilian ingredients and prepares suggestions such as duck guioza with tucupi, jambu and Brazilian pepper oil and chili pepper tempura with shrimp served with spicy bacuri sauce, an Amazonian fruit. Each dish costs R$53.

Reopened in a new location and format last year, Barouche offers portions to share created by chef Rodrigo Felicio, from the now-defunct Capivara. This line includes the boiled egg canapé with gribiche (a new sauce made with anchovy) and anchovy, and the mackerel rillette with guanciale and fennel, both for R$48.

Another new restaurant following the trend is Virado, located in República. In his first own kitchen, chef Benê Souza presents São Paulo cuisine with influences from different countries in dishes that range in price from R$22 to R$75.

Among them are beef crudo with capers, Sicilian lemon and basil oil, accompanied by pastel de vento (R$40) and rigatoni with sausage ragu and Tulha cheese (R$54).

Also in this vein, Jacó, in Pinheiros, run by chef Iago Jacomussi, has just revamped its menu.

New dishes include agnolotti stuffed with goat’s boursin cheese, served with pea cream with tahini and crispy garlic (R$78) and roasted pumpkin, accompanied by straciatella, pangrattato (a type of farofa) and pumpkin caramel with miso (R$66). If a person were to try all 13 dishes on the menu, they would pay R$877.

At the Taiwanese restaurant Aiô, in Vila Mariana, the dishes are listed without divisions — there are 12, which together cost R$611. The restaurant’s clientele divides orders such as the tomato salad drizzled with vinegar, garum sauce (fermented oyster or fish-based sauce), chilli oil and moyashi (R$42) and the char siu of pork loin (R$77), to be eaten with your hands in a pancake with cucumber and red rice.

One of the pioneering chefs in this format is Giovanna Grossi, who runs Animus, located in Pinheiros. When she opened her restaurant in 2019, she faced reluctance from customers.

“At first, it wasn’t easy, people weren’t very open. They said the food was great, but they wanted a bigger plate. I had a customer who got up and left.” To get around the situation, waiters reinforced the explanation of the menu, which offers dishes ranging from R$20 to R$165.

Among them is the grilled green beans with black olive coulis, cashew nuts and Maratimba cheese (R$48). One of the recent additions is the caramelized onion rice and crispy onion (R$58).

Corrutela, in Vila Madalena, has been using this system since 2018. Chef César Costa does not propose a pre-determined order, but suggests that customers combine the items they prefer. Among them, the cured pork loin (R$76) can be accompanied by cassava in fermented butter (R$36) or rice with mushrooms and egg yolk (R$64).

The small-portion menu format is not new, but it only really caught on in São Paulo after the end of the pandemic, according to Goldenberg, from Ghesta. And it tends to attract a younger audience.

“There are still a lot of people who are used to the model of ordering an individual dish. It’s a matter of maturing the idea that it can be nice to eat in another way.”

Aio
R. Áurea, 307, Vila Mariana, south region, tel. (11) 5083-4778, @aiorestaurante

Animus
R. Vupabussu, 347, Pinheiros, west region, @animusrestaurant

Barouche
R. Medeiros de Albuquerque, 401, Vila Madalena, @barouche.sp

Clandestine
R. Girassol, 833, Vila Madalena, west region, @clandestinarestaurante

Corrutela
R. Medeiros de Albuquerque, 256, Vila Madalena, west region, @corrutela

Jacob
R. Fidalga, 357, Pinheiros, west region, @jaco__sp

Name
R. Harmonia, 815, Vila Madalena, west region, @nomogamia

Turned
Largo do Arouche, 150, República, central region, @virado.sp