Casas do Norte remain firm on the outskirts of SP with buchada, jerky and rapadura

At Casa do Norte Bela Vista, by Henrique Alves de Araújo, 52, from Ceará, dried meat shares the space with solar energy plates. And the innovations follow. The establishment, which is located in Guarulhos, in Greater São Paulo, also has its own app for customers to place their orders.

Without letting go of technology, Araújo insists on maintaining the store’s northeastern tradition, serving dishes and selling typical products. “Buchada, dried meat, brown sugar, crackers, string beans, flour, pepper, cachaça and even hat, from all over the Northeast”, he says.

The trade is 20 years old. “When I bought the land, it was just bush. I worked, earning money and then I started doing it.” Today, there are three floors and more than 20 employees, in a space that receives about a thousand people on weekends and accumulates a queue at the door.

Greater São Paulo concentrates a large number of Northeasterners who, like Henrique, live on the periphery. That is why, according to him, houses in the North are so sought after and common. “Northeasterners represent about 90% of my neighborhood.”

According to the last census by IBGE, the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, in 2010, there are more than 3 million migrants from the Northeast of Brazil living in the metropolitan region of São Paulo — 1.3 million of them in the capital.

But Araújo says that the houses in the North also attract people from São Paulo and even foreigners. “Here I have Japanese people who buy jabá”, comments Manoel Andrade, 68, from Bahia, owner of Casa do Norte MA, with 57 years of existence in Cidade Ademar, in the south zone of São Paulo.

The space has the same structure and decoration as when it was founded, as a mixture of market and restaurant that serves typical lunch daily. During all these years, the merchant watched the transformation of the neighborhood, the closing of stores and the arrival of the lean cows with the Covid-19 pandemic.

Jucesp, Board of Trade of the State of São Paulo, responsible for registering commercial establishments, does not have a survey of the number of houses of this type. In an informal search on Google Maps, however, Agência Mural counted 313 houses in the North on the outskirts of the capital. In the east zone, there are at least 143 locations – then there are the south zone (107), the north zone (49) and the west zone (14).

The report only considered establishments with the nomenclature “house of the north”, located in one of the 40 districts located in peripheral regions of the city.

It is in Cidade Ademar, where there are about 20 stores, that Cristiane Trudes, 41, from São Paulo, decided to take over Casa do Norte Missionária. She has been in charge for four months and is the third owner of the establishment, which has existed for 22 years.

To better understand regional products and take care of the parish, Trudes says he did an intensive month-long research with the former owner. “Sometimes the customer asks for a product with a different name, we ask what it is — and, if necessary, we search the internet”, he says.

But she also adapted and gave the space a personal touch, incorporating natural products. “It is difficult to find a house in the North with 100% products from the Northeast”, she explains.

Manoel Andrade, from Casa do Norte MA, says he is also in favor of these changes and adaptations that make the commerce more attractive. Mainly because of inflation.

“On pay week, the most expensive products sell more. Towards the end of the month, it’s the turn of the cheapest things, like dry sausage and flour”, exemplifies Trudes.

Casa do Norte Bela Vista

Rua Bela Vista, 799, Jardim Leblon, Guarulhos (SP), tel (11) 2303-3429, casanortebelavista.com.br

North House MA

Avenida Cupecê, 3875, Americanópolis, São Paulo, tel. (11) 5021-7032

Northern Missionary House

Avenida Yervant Kissajikian, 3013, Vila Missionária, São Paulo, tel. (11) 98411-0418, Facebook casanortemissionaria​