ABSTRACT
This article analyses the contribution of modernist writers and artists to the construction of an idea of “Brazilian cuisine,” through the specific perspective of Mário de Andrade (1893-1945) and his only chronicle entirely dedicated to the subject, Tacacá with tucupi, published in 1939, shortly after he had read Açúcar: algumas receitas de bolos e doces dos engenhos do Nordeste, by Gilberto Freyre (1900-1987). Through a historical reading of the text, this article aims to demonstrate that Mário wrote Tacacá com tucupi in order to explicitly criticize the so-called “good eaters” – intellectuals who used to appreciate French gastronomy, but were ashamed of Brazilian peculiarities –, and, at the same time, to tacitly contradict the regionalist bias of Freyre’s book. Ironically, Mário reconfigures the country’s culinary map, daring to equate national foods with French foods and synthesizing, through cooking, some of his important concepts about Brazilian culture.
KEYWORDS
Modernism; regionalism; brazilian cuisine
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