May 9, 2025 • 35 mins
This type of restaurant serves barbecue, often spit-roasted and portioned off tableside by servers in continual rounds from the grill. Anney and Lauren dig into the history and cultures behind churrascarias and rodizio-style service.
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hello, and welcome to Saber Prediction of iHeartRadio. I'm Annie Reese.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
And I'm Lauren Vogelbaum, and today we have an episode
for you about Rascriez.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Yes, it is going to be a fun with pronunciation.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Yeah, uh huh absolutely.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
As I've said before, I have studied a little bit
of Spanish, just enough to really get myself in trouble
in both Spanish and more trouble in Portuguese.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
So here we are.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Here we are. But there was a particular reason we
chose this one.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, okay, So what had happened was Annie and me,
but perhaps more so Annie, we're fans of Star Wars.
You know this about us, and of course May the
fourth is a official Star Wars holiday has May the
Fourth be with you always, but it's also you get
(01:06):
May fifth, the Revenge of the Fifth. And it's furthermore,
what the twentieth anniversary this year of Revenge.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
Of the Sith.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
It's the twentieth anniversary of Revenge of the Sith and
the forty fifth anniversary of the Empire Staruk's buck Wow wow.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Okay, all right, so I was like, Annie, are there
any Star Wars related topics that you would like to do,
and she was like, well, because of the anniversary time
with Revenge of the Sith, how about some kind of
barbecued meat. Yeah, because of what happens to Anakin at
(01:47):
the end of that film. And so after I stopped laughing,
I you know, had been thinking about Yeah, yeah, I
went down a little bit of a Google rabbit hole
about all it's kind of about that sort of thing,
and came upon trescries as an interesting topic.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yes, and you know, the memes are funny. I don't
think Anakin Skywalker or Darth Vader would appreciate it. But
I also don't think he'd be into any of the memes.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
So I wouldn't say that he's got a good sense
of humor.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
No, I think that's the whole point this kind of honestly,
he really really doesn't. But yeah, there are a lot
of memes, and so here we are. I do have
(02:42):
I wouldn't say a lot of experience with trescria is,
but I do have some. The first time I went,
I went with my little brother to an establishment we'll
be talking about later, not a sponsor, but focus shall
and it was for his graduation and we didn't know
the protocol of flipping.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Oh huh.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
So we got so much meat and it was it
was bad news. But it relates to the Star Wars
experience because when he walked out, he looked like C
three peo he was so full.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Uh huh uh huh. Yeah, yeah, it was it's a danger.
It's a danger.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Yes. We kept like panicking because we'd realize, oh no,
it's still our paddles are still on green.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
They're coming and they're coming. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
But then I also have a friend that I've always
thought this was really interesting about her, but she would
go to that same restaurant, but she would only pay
for the buffet, so she wouldn't pay meats, but she
did it for lunch, like not infrequently, and it was
just I was like, oh, that's a new one.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
From what I understand, they have a good buffet. Sure,
I actually have never been to this style of restaurant.
I'm not really who it's built for. I'm like, I'm like,
oh no, I had four ounces of meat and a
small salad.
Speaker 3 (04:05):
I'm unbearably full. I'm that kind of human. I snack.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
I don't really feast, so yeah, yeah, but I mean
I think I should go. It sounds wonderful.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
There is something fun about it, sort of like what
we talked about with dim sumwhere you know it's by
your table, get to see it, you get to smell it, you.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Get to try a little bit of everything. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Yeah, yeah, and the paddle situation is sort of fun
if you remember to do it.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
You can also say no when they come to your table.
You can be like, oh my bad, note, thank you.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
You can also ask for meats, because there are some
they don't bring out as often. I want that I
did get. I did do this, and I think it
was I was in Peru and I did it and
it was It was really good, but it was much
less of a I didn't leave feeling miserable. Okay, but
(05:09):
that being said, there is Conan O'Brien, as the show
called Conan O'Brien Must Go. I think the second season
is actually coming out this week. But he went to
Argentina in the first season and they did a whole
thing about where they went to a restaurant kinda like that,
and they had a whole thing with the gauchos that
they did and it's very funny. So if you want
(05:31):
to check that out, that is something I recommend. Yes, Well,
for past episodes, you could see maybe some we've done BBQ.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
A little bit of barbecue related to I think we
talked about it in our Ashville episodes.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
That sounds right, I think so. We also did a
really cool interview once with Howard Conyers.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Who is a rocket scientist who is really passionate about barbecue.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
It was really cool.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Yeah, yeah, he's awesome.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
I highly recommend. If you haven't listened to that episode,
buffets perhaps sure, yeah, yeah, But I guess this brings
us to our question traskaria. What is it?
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Well, trescaria is a type of restaurant that serves primarily treascos,
which are grilled meats, often in the rdizio style, in
which large cuts or skewers or plates are brought out
from the kitchen and patrons signal if they want some,
and then the servers will will portion some of it
off table side. The grilling is usually over charcoal. The
(06:45):
meats can vary, but there's an emphasis on beef. Often
the only seasoning applied before cooking is salt. Those skewers
are sometimes layered with like chunks of vegs, like an
onion and tomato among the meat, and sometimes sauces are
applied after cooking or offered table side. And sides at
these restaurants can include leafy salads, grilled vegetables, various starches.
(07:06):
Drinks often include wine and beer and cocktails. It's fun
because you can write, you can try a lot of
different things, and it's often a you know, like long, relaxed, chatty,
friends and family kind of meal. Though, as with any
kind of steakhouse, like, some individual restaurants and chains are
more casual and some are more upscale. But in any case,
(07:27):
it's you know, like you've got am, you've got some
like barbecue masters in the back, and then people just
bring their best works straight to your table. It is
a veritable parade or dance of meat dinner in a show.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
Yes, you get jealous when you're like, oh, oh, that
one's over there, I want to try that meat.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
I should go okay anyway. Let's note here that chirasco
is a broader term used in both Spanish and Portuguese
to refer to barbecue, and just as in the US,
barbecue can mean a lot of things and is like
specifically culturally evocative in different ways for many different people.
(08:20):
Chiasco is not a single thing. Chascarias are a more
specific type of restaurant that arose in like the southeast
corner of South America, like like Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay
uh in the cattle raising plains region there or pump us. Okay,
So there you go. That's that's that's one set of definitions. Next,
(08:41):
Rhodizio means rotation, and it refers to the rotation of
dishes around the dining room.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
In Brazil.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
There are other ridizio style restaurants and dishes served in
that style in other restaurants, like basically any anything you
can think of, because it's a it's a it's a
type of service. The redizio servers are called passadors or
more romantically, gauchos, gaucho being a word for cowboy. We'll
get into that in the history section. So in redizio
(09:09):
dining dishes will come around the room, but you can,
as Annie said, often make a specific request from the
grill or order things a la carte, or be like,
oh hey, could you bring that one back here?
Speaker 3 (09:19):
That was really good?
Speaker 2 (09:20):
When the passador cuts you off a slice you use
personal little tongs to nab it and transfer it to
your plate. Specifically, American Redizio escriaz usually charge a flat
price a prefee for redisio service plus access to a
salad bar and hot bar with all kinds of sides.
And yeah, each table usually has a card or a
(09:42):
paddle that you can flip between green and red. Green
means please bring whatever you've got by the table, and
red means that you're taking a break. But as I said,
you can also say oh, oh, no, thank you when
someone gets tiered table with something you're not morally obligated
(10:03):
to take everything that they're serving.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
Sometimes it happens so fast.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
Lord, I know, I know, you can get overwhelmed.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
It's a marathon, not a sprint, for sure.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Taste yourself. But okay, let's talk about those meats. All
sorts of cuts of beef, sometimes from specific breeds of cattle,
some cuts that are traditional to this part of South
America and Brazil's specifically, like the cut of pecuna, which
is a really visually iconic one. It's this top sirloin
(10:41):
cut that still has a thick cap of fat attached
to one side. And these thick strips of it will
be curved into a cea shape onto skewers, with the
fat cap on the outer edge, so it just melts
into the meat. There's also a coupine, which is this
cut from like the fatty hump of this specific breed
that's popular in Brazil. All kinds of cuts may be
(11:03):
served lean to fatty, everything sort of in between. Again,
most of these are only seasoned with salt before they're grilled.
But table side, you might garnish your plain steak with
the sauces like some chimmy cherry, you know, like like
herbal and bright and garlicee or other vinegar vegetable type sauces.
(11:24):
But they will serve all kinds of proteins pork, lamb, chicken, fish, shrimp,
various sausages, you know, All of the above, including different
cuts of beef, might be wrapped in bacon or crusted
in parmesan, or given a rub or marinate or based
you might get awful like chicken hearts.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
In there.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Then there are the apps and sides, which a lot
of the conventional wisdom or like American wisdom, or like
American this is how you eat the most meat wisdom
is like ignore them.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Go only for the steak, Yeah, which I think is
a little silly. I'm like, food is good.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
You don't need to you don't need to like put
them the most, Put the restaurant the most in the
hole for letting you eat there. That's make the point
of restaurants. But yeah, so you might get grilled vegetables
or fruit like pineapple, lots of raw salid options, often
some cheeses and or charcouterie, maybe some chilled seafood. A
(12:26):
common hot option is faijuata, which is this traditional Brazilian
black bean stew. Then starches like fried polenta or some
cassava cheese, bread or rice with or without beans, maybe
some fried plantains or bananas, some mashed or grilled potatoes,
or farrofa, which is a type of like fluffy grained
(12:47):
cassava meal dish. Yep, little bit like a fine grained couscous.
And as these are full service restaurants, they usually have
a dessert menu. But that's not what we're here to
talk about today.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
We did get dessert the first time we went, Even
as miserable as we were, we were like, it's a celebration.
Let go.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
They do have some traditional Brazilian ones at a lot
of these places that we've been meaning to do whole
episodes on, So.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
We'll get back to those. Yeah, that's a later episode
for sure. Well what about the nutrition.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
That depends on you?
Speaker 2 (13:26):
That is up to you. That's a problem. Despite what
certain influencers might tell you, eating nothing but meat is
bad him.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Bodies are complicated. Get a vegetable, drink of water.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Drink of water, pace yourself, have a nice time, have
a nice time. This is I would say, I would
put this in the category of treats.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
I would I would assume so, yes, I'd say that
most steakhouse experiences are probably treats, especially all you can
eat steakhouses.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
Yeah, yes, so just don't do it all the time. Maybe, Yeah,
we do have some numbers for you.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
We do.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
Okay, So, any given Shrescaria is usually going to have
like ten to twenty different meats on the menu at
any given time. This is what's going to be, especially
if it's rudisio like circling through the dining room. One
Sarscaria chain that originated in Colorado, currently has twenty five
locations throughout the United States. That's a Rudizio Grill, another
(14:35):
one from Texas, Texas to Brazil, has fifty five locations
in the United States and thirteen abroad, including in the
United Arab Emirates and South Korea, and Foga de Sheell,
which originated in Brazil, has nine there, eleven throughout Central
South America and the Middle East, and eighty one in
(14:56):
the United States. Yeah, and those are just the chains.
There are a plenty of independent restaurants out there.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yes, there are. And there's a really interesting, if not
complicated history behind this style of dining, in this style
of meat.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Yeah yeah, and we are going to get into that
as soon as we get back from a quick break
for a word from our sponsors, and we're back.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you. Okay. So the history
of grilled meats is quite a long one.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Oh yeah, yeah, that's too much for us today, but
all right. So, in terms of cattle in this region,
Spanish colonizers brought cattle with them to the Americas as
early as fourteen ninety three, with Columbus on his second voyage,
arriving first in the Caribbean. Cattle then spread with colonization
and also just on their own in the wild through
(16:02):
Central and South America. The Spanish brought them to Bolivia
as work animals for the silver mines and the fifteen hundreds.
Portuguese colonists were also bringing their own cattle to Brazil
during the early fifteen hundreds, and due to all of this,
cattle existed in the pump us in great numbers by
the mid seventeen hundreds or so. Like this significantly changed
(16:25):
the environment and ecosystem and human food ways in this area,
and then, especially as uprisings brought an end to enslavement
and colonial rule in this area in the early to
mid eighteen hundreds, cattle rearing became this increasingly important agricultural business.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Yes, so when it comes specifically to Turrosco, experts believe
that it dates back to the Gauchos of South America
in the eighteen hundreds. We've discussed this before, but the
Gauchos were nomadic horsemen, farmhands, and ranchers in parts of
South America. In Brazil, they were particularly associated with a
region called Rio Grande do sol again write in if
(17:09):
I'm mispronouncing anything Portuguese. Yeah, not a language, but yes,
let us know. So as the Gauchos traveled around. One
resource they didn't lack was beef, and it didn't take
them long to start roasting a variety of cuts of
meats on a spit for a meal. According to some sources,
the core of this style of cooking meat goes back
(17:32):
to the sixteen hundreds, when the Guarani people indigenous to
Brazil with a lot of livestock, salted raw meat and
cooked it on a spit, and then the tradition spread
across Brazil. This is a much larger topic for a
different podcast, but I do think we should point out
that many countries use the gaucho as a national symbol,
(17:53):
a point of pride. Whenever you introduce that sort of
rhetoric and national pride, these histories have the potential to
be massaged or overblown or fabricated entirely to align with
that narrative. In this case, since the Chotaskania is tied
to the Gauchows, they can get wrapped up on all
(18:15):
of that depending on your source. That's not to say
that these stories aren't true, but that national pride does
entail a vested interest that is important to keep in mind,
and countries everywhere do this.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
This is not Oh yeah, this happens in the United
States everywhere. Yeah, yes, sure, but at any rate. Yes,
The cattle industry in this area kept growing, including in
the early nineteen hundreds with the import of zebu, which
is this breed of cattle from originally from South Asia
that does well in warm climates and has a little
(18:48):
fatty hump on its back.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
Ahm hm, all right. So over time, this style of
dining of meats on skewers over usually grilled over hot coals,
grew in popularity alongside the growth of Brazil's network of roads.
In the mid nineteen hundreds, as restaurants started opening up
along these roads to sustain travelers, meat was plentiful, so
(19:11):
it was fairly cheap for these early charscadias to offer
a lot of meat. By the nineteen seventies, this style
of restaurant was pretty popular in southern Brazil, though they
were almost more like gas station stops at the time
from what I read like roadhouses. Yeah yeah. The meat
was typically cooked outside on wooden skewers over charcoal. As
(19:33):
time went on and as the country became more urbanized,
these venues grew popular enough to transform into larger restaurant spaces,
and kind of going back to my earlier point, a
lot of big modern restaurant chains that specialize in the
style of dining like to take credit for the invention
(19:53):
of this type of meat being served at the table.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah, the regizio style. Yeah, exactly as usual. A lot
of them these stories cannot be verified. But one popular
story a lot of them liked to tell is the classic.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
It was an accident, pretty simply, a waiter in a
Rio Grandu soul restaurant accidentally delivered a meat skewer to
the incorrect table. The waiter shaved some of the meat
off for the table anyway before finding the correct recipient,
but the whole thing was really well received, and a
lot of other tables then requested the same treatment. They're like,
(20:32):
what is this? I want to try this?
Speaker 3 (20:35):
And the rest was history.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, the rest was history. And that does bring us
to Fogo de Chao. Fogo de Shao got its start
in nineteen seventy nine after two pairs of brothers purchased
a churrascaria in the Brazilian city of Porto Aleegra.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
We one pair were investors, the other pair had gotten
into the restaurant industry a few years before working in
steakhouses and readdition narrow before taking over that first fog
To show, and they were at the forefront of a
growing trend when it came to these types of steakhouses
and particularly Rhodizio style steakhouses. This is the style that
(21:14):
a lot of US are now familiar with, where customers
pay a fixed price and waiters carve off several different
types of meat from skiwers table side at the diner's request.
They were also the ones who made it into a
fine dining experience and like really brought the Brazilian steakhouse
into cities and tourist areas. Fog To Shao opened their
second location in this posh neighborhood in Sal Paulo in
(21:38):
nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Yes, and to reiterate, they are often credited with introducing
this concept to big cities in the US as well,
but they were not the first. No, we've already mentioned
this establishment, but Rudizio Grill was the first Brazilian state
house chain restaurant to open in the US in nineteen
(22:02):
ninety five or nineteen ninety six. The founder was a
Brazilian immigrant who worked various jobs in the food industry
before setting his sights on bringing Brazilian food and culture
to the US.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Other independent restaurants in the style were opening in America
around that time, including Chidescaria Platiforma in New York City
in nineteen ninety six.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
One of the first reviews of Fogo de Shall printed
in American media proclaimed it, quote a meat eater's mecca.
Their first international location opened in Texas in nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
They chose Texas because they figured that, like Texans already
love a steakhouse.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Yeah, they were like.
Speaker 3 (22:51):
Well, if not there, then where.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
But generally speaking, like the concept had had a lot
going for it at that time. Time in the nineties
to early aughts, you know, like all you can eat
buffets were really.
Speaker 3 (23:05):
Popular around here.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Then steakhouses in general were big, and anything a little
showy or kind of participatory was very posh. Like think
of all of those melting pot fondoue restaurants that were
around then. This is anecdotal, but a lot of the
American articles that I read while doing my reading for
this episode, we're like like that we're explaining basically to Americans,
(23:31):
what trascarias are. We're from the early twenty teens. That
seemed like some kind of zeitgeist moment in this country
for this style thing.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Certainly.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
By twenty eighteen, this tabletop game company called Absurdist Productions
released a card game called Escaria, a cutthroat game of
gluttony wherein players vie to gain the most meat cards
and pass off any sides and dessert to other players
and furthermore cause shenanigans to mess up other players' plans
(24:04):
to do the same. You have like an active face
up space in front of you. That's your plate, and
then you have like a sort of victory point card
pile that's your stomach.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
It sounds adorable. To be honest, I would play that.
I would play that. I love that.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
It's the point is, let me send these sides and.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Deserts to somebody else. I only want the meats.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
I think a lot of these restaurants did have a
hard time during the COVID pandemic, perhaps obviously the whole
restaurant industry did. But but they are back on their
feet again. As of twenty twenty three, a private equity
firm bought fog to Shao for about one point one
billion dollars, including a little bit of debt that it had,
and Fogo to Show is currently working on opening an
(24:53):
additional thirteen locations around the world, like actively right now.
So yeah, also a currently in like late twenty twenty four,
early twenty twenty five, there's been a bunch of Tirasco
like popping off on TikTok. I'm not on TikTok because
I'm old, so I couldn't tell you, but this is
what I read.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
I saw that too. I'm also not on TikTok, but
I was just looking up how to pronounce certain things
and it kept being TikTok videos of people being like,
oh I met this chatasca to you, and I was like,
what's going on here?
Speaker 3 (25:28):
I mean it is.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
It is visually striking, yes, and it's fun and people
like taking videos and restaurants bless yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Yeah, And I think it's got a little bit of
that I don't know, almost like the challenge food aspect
of like let me see how much of this I
can eat that we find popular as humans for some reason,
I don't know. I ran into a lot of it too.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
It certainly occurs, and Truscuria is certainly a place where
you can participate in a cutthroat game of gluttony.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
That's true, you can also participate in an accidental game
of gluttony. Remember to turn your battle around everyone.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Or politely say oh no, no, thank you, please.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
No more, be vigilant, stay in touch with your body
and your writers.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Or as Anakin Skywalker might say, a simple.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
No, you don't have the high ground, the truscorea. You're
in danger of overeating wisdom.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Wisdom absolutely well.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
If any of y'all have specific Trascaria experiences, if you
have been to a place that is in the US,
perhaps where this tradition comes from, we would love to
hear more about it. If you have tuasco or other
barbecue traditions in your family, we would love to hear
about them.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
We would. And any other Star Wars recipes memes.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Oh yeah, oh man, we love those, always always.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
But that is what we have to say about Shaasca.
He is for now.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
It is.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
We do already have some listener mail for you, though,
and we are going to get into that as soon
as we get back from one more quick break for
a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
And we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you.
Speaker 4 (27:49):
And we're back withoo it's Flames.
Speaker 1 (28:01):
I was gonna do a whole Star Wars thing in
I panic, so we went with Flames. I think it
was good.
Speaker 3 (28:08):
Yeah, I had a Star Wars vibe to it.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
It did it? Did? I have to say a bat
all the heroes? John Williams that song, That's what I
was going to try to go for, but it would
be too complicated too.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
It's difficult to express.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
I mean I can express it, but I would need
more space and more time.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, like if you if you started, yeah, different different
pieces of John Williams music, if you started the choreography
for a specific fight scene, I might be able to
pick it up.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
But but not like not like over our video chat.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
No, LUs, we have some constraints. Oh well, okay, So
a lot of you have written in about Krispy Kreme.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Oh yay, this is awesome and I love it.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Please it coming. Christina wrote, loved your Krispy Kreme episode.
Donuts are one of my most favorite foods. So I
had to listen on a full stomach. I was trying
to find the details. But krispy Kreme has always struggled
in the Houston market. I remember all the excitement of
going and seeing them make the donuts when they first
(29:19):
came to town as a child, and they closed abruptly,
it seemed because of financial troubles. Personally, I think they
were unprepared for Houston's loyalty to our local franchise, Shipley.
The most interesting thing about Shipley is the cutter for
the donuts is actually hexagonal to reduce dough waste once fried.
(29:40):
They do appear more around, but if you look, you
may notice they also serve Colatch cheese, which is like
a big pig in a blanket, but another Texas favorite.
Be sure to stop it next time you're around Houston.
Oh yeah, I love it lace because I feel like
(30:00):
krispy Kreme sort of has that, you know, as we
were talking about that nostalgic Southern vibe. Perhaps, but it
sounds like Shipley is doing that. This is already for Texas,
so right, right, right, So Christy, I can see krispy
Kreme would struggle if already you've got.
Speaker 2 (30:19):
You already have a favorite nostalgic donut place. Yeah, yeah,
I've not been to a Shipley.
Speaker 3 (30:25):
Now I need to.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Go no, and I did because I actually wasn't sure
what klotchtes were.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
Oh, and I.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Read a whole article about them and the difference between
a pig and a blanket. I got really interested. I
went deep in a rabbit hole. Yeah, only a savor
ladies and listeners perhaps would appreciate. But I did get
really invested because I know there's a lot of opinions
opinions about it, but you know we'd.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
Love Oh, yes, always, Oh it was so good.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Speaking of Leslie wrote, thanks for the great podcast. As always,
I to enjoy the idea of pelting someone with garlic.
In protest, I had to learn some strong pest opinions
last year, and some strong food pinions in general, because
someone I love very much has developed a cashew allergy.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yikes.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
We found out the hard way because they ate a
whole lot of a takeaway curry that we learned was
mostly made out of cashews and that had a serious
reaction to it.
Speaker 3 (31:31):
No airway involvement. Few.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
We then found out that a jarred pesto we'd used
for some pasta that eaten a little of a few
months prior and reacted to but we weren't sure if
they had also contained cashew. I was really surprised because
I'd never heard of cashews and pesto.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
Growing up.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
It was always pine nuts, maybe walnuts or almonds if
you were doing something fancy with kale or arugula, or
just leave it out if.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
It's too expensive.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Plus, the standard pre made pesto at both of the
large scale food service operations I've been at for the
past eight years is not free for allergy safety reasons.
Que the scouring of grocery store shelves to find a
cashew free pesto, and they all now contain cashew, or
at least the ones buy us do. How disappointing. I'll
(32:17):
have to wait until summer and we'll just make our
own and freeze it. This has since spilled over into
some passover related angst. Both very well known brands of
commercially made macaroons now use cashew in their Rocky Road versions,
which means that it's safer for us to just make
our own.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
Sigh.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Thirty plus years of this being a beloved holiday treat,
but between this and a few other factors, will just
stick to only buying their MATSA.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
Now that is a bummer.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Oh, manishevitz angst I feel you.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Yeah, or just like nostalgic brand. Yeah, that's oh you're like,
You're like, no, but i'd need that packaged thing.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
It's not the same when I make it at home.
It's good medi that I'm.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
Used to, right, that reminds me of my childhood, but
also another great reminder to always look at your labels
because oh yeah, I didn't know that either about pesto.
And actually after we got this email, I went and
looked at mine and it has cash us in it.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
Well huh, I mean, yeah, they're they're less expensive than
pine nuts probably in most cases really creamy. Yeah, interesting though.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Yeah, I'm sure you probably have more to say about
this than me, but I feel like that's it'd be
better to have kind of this allergy safe version. I
don't know that doesn't have, or at least you make
clear like on the label, like nuts or something. I
don't know.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
Yeah, that's a yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
I as as a human with interesting food intolerances. I
read the ingredients label of everything that I buy, even
and if it doesn't seem remotely possible for there to
be sweet peppers or pineapple and something, I'm like what
if it does, and you know it's important, it's important
to do. But who I'm so glad that your loved
(34:14):
one is okay. Allergies are very serious or can be,
and so I'm glad that y'all are finding workarounds even
if they are kind of a pain in the.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Tukis yes, And I bet your homemade pesto is going.
Speaker 3 (34:29):
To be Oh, it's going to be so good. You're
gonna be happy that you did it overall.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
Let us know, let us know.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Yeah, yeah, oh, I know.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
I am always happy when I do homemade pasto. Like
somewhere halfway halfway through the process, when my whole kitchen
smells like basil, I'm like, oh, all right, this is
why I'm doing this.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yeah, it is a delightful smell. Wow. Thank you to
both of those listeners writing in. If you would like
to write to us, you can. Our email is Hello
at savor.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
You can also find us on social media. We are
on Instagram and Blue Sky at saver pod and we
do hope to hear from you.
Speaker 3 (35:08):
Saverr is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, you can visit
the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows. Thanks as always to our super producers
Dylan Fagan and Andrew Howard. Thanks to you for listening,
and we hope that lots more good things are coming
your way.
Hello, and welcome to Saber Prediction of iHeartRadio. I'm Annie Reese.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
And I'm Lauren Vogelbaum, and today we have an episode
for you about Rascriez.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Yes, it is going to be a fun with pronunciation.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Yeah, uh huh absolutely.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
As I've said before, I have studied a little bit
of Spanish, just enough to really get myself in trouble
in both Spanish and more trouble in Portuguese.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
So here we are.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Here we are. But there was a particular reason we
chose this one.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, okay, So what had happened was Annie and me,
but perhaps more so Annie, we're fans of Star Wars.
You know this about us, and of course May the
fourth is a official Star Wars holiday has May the
Fourth be with you always, but it's also you get
(01:06):
May fifth, the Revenge of the Fifth. And it's furthermore,
what the twentieth anniversary this year of Revenge.
Speaker 3 (01:14):
Of the Sith.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
It's the twentieth anniversary of Revenge of the Sith and
the forty fifth anniversary of the Empire Staruk's buck Wow wow.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Okay, all right, so I was like, Annie, are there
any Star Wars related topics that you would like to do,
and she was like, well, because of the anniversary time
with Revenge of the Sith, how about some kind of
barbecued meat. Yeah, because of what happens to Anakin at
(01:47):
the end of that film. And so after I stopped laughing,
I you know, had been thinking about Yeah, yeah, I
went down a little bit of a Google rabbit hole
about all it's kind of about that sort of thing,
and came upon trescries as an interesting topic.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Yes, and you know, the memes are funny. I don't
think Anakin Skywalker or Darth Vader would appreciate it. But
I also don't think he'd be into any of the memes.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
So I wouldn't say that he's got a good sense
of humor.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
No, I think that's the whole point this kind of honestly,
he really really doesn't. But yeah, there are a lot
of memes, and so here we are. I do have
(02:42):
I wouldn't say a lot of experience with trescria is,
but I do have some. The first time I went,
I went with my little brother to an establishment we'll
be talking about later, not a sponsor, but focus shall
and it was for his graduation and we didn't know
the protocol of flipping.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
Oh huh.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
So we got so much meat and it was it
was bad news. But it relates to the Star Wars
experience because when he walked out, he looked like C
three peo he was so full.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Uh huh uh huh. Yeah, yeah, it was it's a danger.
It's a danger.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Yes. We kept like panicking because we'd realize, oh no,
it's still our paddles are still on green.
Speaker 3 (03:25):
They're coming and they're coming. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
But then I also have a friend that I've always
thought this was really interesting about her, but she would
go to that same restaurant, but she would only pay
for the buffet, so she wouldn't pay meats, but she
did it for lunch, like not infrequently, and it was
just I was like, oh, that's a new one.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
From what I understand, they have a good buffet. Sure,
I actually have never been to this style of restaurant.
I'm not really who it's built for. I'm like, I'm like,
oh no, I had four ounces of meat and a
small salad.
Speaker 3 (04:05):
I'm unbearably full. I'm that kind of human. I snack.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
I don't really feast, so yeah, yeah, but I mean
I think I should go. It sounds wonderful.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
There is something fun about it, sort of like what
we talked about with dim sumwhere you know it's by
your table, get to see it, you get to smell it, you.
Speaker 3 (04:26):
Get to try a little bit of everything. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Yeah, yeah, and the paddle situation is sort of fun
if you remember to do it.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
You can also say no when they come to your table.
You can be like, oh my bad, note, thank you.
Speaker 1 (04:42):
You can also ask for meats, because there are some
they don't bring out as often. I want that I
did get. I did do this, and I think it
was I was in Peru and I did it and
it was It was really good, but it was much
less of a I didn't leave feeling miserable. Okay, but
(05:09):
that being said, there is Conan O'Brien, as the show
called Conan O'Brien Must Go. I think the second season
is actually coming out this week. But he went to
Argentina in the first season and they did a whole
thing about where they went to a restaurant kinda like that,
and they had a whole thing with the gauchos that
they did and it's very funny. So if you want
(05:31):
to check that out, that is something I recommend. Yes, Well,
for past episodes, you could see maybe some we've done BBQ.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
A little bit of barbecue related to I think we
talked about it in our Ashville episodes.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
That sounds right, I think so. We also did a
really cool interview once with Howard Conyers.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Who is a rocket scientist who is really passionate about barbecue.
Speaker 1 (06:02):
It was really cool.
Speaker 3 (06:04):
Yeah, yeah, he's awesome.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
I highly recommend. If you haven't listened to that episode,
buffets perhaps sure, yeah, yeah, But I guess this brings
us to our question traskaria. What is it?
Speaker 2 (06:21):
Well, trescaria is a type of restaurant that serves primarily treascos,
which are grilled meats, often in the rdizio style, in
which large cuts or skewers or plates are brought out
from the kitchen and patrons signal if they want some,
and then the servers will will portion some of it
off table side. The grilling is usually over charcoal. The
(06:45):
meats can vary, but there's an emphasis on beef. Often
the only seasoning applied before cooking is salt. Those skewers
are sometimes layered with like chunks of vegs, like an
onion and tomato among the meat, and sometimes sauces are
applied after cooking or offered table side. And sides at
these restaurants can include leafy salads, grilled vegetables, various starches.
(07:06):
Drinks often include wine and beer and cocktails. It's fun
because you can write, you can try a lot of
different things, and it's often a you know, like long, relaxed, chatty,
friends and family kind of meal. Though, as with any
kind of steakhouse, like, some individual restaurants and chains are
more casual and some are more upscale. But in any case,
(07:27):
it's you know, like you've got am, you've got some
like barbecue masters in the back, and then people just
bring their best works straight to your table. It is
a veritable parade or dance of meat dinner in a show.
Speaker 1 (07:47):
Yes, you get jealous when you're like, oh, oh, that
one's over there, I want to try that meat.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
I should go okay anyway. Let's note here that chirasco
is a broader term used in both Spanish and Portuguese
to refer to barbecue, and just as in the US,
barbecue can mean a lot of things and is like
specifically culturally evocative in different ways for many different people.
(08:20):
Chiasco is not a single thing. Chascarias are a more
specific type of restaurant that arose in like the southeast
corner of South America, like like Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay
uh in the cattle raising plains region there or pump us. Okay,
So there you go. That's that's that's one set of definitions. Next,
(08:41):
Rhodizio means rotation, and it refers to the rotation of
dishes around the dining room.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
In Brazil.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
There are other ridizio style restaurants and dishes served in
that style in other restaurants, like basically any anything you
can think of, because it's a it's a it's a
type of service. The redizio servers are called passadors or
more romantically, gauchos, gaucho being a word for cowboy. We'll
get into that in the history section. So in redizio
(09:09):
dining dishes will come around the room, but you can,
as Annie said, often make a specific request from the
grill or order things a la carte, or be like,
oh hey, could you bring that one back here?
Speaker 3 (09:19):
That was really good?
Speaker 2 (09:20):
When the passador cuts you off a slice you use
personal little tongs to nab it and transfer it to
your plate. Specifically, American Redizio escriaz usually charge a flat
price a prefee for redisio service plus access to a
salad bar and hot bar with all kinds of sides.
And yeah, each table usually has a card or a
(09:42):
paddle that you can flip between green and red. Green
means please bring whatever you've got by the table, and
red means that you're taking a break. But as I said,
you can also say oh, oh, no, thank you when
someone gets tiered table with something you're not morally obligated
(10:03):
to take everything that they're serving.
Speaker 1 (10:06):
Sometimes it happens so fast.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
Lord, I know, I know, you can get overwhelmed.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
It's a marathon, not a sprint, for sure.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Taste yourself. But okay, let's talk about those meats. All
sorts of cuts of beef, sometimes from specific breeds of cattle,
some cuts that are traditional to this part of South
America and Brazil's specifically, like the cut of pecuna, which
is a really visually iconic one. It's this top sirloin
(10:41):
cut that still has a thick cap of fat attached
to one side. And these thick strips of it will
be curved into a cea shape onto skewers, with the
fat cap on the outer edge, so it just melts
into the meat. There's also a coupine, which is this
cut from like the fatty hump of this specific breed
that's popular in Brazil. All kinds of cuts may be
(11:03):
served lean to fatty, everything sort of in between. Again,
most of these are only seasoned with salt before they're grilled.
But table side, you might garnish your plain steak with
the sauces like some chimmy cherry, you know, like like
herbal and bright and garlicee or other vinegar vegetable type sauces.
(11:24):
But they will serve all kinds of proteins pork, lamb, chicken, fish, shrimp,
various sausages, you know, All of the above, including different
cuts of beef, might be wrapped in bacon or crusted
in parmesan, or given a rub or marinate or based
you might get awful like chicken hearts.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
In there.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
Then there are the apps and sides, which a lot
of the conventional wisdom or like American wisdom, or like
American this is how you eat the most meat wisdom
is like ignore them.
Speaker 3 (11:57):
Go only for the steak, Yeah, which I think is
a little silly. I'm like, food is good.
Speaker 2 (12:03):
You don't need to you don't need to like put
them the most, Put the restaurant the most in the
hole for letting you eat there. That's make the point
of restaurants. But yeah, so you might get grilled vegetables
or fruit like pineapple, lots of raw salid options, often
some cheeses and or charcouterie, maybe some chilled seafood. A
(12:26):
common hot option is faijuata, which is this traditional Brazilian
black bean stew. Then starches like fried polenta or some
cassava cheese, bread or rice with or without beans, maybe
some fried plantains or bananas, some mashed or grilled potatoes,
or farrofa, which is a type of like fluffy grained
(12:47):
cassava meal dish. Yep, little bit like a fine grained couscous.
And as these are full service restaurants, they usually have
a dessert menu. But that's not what we're here to
talk about today.
Speaker 1 (13:00):
We did get dessert the first time we went, Even
as miserable as we were, we were like, it's a celebration.
Let go.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
They do have some traditional Brazilian ones at a lot
of these places that we've been meaning to do whole
episodes on, So.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
We'll get back to those. Yeah, that's a later episode
for sure. Well what about the nutrition.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
That depends on you?
Speaker 2 (13:26):
That is up to you. That's a problem. Despite what
certain influencers might tell you, eating nothing but meat is
bad him.
Speaker 3 (13:41):
Bodies are complicated. Get a vegetable, drink of water.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Drink of water, pace yourself, have a nice time, have
a nice time. This is I would say, I would
put this in the category of treats.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
I would I would assume so, yes, I'd say that
most steakhouse experiences are probably treats, especially all you can
eat steakhouses.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
Yeah, yes, so just don't do it all the time. Maybe, Yeah,
we do have some numbers for you.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
We do.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
Okay, So, any given Shrescaria is usually going to have
like ten to twenty different meats on the menu at
any given time. This is what's going to be, especially
if it's rudisio like circling through the dining room. One
Sarscaria chain that originated in Colorado, currently has twenty five
locations throughout the United States. That's a Rudizio Grill, another
(14:35):
one from Texas, Texas to Brazil, has fifty five locations
in the United States and thirteen abroad, including in the
United Arab Emirates and South Korea, and Foga de Sheell,
which originated in Brazil, has nine there, eleven throughout Central
South America and the Middle East, and eighty one in
(14:56):
the United States. Yeah, and those are just the chains.
There are a plenty of independent restaurants out there.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yes, there are. And there's a really interesting, if not
complicated history behind this style of dining, in this style
of meat.
Speaker 2 (15:17):
Yeah yeah, and we are going to get into that
as soon as we get back from a quick break
for a word from our sponsors, and we're back.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you. Okay. So the history
of grilled meats is quite a long one.
Speaker 2 (15:41):
Oh yeah, yeah, that's too much for us today, but
all right. So, in terms of cattle in this region,
Spanish colonizers brought cattle with them to the Americas as
early as fourteen ninety three, with Columbus on his second voyage,
arriving first in the Caribbean. Cattle then spread with colonization
and also just on their own in the wild through
(16:02):
Central and South America. The Spanish brought them to Bolivia
as work animals for the silver mines and the fifteen hundreds.
Portuguese colonists were also bringing their own cattle to Brazil
during the early fifteen hundreds, and due to all of this,
cattle existed in the pump us in great numbers by
the mid seventeen hundreds or so. Like this significantly changed
(16:25):
the environment and ecosystem and human food ways in this area,
and then, especially as uprisings brought an end to enslavement
and colonial rule in this area in the early to
mid eighteen hundreds, cattle rearing became this increasingly important agricultural business.
Speaker 1 (16:46):
Yes, so when it comes specifically to Turrosco, experts believe
that it dates back to the Gauchos of South America
in the eighteen hundreds. We've discussed this before, but the
Gauchos were nomadic horsemen, farmhands, and ranchers in parts of
South America. In Brazil, they were particularly associated with a
region called Rio Grande do sol again write in if
(17:09):
I'm mispronouncing anything Portuguese. Yeah, not a language, but yes,
let us know. So as the Gauchos traveled around. One
resource they didn't lack was beef, and it didn't take
them long to start roasting a variety of cuts of
meats on a spit for a meal. According to some sources,
the core of this style of cooking meat goes back
(17:32):
to the sixteen hundreds, when the Guarani people indigenous to
Brazil with a lot of livestock, salted raw meat and
cooked it on a spit, and then the tradition spread
across Brazil. This is a much larger topic for a
different podcast, but I do think we should point out
that many countries use the gaucho as a national symbol,
(17:53):
a point of pride. Whenever you introduce that sort of
rhetoric and national pride, these histories have the potential to
be massaged or overblown or fabricated entirely to align with
that narrative. In this case, since the Chotaskania is tied
to the Gauchows, they can get wrapped up on all
(18:15):
of that depending on your source. That's not to say
that these stories aren't true, but that national pride does
entail a vested interest that is important to keep in mind,
and countries everywhere do this.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
This is not Oh yeah, this happens in the United
States everywhere. Yeah, yes, sure, but at any rate. Yes,
The cattle industry in this area kept growing, including in
the early nineteen hundreds with the import of zebu, which
is this breed of cattle from originally from South Asia
that does well in warm climates and has a little
(18:48):
fatty hump on its back.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
Ahm hm, all right. So over time, this style of
dining of meats on skewers over usually grilled over hot coals,
grew in popularity alongside the growth of Brazil's network of roads.
In the mid nineteen hundreds, as restaurants started opening up
along these roads to sustain travelers, meat was plentiful, so
(19:11):
it was fairly cheap for these early charscadias to offer
a lot of meat. By the nineteen seventies, this style
of restaurant was pretty popular in southern Brazil, though they
were almost more like gas station stops at the time
from what I read like roadhouses. Yeah yeah. The meat
was typically cooked outside on wooden skewers over charcoal. As
(19:33):
time went on and as the country became more urbanized,
these venues grew popular enough to transform into larger restaurant spaces,
and kind of going back to my earlier point, a
lot of big modern restaurant chains that specialize in the
style of dining like to take credit for the invention
(19:53):
of this type of meat being served at the table.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Yeah, the regizio style. Yeah, exactly as usual. A lot
of them these stories cannot be verified. But one popular
story a lot of them liked to tell is the classic.
Speaker 1 (20:10):
It was an accident, pretty simply, a waiter in a
Rio Grandu soul restaurant accidentally delivered a meat skewer to
the incorrect table. The waiter shaved some of the meat
off for the table anyway before finding the correct recipient,
but the whole thing was really well received, and a
lot of other tables then requested the same treatment. They're like,
(20:32):
what is this? I want to try this?
Speaker 3 (20:35):
And the rest was history.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Yeah, the rest was history. And that does bring us
to Fogo de Chao. Fogo de Shao got its start
in nineteen seventy nine after two pairs of brothers purchased
a churrascaria in the Brazilian city of Porto Aleegra.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
We one pair were investors, the other pair had gotten
into the restaurant industry a few years before working in
steakhouses and readdition narrow before taking over that first fog
To show, and they were at the forefront of a
growing trend when it came to these types of steakhouses
and particularly Rhodizio style steakhouses. This is the style that
(21:14):
a lot of US are now familiar with, where customers
pay a fixed price and waiters carve off several different
types of meat from skiwers table side at the diner's request.
They were also the ones who made it into a
fine dining experience and like really brought the Brazilian steakhouse
into cities and tourist areas. Fog To Shao opened their
second location in this posh neighborhood in Sal Paulo in
(21:38):
nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Yes, and to reiterate, they are often credited with introducing
this concept to big cities in the US as well,
but they were not the first. No, we've already mentioned
this establishment, but Rudizio Grill was the first Brazilian state
house chain restaurant to open in the US in nineteen
(22:02):
ninety five or nineteen ninety six. The founder was a
Brazilian immigrant who worked various jobs in the food industry
before setting his sights on bringing Brazilian food and culture
to the US.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Other independent restaurants in the style were opening in America
around that time, including Chidescaria Platiforma in New York City
in nineteen ninety six.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
One of the first reviews of Fogo de Shall printed
in American media proclaimed it, quote a meat eater's mecca.
Their first international location opened in Texas in nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
They chose Texas because they figured that, like Texans already
love a steakhouse.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Yeah, they were like.
Speaker 3 (22:51):
Well, if not there, then where.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
But generally speaking, like the concept had had a lot
going for it at that time. Time in the nineties
to early aughts, you know, like all you can eat
buffets were really.
Speaker 3 (23:05):
Popular around here.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
Then steakhouses in general were big, and anything a little
showy or kind of participatory was very posh. Like think
of all of those melting pot fondoue restaurants that were
around then. This is anecdotal, but a lot of the
American articles that I read while doing my reading for
this episode, we're like like that we're explaining basically to Americans,
(23:31):
what trascarias are. We're from the early twenty teens. That
seemed like some kind of zeitgeist moment in this country
for this style thing.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Certainly.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
By twenty eighteen, this tabletop game company called Absurdist Productions
released a card game called Escaria, a cutthroat game of
gluttony wherein players vie to gain the most meat cards
and pass off any sides and dessert to other players
and furthermore cause shenanigans to mess up other players' plans
(24:04):
to do the same. You have like an active face
up space in front of you. That's your plate, and
then you have like a sort of victory point card
pile that's your stomach.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
It sounds adorable. To be honest, I would play that.
I would play that. I love that.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
It's the point is, let me send these sides and.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Deserts to somebody else. I only want the meats.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
I think a lot of these restaurants did have a
hard time during the COVID pandemic, perhaps obviously the whole
restaurant industry did. But but they are back on their
feet again. As of twenty twenty three, a private equity
firm bought fog to Shao for about one point one
billion dollars, including a little bit of debt that it had,
and Fogo to Show is currently working on opening an
(24:53):
additional thirteen locations around the world, like actively right now.
So yeah, also a currently in like late twenty twenty four,
early twenty twenty five, there's been a bunch of Tirasco
like popping off on TikTok. I'm not on TikTok because
I'm old, so I couldn't tell you, but this is
what I read.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
I saw that too. I'm also not on TikTok, but
I was just looking up how to pronounce certain things
and it kept being TikTok videos of people being like,
oh I met this chatasca to you, and I was like,
what's going on here?
Speaker 3 (25:28):
I mean it is.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
It is visually striking, yes, and it's fun and people
like taking videos and restaurants bless yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Yeah, And I think it's got a little bit of
that I don't know, almost like the challenge food aspect
of like let me see how much of this I
can eat that we find popular as humans for some reason,
I don't know. I ran into a lot of it too.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
It certainly occurs, and Truscuria is certainly a place where
you can participate in a cutthroat game of gluttony.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
That's true, you can also participate in an accidental game
of gluttony. Remember to turn your battle around everyone.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Or politely say oh no, no, thank you, please.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
No more, be vigilant, stay in touch with your body
and your writers.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
Or as Anakin Skywalker might say, a simple.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
No, you don't have the high ground, the truscorea. You're
in danger of overeating wisdom.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Wisdom absolutely well.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
If any of y'all have specific Trascaria experiences, if you
have been to a place that is in the US,
perhaps where this tradition comes from, we would love to
hear more about it. If you have tuasco or other
barbecue traditions in your family, we would love to hear
about them.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
We would. And any other Star Wars recipes memes.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Oh yeah, oh man, we love those, always always.
Speaker 1 (27:23):
But that is what we have to say about Shaasca.
He is for now.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
It is.
Speaker 2 (27:29):
We do already have some listener mail for you, though,
and we are going to get into that as soon
as we get back from one more quick break for
a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
And we're back. Thank you, sponsor, Yes, thank you.
Speaker 4 (27:49):
And we're back withoo it's Flames.
Speaker 1 (28:01):
I was gonna do a whole Star Wars thing in
I panic, so we went with Flames. I think it
was good.
Speaker 3 (28:08):
Yeah, I had a Star Wars vibe to it.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
It did it? Did? I have to say a bat
all the heroes? John Williams that song, That's what I
was going to try to go for, but it would
be too complicated too.
Speaker 3 (28:22):
It's difficult to express.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
I mean I can express it, but I would need
more space and more time.
Speaker 3 (28:29):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, like if you if you started, yeah, different different
pieces of John Williams music, if you started the choreography
for a specific fight scene, I might be able to
pick it up.
Speaker 3 (28:43):
But but not like not like over our video chat.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
No, LUs, we have some constraints. Oh well, okay, So
a lot of you have written in about Krispy Kreme.
Speaker 3 (28:56):
Oh yay, this is awesome and I love it.
Speaker 1 (28:59):
Please it coming. Christina wrote, loved your Krispy Kreme episode.
Donuts are one of my most favorite foods. So I
had to listen on a full stomach. I was trying
to find the details. But krispy Kreme has always struggled
in the Houston market. I remember all the excitement of
going and seeing them make the donuts when they first
(29:19):
came to town as a child, and they closed abruptly,
it seemed because of financial troubles. Personally, I think they
were unprepared for Houston's loyalty to our local franchise, Shipley.
The most interesting thing about Shipley is the cutter for
the donuts is actually hexagonal to reduce dough waste once fried.
(29:40):
They do appear more around, but if you look, you
may notice they also serve Colatch cheese, which is like
a big pig in a blanket, but another Texas favorite.
Be sure to stop it next time you're around Houston.
Oh yeah, I love it lace because I feel like
(30:00):
krispy Kreme sort of has that, you know, as we
were talking about that nostalgic Southern vibe. Perhaps, but it
sounds like Shipley is doing that. This is already for Texas,
so right, right, right, So Christy, I can see krispy
Kreme would struggle if already you've got.
Speaker 2 (30:19):
You already have a favorite nostalgic donut place. Yeah, yeah,
I've not been to a Shipley.
Speaker 3 (30:25):
Now I need to.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Go no, and I did because I actually wasn't sure
what klotchtes were.
Speaker 3 (30:34):
Oh, and I.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Read a whole article about them and the difference between
a pig and a blanket. I got really interested. I
went deep in a rabbit hole. Yeah, only a savor
ladies and listeners perhaps would appreciate. But I did get
really invested because I know there's a lot of opinions
opinions about it, but you know we'd.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
Love Oh, yes, always, Oh it was so good.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
Speaking of Leslie wrote, thanks for the great podcast. As always,
I to enjoy the idea of pelting someone with garlic.
In protest, I had to learn some strong pest opinions
last year, and some strong food pinions in general, because
someone I love very much has developed a cashew allergy.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
Yikes.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
We found out the hard way because they ate a
whole lot of a takeaway curry that we learned was
mostly made out of cashews and that had a serious
reaction to it.
Speaker 3 (31:31):
No airway involvement. Few.
Speaker 2 (31:34):
We then found out that a jarred pesto we'd used
for some pasta that eaten a little of a few
months prior and reacted to but we weren't sure if
they had also contained cashew. I was really surprised because
I'd never heard of cashews and pesto.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
Growing up.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
It was always pine nuts, maybe walnuts or almonds if
you were doing something fancy with kale or arugula, or
just leave it out if.
Speaker 3 (31:54):
It's too expensive.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Plus, the standard pre made pesto at both of the
large scale food service operations I've been at for the
past eight years is not free for allergy safety reasons.
Que the scouring of grocery store shelves to find a
cashew free pesto, and they all now contain cashew, or
at least the ones buy us do. How disappointing. I'll
(32:17):
have to wait until summer and we'll just make our
own and freeze it. This has since spilled over into
some passover related angst. Both very well known brands of
commercially made macaroons now use cashew in their Rocky Road versions,
which means that it's safer for us to just make
our own.
Speaker 3 (32:35):
Sigh.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Thirty plus years of this being a beloved holiday treat,
but between this and a few other factors, will just
stick to only buying their MATSA.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
Now that is a bummer.
Speaker 3 (32:46):
Oh, manishevitz angst I feel you.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Yeah, or just like nostalgic brand. Yeah, that's oh you're like,
You're like, no, but i'd need that packaged thing.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
It's not the same when I make it at home.
It's good medi that I'm.
Speaker 1 (33:04):
Used to, right, that reminds me of my childhood, but
also another great reminder to always look at your labels
because oh yeah, I didn't know that either about pesto.
And actually after we got this email, I went and
looked at mine and it has cash us in it.
Speaker 2 (33:20):
Well huh, I mean, yeah, they're they're less expensive than
pine nuts probably in most cases really creamy. Yeah, interesting though.
Speaker 1 (33:31):
Yeah, I'm sure you probably have more to say about
this than me, but I feel like that's it'd be
better to have kind of this allergy safe version. I
don't know that doesn't have, or at least you make
clear like on the label, like nuts or something. I
don't know.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
Yeah, that's a yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
I as as a human with interesting food intolerances. I
read the ingredients label of everything that I buy, even
and if it doesn't seem remotely possible for there to
be sweet peppers or pineapple and something, I'm like what
if it does, and you know it's important, it's important
to do. But who I'm so glad that your loved
(34:14):
one is okay. Allergies are very serious or can be,
and so I'm glad that y'all are finding workarounds even
if they are kind of a pain in the.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Tukis yes, And I bet your homemade pesto is going.
Speaker 3 (34:29):
To be Oh, it's going to be so good. You're
gonna be happy that you did it overall.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
Let us know, let us know.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Yeah, yeah, oh, I know.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
I am always happy when I do homemade pasto. Like
somewhere halfway halfway through the process, when my whole kitchen
smells like basil, I'm like, oh, all right, this is
why I'm doing this.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Yeah, it is a delightful smell. Wow. Thank you to
both of those listeners writing in. If you would like
to write to us, you can. Our email is Hello
at savor.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
You can also find us on social media. We are
on Instagram and Blue Sky at saver pod and we
do hope to hear from you.
Speaker 3 (35:08):
Saverr is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (35:10):
For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, you can visit
the iHeartRadio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows. Thanks as always to our super producers
Dylan Fagan and Andrew Howard. Thanks to you for listening,
and we hope that lots more good things are coming
your way.
Savor News
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Anney Reese
Lauren Vogelbaum
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