Branca's adafina
a panelada for Shabbat“… huã panellada de comer a qual ficava cozinhada daquella tarde pera ho dia seguinte … lançavão a carne picada na panella com azeite e cebolla e grãos e adubos e outras cousas, e barravão lhe o testo com massa ao redor e metiamna dentro em hum forno onde estava até se cozer.” Anna Lins, who lived in the house as a girl, 10 November 1593. Denunciações de Pernambuco, p. 57
Ingredients
- Dried chickpeas, soaked overnight, a third of them mashed · 250 g
- Beef chuck or brisket, or mutton shoulder, in 4 cm pieces, visible fat trimmed · 1.2 kg
- Extra virgin olive oil · 5 tbsp
- Onions, thinly sliced · 3 large
- Garlic, peeled; converso cooks fried onions and garlic in oil · 6 cloves
- Bay leaves · 2
- Salt · about 2 tsp
- Water, to just cover · about 1.5 l
- Eggs in their shells, optional; not in her record, but in other trials · 6
- Fresh coriander and mint, to finish
Her adubos, pounded in a mortar
- Black peppercorns · 1½ tsp
- Cumin seeds, lightly toasted · 1½ tsp
- Coriander seeds, lightly toasted · 1½ tsp
- Caraway seeds · 1 tsp
- Cinnamon stick · 3 cm
- Whole cloves, optional · 2
- Nutmeg, grated, optional · ¼ tsp
- Saffron, steeped in 3 tbsp hot water, or ¾ tsp turmeric · a generous pinch
Method
- Friday, early afternoon. Pound the peppercorns, cumin, coriander, caraway, cinnamon and any cloves to a coarse powder; add the nutmeg.
- Heat the oil in a heavy clay pot or casserole. Brown the meat in batches and set it aside.
- Soften the onions slowly in the same oil, about 15 minutes, until golden. Add the garlic and the spices and stir for a minute.
- Return the meat. Add the chickpeas, bay, saffron with its water, salt and water to just cover. Bring to a simmer.
- Nestle in the eggs, if using. Cover tightly, sealing the lid with flour-and-water paste or a sheet of foil.
- Before candle lighting, move the pot to the oven at 95–100 °C, or a slow cooker on low. Her household sealed the lid with dough and put the pot in an oven. Leave it until Saturday lunch, 16–18 hours. If you want some on Friday night, take it out after 4–5 hours.
- Peel the eggs; their whites will be light brown and the yolks creamy. Serve the meat and chickpeas in their yellow broth with coriander, mint and bread.
What was in her spice box
| Spice | What the sources say |
|---|---|
| Pepper, cumin, coriander, caraway pimenta, cominhos, coentro, alcaravia | Named together in a Toledo converso pot, testimony of 1523; the witness called their smell güesmo |
| Cinnamon canela | In a medieval Andalusian Jewish Sabbath dish and in Piñer's adefina |
| Cloves, nutmeg cravo, noz-moscada | Not named in any testimony found; Piñer's adefina uses nutmeg |
| Saffron açafrão | Iberian cooks almost always used it for yellow. No Brazilian witness names it, but a 1517 stew from Guadalajara had saffron and pepper |
| Turmeric açafrão-da-Índia | A modern stand-in for saffron; Roden and Piñer both use it |
Not in her pot: paprika, tomato or potato, which came from the Americas later. Other trial pots add chard, fava beans or turnips; add them if you like, but they are not in her record. For a Pernambuco plate, add cassava, a whole pimenta-de-cheiro and farofa, and say they're your additions. Ask your rabbi how the S&P community keeps food hot over Shabbat before making it for Shabbat itself. Sources: Denunciações de Pernambuco 1593–1595 (São Paulo, 1929), pp. 31, 57; Gitlitz and Davidson, A Drizzle of Honey (1999), pp. 14, 36, 150, 169, 171, 225; Piñer, Sephardi (2021), pp. 101–103, and Jews, Food, and Spain (2022), pp. 131, 179, 200, 203–204; Roden, The Book of Jewish Food (1996), pp. 189, 191, 194, 200, 213, 367–369.