Food and spirits: religion, gender, and identity in the ‘African’ cuisine of Northeast Brazil

Abstract

Acarajé is an Afro-Brazilian culinary specialty sold throughout the city of Salvador. Because of its African origins, acarajé is typically used as a sacred food in the meetinghouses or terreiros of Afro-Brazilian religious traditions such as Candomblé. The image of the acarajé seller – dressed in a flowing white dress elaborated with lace and beads – selling this so-called ‘food of the gods’ has become one of the most iconic images of Salvador, the capital of Bahia. It is often used to depict the city as rustic, quaint, and – most importantly – Black. However, evangelical churches decry the consumption of acarajé and its use in the terreiro as devil worship and have introduced so-called bolinhos de Jesus or Jesus's acarajé as a Christian alternative. This article explores how questions about Blackness and the African past, competitive religious identity, gender, and ethnicity all converge and intersect within the symbol of the Baiana and the food she sells.

Keywords:

• Brazil
• Bahia
• Blackness
• women
• religion
• food