Marco Kaye

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Remains of the Day

Photos of the scraps that make up Brazil's most storied dish.

Rooted in the one-pot peasant stews of Spain and Portugal and adapted by Brazil’s plantation workers in the 16th century, feijoada is a stew made of spare parts—a culinary method that turns the more “interesting” cuts into an economic, if time-consuming, meal to satisfy an entire table. Preparing it involves visiting a butcher, or several, to procure the more business-oriented (read: least expensive) parts of a pig: the trotters (feet), tail, and ears. Add some beef tongue, slab bacon, beans, ham hocks, carne seca (sun-dried salted beef), and, if you’re lucky enough to find it, linguiça, a Portuguese sausage whose close cousin is chorizo.

Beef brisket

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