Made in Azores – from the Azores straight to your table

with Brak komentarzy
Poleć innym:

Ostatnia aktualizacja: 2020-12-07. Autor: Milena

One day I was walking down from Monte Brasil with one of my friends and we talked about the connections between the Azores and the world. After that conversation I came back home and typed in my browser one phrase: Made in Azores.

Do you sometimes regret that you went somewhere with a backpack or a suitcase that are too small? That you have no space to take with you all the delicious things that you tasted during your holidays? I prefer travelling with a small backpack but the truth is that I wasn’t able to bring with me Tokaji wine from Hungary or olive oil from Spain.

It turned out that this friend has a great solution for the ones coming back from the Azores – Made in Azores. It’s an online shop with products from the Azores!

Three friends (including my friend) opened this shop because of their love for the Azorean culture and cuisine. They wanted to share the islands’ heritage with the world. The shop has been working since 2013 and has already served clients from almost 40 countries all over the world. It has already handled and still handles orders from Poland!

When I heard about it, I almost jumped for joy. I imagined you coming back from the Azores and starting to miss the Azorean wine cultivated on volcanic rocks, cheese from the happy cows grazing in the meadows with an ocean view and historical local cupcakes Donas Amélias. You wait for your next paycheque to buy the next plane ticket, but you’re cheered with the fact that you’ve already placed an order and all these delicious things you’d love to try again are already on their way from the Azores straight to your table.

If one day I move out of the Azores, I will be a regular customer of Made in Azores.

I even know what will be in my cart:

  1. Donas Amélias – they have to be there! After each arrival to the island I go to Pastelaria Santa Bárbara and ask my friend Márcio for my favourite cupcakes.
  2. Wine! I love the Azorean wine. Including Biscoitos wine. I will probably choose fortified wine Chico Maria, it’s so delicious! And I’ll add some Pico wine, probably white Faria’s Vineyard.
  3. Azorean tea. I like both Gorreana and Porto Formoso, so I will probably order them in rotation. By the way, do you know that in the Azores there are the only tea plantations in Europe? They are worth seeing!
  4. Cheese! I like Castelinhos cheese, cheeses from Quinta dos Açores are also great… But my absolutely favourite cheese is the one from Queijo vaquinha! And I will probably order one time the hot one, the other time the traditional one. Because I cannot decide which of them I like more.
  5. Jams! Pumpkin jam and physalis jam. And if there was a chance to add something nonstandard to the order, I’d be more than happy to see hot pepper jam from Andreia from Biscoitos.
  6. Catnip tea. When I moved to Terceira, my friends were always picking up something green in their backyard. They were calling it “chá de nêveda”. I liked it. Only long time later I learned that I was drinking a catty aphrodisiac!
  7. Pico Mel, thus honey aguardente. Aguardente is a kind of high quality moonshine. This one comes from Pico island and is head and shoulder above all the other ones.
  8. Blackberry liqueur. I have love’hate relationship with the Azorean blackberries. At the beginning I was swearing at all the silvas on the trails. I didn’t know the translation, I only that it meant numerous spiky twigs which were ripping my boots, trousers and jacket. And hurting me. Later some fruits started showing up on them. Blackberries. I stopped complaining for a few months. After all, they were filling up my stomach!
  9. New Cristóvam’s álbum. Cristóvam is a great musician from Terceira. You can listen to the interview with him and read a coverage of his concert in Poland (the first one, but for sure not the last one). So far in the shop you can get his CD “Hopes & Dreams”. If I leave the island and he launches a new album, I’ll be the first in the line to order it.

I don’t know what about it but to me it sounds delicious!

I only have to remember not to go to the North Korea. As the owners of the shop say, they send their products everywhere but to North Korea, as “they don’t like hot cheese there”.

And talking about the sound – it turns out that the shop’s founders didn’t settle for physical products. They also created a YouTube channel Made in Azores with elements of the Azorean culture and art. You can find there among others recordings of such Azorean artists as Cristóvam, João da Ilha, Sara Cruz, Victor Castro or João Félix. There are also poems there, landscapes, a bit of the islands’ history – a foretaste of the beauty and uniqueness of the Azores. Or a memory of them.

Made in Azores
Tea factory Gorreana

The world is small and the island even smaller

When I was walking down Monte Brasil that day, I was thinking that the world is small and the island even smaller. I had been thinking for long time that it would be a great idea to send Azorean products to the world. On that day it turned out that such a solution already existed. And it was created by one of my friends!

And today I’m writing this article for you and I’m wondering which song to leave you with. You can hear as Cristóvam and João da Ilha regularly on my Facebook and Instagram account regularly, so I keep on looking. And what am I finding? A beautiful traditional Azorean song performed by… my colleague from the volcano Algar do Carvão! My dear, today for you Carla Ferreira in the song “Olhos Negros” (“black eyes”).

Enjoy tasting the Azorean culture! With all your senses!



PS No, it’s not a sponsored post. It’s my gift for you 🙂 Enjoy! 🙂

Poleć innym: