Maria Adelaide Reis’ hands preserve tradition against time The history of an entire village in Northern Portugal is tied to the dough she produces and sells on Saturdays at the Portuguese festival of Cantinho das Concertinas. The Portuguese “folar,” a homemade bread filled with calabresa sausage, ham, and bacon, is typical of Trás-os-Montes. Adelaide learned the recipe in Ferrugende, where she was born. “When I was a child, we would receive this bread from our godmothers during Easter, and the village priest would go from house to house to eat a piece accompanied by a glass of port wine. But today, this tradition is almost lost,” laments this Portuguese woman, aged 56, who arrived in Brazil in 1971. In Copacabana, she made the bread at home to quench her homesickness, but the aroma from the oven invaded other apartments. “People couldn’t resist and started asking me to make it by order,” she says. Seven years ago, she started setting up a stall at the Portuguese festival at the Centro de Abastecimento do Estado da Guanabara, CADEG. Amidst the concertinas, she sells folares and cornbread baked on her farm in Saquarema, where she has been living for 22 years. “At home, we have a vegetable garden, we raise rabbits and sheep, and I make ham once a year.”