Chef Juliana
Açaí com Camarão do Pará
You think açaí belongs with banana and granola because that's the version that traveled. In Pará, thick unsweetened açaí sits beside shrimp, rice, and farinha. Anota aí: same fruit, different meal.
Culinary Explorer
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Carne de Sol com Jerimum
Created by
You don't need a sertão kitchen to understand this plate. Salted beef, sweet jerimum, onion, garlic, and patience make a dinner that lands hard and asks very little.
Main Dishes
Brazilian
Comfort Food
Weeknight
Batch Cooking
35 min
Active Time
35 min cook•1 hr 10 min total
Yield4 servings
You look at carne de sol and think, isso não é pra mim. Too regional, too salty, too many rules. Good. Let's take that fear apart before it ruins dinner. Cozinhar não é dom, é um aprendizado, and this one is mostly soaking, drying, dourar, and not crowding the pan like a person in a hurry to make grey meat.
I won't pretend this tradition is mine to own. The sertanejos who cure, dry, pound, stretch, and feed families from tough conditions carry that knowledge. What I can teach is the home kitchen version: how to handle the salt, how to melt jerimum into a rough, sweet purée, and how to put the two on a pê-efe with arroz soltinho, feijão, and something green. That's comida de verdade. Not fancy. Not poor. Intelligent.
The whole point is contrast. The beef brings salt and chew. The jerimum brings sweetness and softness. The refogado brings the floor under both, because onion and garlic in good fat do work no packet can do honestly. A gente cooks the beef in batches so it sears instead of steams, cooks the jerimum until it crushes with a spoon, then eats them together because one makes sense of the other.
By the end, you'll have a pan of deep amber carne de sol and bright orange jerimum that can resolver o jantar tonight and tomorrow. Make rice. Warm beans. Slice couve thin. The country is in that plate, quietly doing its job.
In the sertão of Brazil's Northeast, salting and drying meat was a practical way to make beef last in heat before refrigeration, part of a cure-dry-stretch grammar built from scarcity and intelligence. Carne de sol is usually more lightly salted and less dry than carne seca or charque, while charque is heavily salted and pressed, so it needs a longer soak. Jerimum, the Northeast name for pumpkin or squash, meets the cured beef at the table because its sweetness softens the salt and helps a small amount of meat feed more people.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
carne de sol
Quantity
600g
cut into 2-inch pieces
cold water
Quantity
4 cups
for soaking the meat
neutral oil or manteiga de garrafa
Quantity
3 tablespoons
divided
onion
Quantity
1 large
thinly sliced
garlic
Quantity
4 cloves
minced
jerimum, pumpkin, kabocha, or butternut squash
Quantity
1 1/2 pounds
peeled and cut into 1-inch cubes
water
Quantity
1/2 cup, plus more as needed
bay leaf
Quantity
1
black pepper
Quantity
1/2 teaspoon
cilantro or parsley (optional)
Quantity
1 tablespoon
chopped
salt (optional)
Quantity
only if needed
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| carne de solcut into 2-inch pieces | 600g |
| cold waterfor soaking the meat | 4 cups |
| neutral oil or manteiga de garrafadivided | 3 tablespoons |
| onionthinly sliced | 1 large |
| garlicminced | 4 cloves |
| jerimum, pumpkin, kabocha, or butternut squashpeeled and cut into 1-inch cubes | 1 1/2 pounds |
| water | 1/2 cup, plus more as needed |
| bay leaf | 1 |
| black pepper | 1/2 teaspoon |
| cilantro or parsley (optional)chopped | 1 tablespoon |
| salt (optional) | only if needed |
Equipment Needed
- •Wide heavy 30cm skillet or shallow 4-liter pot
- •Medium bowl for soaking
- •Tongs
- •Wooden spoon or sturdy spatula
- •Potato masher or fork
Instructions
- 1
Soak the meat
Put the carne de sol in a bowl and cover with 4 cups cold water for 20 to 30 minutes. Taste a tiny cooked shred if you're unsure, or smell and feel it after soaking: it should still smell cured and meaty, not harshly salty. Carne de sol is not charque, so don't soak all the life out of it. The point is to tame the salt, not wash away the dish.
If what you bought is labeled carne seca or charque, give it a longer soak, changing the water a few times. Those are saltier and drier than carne de sol, and pretending they're the same is how dinner gets bossy. - 2
Dry it well
Drain the meat and pat it very dry with a clean towel or paper towel. Let it sit on a plate while you cut the onion and jerimum. Dry meat browns. Wet meat spits, cools the pan, and starts boiling itself, which is not what a gente came here to do.
- 3
Sear in batches
Heat 2 tablespoons oil or manteiga de garrafa in a wide heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Add the carne de sol in a single layer, with space between the pieces, and brown until deep amber on two or three sides, about 6 to 8 minutes total. Work in batches if you need to. Crowd the pan and the meat releases water, the heat drops, and you get grey pieces instead of flavor. Pull the browned meat to a plate.
- 4
Murchar the onion
Drop the heat to medium and add the sliced onion to the same skillet. Stir and scrape the browned bits from the bottom until the onion murcha, softens, and turns golden at the edges, about 6 minutes. Those browned bits are the meat giving you a head start. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute, just until you smell it. Burnt garlic is bitter and has a long memory.
- 5
Cook the jerimum
Add the jerimum cubes, bay leaf, black pepper, and 1/2 cup water. Stir so the squash picks up the onion and garlic, then cover and cook over medium-low heat until the pieces crush easily with a spoon, about 15 to 20 minutes. Stir now and then, adding 2 tablespoons water if the pan gets dry. You want the jerimum to soften and melt, not scorch before it has time to turn sweet.
- 6
Make the purée
Remove the bay leaf. Mash about two-thirds of the jerimum right in the skillet, leaving some chunks for texture. It should look rough and bright orange, glossy from the fat and thick enough to hold the spoon mark for a second. This is not baby food and it's not a smooth restaurant purée. Desgourmetizar, please. The roughness is good eating.
- 7
Bring together
Return the seared carne de sol and any juices on the plate to the skillet. Fold gently so the meat sits partly in the jerimum, then cook uncovered for 5 minutes. Taste before adding salt, because the meat is still doing that job. The finished pan should be sweet, salty, glossy, and balanced, with the beef standing out and the jerimum softening every bite.
- 8
Serve the plate
Finish with cilantro or parsley if you like. Serve with arroz soltinho, feijão, and couve refogada or another green thing that looked good at the market. That's the pê-efe: rice, beans, meat, green. Sounds ordinary. It isn't. It's the formula that keeps dinner honest.
Chef Tips
- •Buy carne de sol from a butcher or market that sells enough of it to keep it fresh. It should smell clean and cured, not sour. If it looks wet and grey, cook something else and don't let a sad ingredient make you doubt yourself.
- •Jerimum is best when it's cheap, heavy for its size, and deeply colored inside. Kabocha is excellent here because it gets sweet and dense. Butternut works on a Tuesday. It will be a little smoother and less earthy, and that's the cost.
- •Manteiga de garrafa gives the most Nordeste flavor if you have it. Use neutral oil if you don't. That's an honest shortcut. A powdered meat seasoning is not.
- •Make double jerimum if you're batch cooking. It reheats well, freezes well, and turns a little leftover meat into another full plate without lying to you.
- •If the final pan tastes too salty, don't panic. Add another cup of cooked jerimum or serve it with unsalted rice and beans. Salt can be spread out. It cannot be argued with.
Advance Preparation
- •The carne de sol can be soaked, drained, dried, and refrigerated up to 1 day ahead. Keep it covered and cold.
- •The jerimum can be peeled and cubed up to 2 days ahead. Store it in a covered container in the fridge.
- •Cooked carne de sol com jerimum keeps 4 days in the fridge and freezes for up to 2 months. Reheat gently with a splash of water so the purée loosens without drying the meat.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 330g)
Calories
415 calories
Total Fat
17 g
Saturated Fat
4 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
12 g
Cholesterol
110 mg
Sodium
1350 mg
Total Carbohydrates
22 g
Dietary Fiber
4 g
Sugars
8 g
Protein
43 g
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