Ancestral Table — Afro-Bahian Cooking Class and Market Tour

We pick you up at your hotel and head to Feira de São Joaquim, the biggest and liveliest popular market in Salvador. Among colorful stalls and the buzz of stallholders, the guide presents the ingredients that support Afro-Bahian cuisine — palm oil, peppers, seafood, herbs and spices that span centuries of tradition. From the fair, we head to the house of the family responsible for the class, where the kitchen stops being a spectacle and returns to being what it always was: meeting, memory and affection.

Under the guidance of the host family — and with the guide nearby, translating and approximating each gesture and each story —, you participate in the preparation of a traditional menu, hands-on, from the first seasoning to the last spoonful. At the end, he sits down at the table to share, together, the meal he helped to create: moquecas, rice, palm flour farofa, a crab cone, dessert and an artisanal caipirinha to top it off with a flourish.