Goiabada

ripe guava pulp cooked long and slow with sugar until it darkens to deep garnet and sets into a dense, glossy, sliceable paste, the great preserved sweet of the Brazilian table

Origin: Brazil

From the journey of Guava.

Goiabada is the most famous of all guava preparations and one of the oldest sweets of Brazil, devised in the colonial sugar estates when the Portuguese applied their Iberian art of the fruit cheese, the marmelada of quince, to the abundant native guava. The pulp of ripe guavas is cooked long and patiently with sugar, stirred over the heat until it thickens, darkens to a deep, glowing garnet-red, and sets, on cooling, into a dense, glossy, sliceable paste that keeps for months without refrigeration. Sold in blocks, tins, and the traditional little wooden boxes (goiabada cascão being the rough, country style and goiabada cremosa the smooth), it is eaten in slices at the close of a meal, spread on bread and cheese, baked into tarts and pastries, and, above all, laid against a slice of fresh Minas cheese as the beloved Romeu e Julieta. For generations of Brazilians goiabada is the taste of childhood and of the interior, a way of catching the fleeting, perishable guava and keeping its sweetness through the year, and it remains one of the defining sweets of the Brazilian kitchen.

Ingredients

1.5 kg ripe guavas
250 ml water
600 g sugar (about equal to the weight of the purée), to taste
1 tbsp lemon juice

Method

Peel and chop the guavas, simmer them with the water until very soft, then blend and pass through a sieve to remove the hard seeds, leaving a smooth purée.
Weigh the purée and measure out roughly the same weight of sugar (a little less for a softer, less sweet paste).
Return the purée to a heavy, wide pan with the sugar and lemon juice. Cook over a medium heat, stirring very often, for about an hour to an hour and a half.
Continue until the paste is very thick, dark garnet-red, and glossy, and pulls away from the base of the pan in a mass when you draw the spoon through (a spoonful dropped on a cold plate should set firm).
Scrape into a lined tin or mould, smooth the top, and leave to cool and set firm, then cut into slices or squares.

Notes

Pink-fleshed guavas give the deepest red paste. The rough, firmer country style is goiabada cascão; a smoother, softer version is goiabada cremosa. Serve in slices with Minas or another mild fresh cheese (Romeu e Julieta), spread on bread, or baked into tarts and the pastry pastéis. The same method makes the Spanish-Caribbean pasta de guayaba.

The Gastrographer

Name: Goiabada
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 1 h 30 min
Total time: 2 h
Yield: 20
Cuisine: Brazil
Ingredients: 1.5 kg ripe guavas; 250 ml water; 600 g sugar (about equal to the weight of the purée), to taste; 1 tbsp lemon juice

Mapping Culinary History

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Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control