Paper Short Abstract:

The so-called traditional and poor communities have always used their senses and memory to build games of flavors based on what, for some, is considered non-food. It is a cuisine “outside” the recipe books, with strong family, community and identity contours that, in recent years, has become a fashion phenomenon.

Paper Abstract:

The so-called traditional and poor communities have always used their senses and memory to build games of flavors based on what, for some, is considered non-food. In Portugal, until the 70s of the 20th century, there was a high rate of illiteracy, especially in the interior of the country and within women group, therefore, except among the elites, cuisine was essentially transmitted by memory. Training was used which, from an early age, gave, almost exclusively to girls and women, the skills to replicate family or local recipes.

In the case of Baixo Alentejo, where the majority of the population did not have agricultural land or vegetable gardens, it was a food generally poor in ingredients, based on bread and the collection of wild species, which used legumes and some horticultural species and which had a scarce amount of meat and fish.

It is a cuisine “outside” the recipe books, with strong family, community and identity contours that, in recent years, has become a fashion phenomenon. Its presence in cookery books is subsequent to the recipes made in the homes of the elite or wealthy, which used the finest parts of slaughtered animals and fish, in addition to a diverse range of vegetables, legumes, cheeses, fruits, sweets and game meats. .

Women's illiteracy allowed recipes to become more heterogeneous, with local variants of the same recipe and also the closure and crystallization of ways of preparing and making them.