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Vatapá
Bahia's rich, golden paste of bread, coconut milk, dendê oil, dried shrimp, and groundnuts — used as a stuffing in acarajé or served alongside rice.
⏱ 50 min🔥 310 kcalMedium
★4.6(234)
5 recipes using shrimp — Feijoada, churrasco, brigadeiros — bold, tropical and communal.
These 5 brazilian shrimp recipes are ready in about 65 minutes on average, with 310–580 kcal per serving, and 20% are rated easy enough for a weeknight. Every recipe includes exact ingredient quantities, step-by-step instructions and full nutrition per serving.
Brazilian food is bold and communal, from smoky churrasco to coconut-rich seafood moquecas and the slow-cooked comfort of feijoada. When Brazilian cooks work with shrimp, they reach for garlic, lime, coriander, dendê (palm) oil, coconut and malagueta chilli, and the techniques that come up most across these recipes are simmering, marinating, steaming and boiling.
Sweet, quick-cooking shellfish that go from raw to ready in two or three minutes — perfect for fast, high-heat dishes. In this collection it's most often cooked with coconut milk, roasted peanuts, garlic, fresh lime juice, full-fat coconut milk and fresh cilantro chopped. The dishes here span brazilian classics ready in as little as 50 minutes to slower, more involved cooking that rewards a relaxed afternoon.
Reader favourite: Moqueca Baiana (Bahian Coconut Fish Stew) is the highest-rated dish in this collection at 4.9★ from 950 ratings.
Bahia's rich, golden paste of bread, coconut milk, dendê oil, dried shrimp, and groundnuts — used as a stuffing in acarajé or served alongside rice.
The shining centerpiece of Afro-Brazilian Bahia cooking — firm white fish and shrimp simmered in coconut milk, palm oil, tomato and pepper, finished with cilantro and lime over white rice.
Bahian creamy shrimp stew with peanuts, coconut milk, and dendê oil — Afro-Brazilian masterpiece.
Rich Bahian fish stew with coconut milk, dendê oil, peppers and lime — a treasure of Afro-Brazilian cuisine.
Crispy black-eyed pea fritters from Bahia, split and filled with shrimp vatapá and caruru.
Look for firm, translucent flesh with a clean sea smell — never ammonia. Shell-on shrimp keep more flavour; larger counts (fewer per kilo) mean bigger shrimp.
Peel and devein, leaving the tail on for presentation if you like. A quick brine firms the texture; pat dry before searing so they brown rather than steam.
Cook just until they curl into a loose C and turn opaque pink — a tight O means they're overdone and rubbery.
Very lean and high in protein, with selenium, vitamin B12 and iodine for few calories.
Most of these 5 Brazilian shrimp recipes are ready in around 65 minutes from start to finish. The quickest, Vatapá, takes about 50 minutes, while the slower-cooked dishes run up to 90 minutes.
Across this collection they range from about 310 to 580 kcal per serving, averaging 420 kcal — Vatapá is the lightest option at 310 kcal.
Moqueca Baiana (Bahian Coconut Fish Stew) is a great place to start — it's rated easy and comes together in about 50 minutes. 20% of the recipes here are beginner-friendly.
In these recipes, shrimp is most often paired with coconut milk, roasted peanuts, garlic, fresh lime juice, full-fat coconut milk and fresh cilantro chopped. Brazilian kitchens also lean on garlic, lime, coriander, dendê (palm) oil, coconut and malagueta chilli.
Cook just until they curl into a loose C and turn opaque pink — a tight O means they're overdone and rubbery.