Exploring food groups is a convenient way to help us learn European Portuguese food vocabulary in a more organized way.
Dairy Products
First let’s look at some laticíniosdairy products
- o leitemilk
- o iogurteyogurt
- o queijocheese
- a manteigabutter
- o geladoice cream
- a natacream
Leite, iogurte, and queijo are a part of many Portuguese people’s breakfasts and snacks. Queijo, in particular, is very important and there are several tasty varieties. As for leite, there are 3 main types:
- Leite magroSkimmed milk – Very low fat content
- Leite meio-gordoSemi-skimmed milk – Medium fat content
- Leite gordoWhole milk – High fat content
Fruits and Vegetables
Next we’ll explore frutosfruits and os legumesvegetables , or vegetaisvegetables .
Frutos is the proper, scientific term for plant structures that carry seeds, but you will probably hear frutafruit or frutasfruits more often in daily life. (Fruta is a collective noun, so either word can be used to refer to fruit as a category.) Frutos would, scientifically, include tomatoes, even though we often consider them to be vegetables. In Portugal, fruits can be added to salads or treated as sobremesasdesserts or snacks.
Comeste fruta hoje?Did you eat fruit today?
Os legumesVegetables are included in most meals, as part of saladassalads or as sopassoups . They include vegetables, cooked or raw, and also leafy greens, like as alfaceslettuces and as couvescabbages . Vegetaisvegetables is technically a broader term that might refer to plants in general, and for that reason, some people may not use it for vegetables. Other people might use legumes and vegetais interchangeably in the context of food, which is acceptable, as all legumes are indeed vegetais.
Let’s see some examples of fruits and vegetables:
- o morangostrawberry
- a laranjaorange
- o ananáspineapple
- a bananabanana
- a maçãapple
- o tomatetomato
- a alfacelettuce
- a cenouracarrot
- o pepinocucumber
- a cebolaonion
Beans
We use as leguminosasbeans, legumes to refer to all kinds of beans. (I guess because the word legumes was already taken for vegetables…) Beans are present in a wide variety of Portuguese dishes. Here are a few common examples:
- o grão de bicochickpea grãos de bicochickpeas
- o feijãobean feijõesbeans
- a ervilhapea ervilhaspeas
- o amendoimpeanut amendoinspeanuts
- a lentilhalentil lentilhaslentils
- a sojasoy
Meat
When it comes to a carnemeat , you can have:
- As carnes vermelhasRed meats which include a carne de porcopork and a carne de vacabeef
- A carne brancaWhite meat which includes a carne de avespoultry meat and fish.
Notice how carne de vacabeef translates to beef? In Portuguese, there isn’t a word for beef, so we use vacacow whether we’re talking about the cow or its meat. The same goes for o porcopork , o peruturkey , and o frangochicken . The same words are used to refer to both the meat and the animal.
Now, be careful because the Portuguese word o bifesteak looks and sounds very similar to beef, but it actually means “steak”. It is sometimes even used to refer to steaks made from the meat of other animals, as in “bife de porco”, not just the steaks made from cows.
Fish
Being a coastal nation, Portuguese cuisine is spectacularly rich in o peixefish and o mariscoseafood
We don’t think of fish as having meat. We only use a carnemeat and os ossosbones when we refer to land animals. Instead, we call the meat of a fish o peixefish , like the animal, and we call its bones as espinhasbones, spines
O bacalhauCod is the most popular fish in Portugal and can be found in hundreds of different dishes. Below you can find some of the most common species of fish and seafood present in our cuisine:
- o bacalhaucod
- a sardinhasardine
- o atumtuna
- o salmãosalmon
- o carapaumackerel
- o polvooctopus
- o camarãoshrimp, prawn
- o mexilhãomussel
- a amêijoaclam
- a lagostalobster
Grains
Now let’s see a list of different cereaiscereals, grains
- o trigowheat
- o milhocorn
- a aveiaoat
- a cevadabarley
- o arrozrice
Os cereais are very much present in our daily lives. They are the basis for our everyday breakfast cereals, especially for kids. They are used to make farinhaflour , which is then used to make massapasta , or the very traditional broa de milhocorn bread , for example.
They’re also part of our second most favorite drink, as cevada is the main ingredient in cervejabeer
Great idea! I added them. Note that the plural exists for all these words, but it’s not commonly used in some cases. For example, we’d say “grãos de arroz” (rice grains) instead of “arrozes”, or “sementes de soja” (soy seeds) instead of “sojas”.
I agree. There are many words that are difficult pronunciations but are not spoken.
I’ll send you a message via our support email to troubleshoot this with you 🙂
Obrigado!
Bife can be a beef steak- bife de vaca. A pork steak – bife de porco. Even a fish steak – bife de atum ( tuna ).
Eu achava que “abacaxi” é palavra correta pra dizer “pineapple”. Todos pessoas em Portugal usam “ananás” pra dizer “pineapple”?
No dia a dia, “abacaxi” usa-se mais no Brasil. Em Portugal, normalmente usamos “ananás”, mas entendemos as duas palavras 🙂 São duas palavras para a mesma fruta, ou, para algumas pessoas, para variedades diferentes da mesma fruta.
Muito obrigado, Joseph! 🙂
Eu acho que eu començo a compreender português mais claro!…??
Obrigada, Jenny
Can yo please explain the difference between “frango” and “galinha”?
I know there are Galinha restaurants, but do I ask for Frango if I want to eat chicken?
“Frango” is what we call a young “galinha” (or “galo”). Many people will say “frango” and “galinha” interchangeably, but these are different things – or rather, the same animal at different ages. Both types of meat can be found, but “frango” is the most common.
Obrigado, I learned so much so far
Hello. What is the difference between Grão and Feijão. They both seem to refer to beans. Thank you.
Hi, Scott. “Grão” is a general term for “grains” (apart from “grão-de-bico”, which is chickpea). “Feijão” is the proper word for beans.
Wow this is helpful. That has been one of my challenges here is grocery shopping. I usually have to open my translate app and use the camera to translate what is on the label.
So glad we could help! We also have a unit on going to the supermarket here: Supermarket 🙂
What translate app do you use that can do that? I was unaware of that function.
Google Translate does this
Hi Whit, I hope by now you’ve gotten an answer, but just in case, I think most people use the Google Translate app. One of the features is that you can aim your camera at words, and the translation appears on screen. It’s wonderful!
I am really enjoying your course which is practical and easy to follow. Thank you!
Just for the record. In the UK we usualy say “We drink (bebemos) the soup.
Your educational post about Portuguese food vocabulary might help people like us who are planning to visit Portugal for the first time. We already applied for a Portugal Visa UK and are hoping to get it soon. I & my wife will be celebrating our first anniversary and I want us to spend this special occasion with each other on a romantic getaway to Portugal. We will also try out a lot of new dishes for the very first time so we are pretty excited about it.
Does the word for turkey – o peru have an accent on the U? Based on the pronunciation, it seems like it should (but it doesn’t in the text above).
Olá, Derek. Peru should be written without accent. Words ending in U with the stress on the last syllable typically don’t require accents on that U. Some examples include peru, menu or canguru. An exception to that rule is when U is preceded by another vowel that doesn’t form a diphthong with it, e.g. baú.
Muito obrigado, Joseph. Faz sentido! You are a rockstar on these forums – thanks for always helping us out!
Oh, obrigado eu, Derek!
E as ostras?! (oysters)
Portuguese oysters are quite famous in France. So much so that, to mean that sb is hard of hearing, we sometimes say “Il / elle a les portugaises ensablées” — i.e. the portuguese oysters (ears) full of sand.
Agreed, the expression is a bit dated, but so am I…
Muito obrigado pelo seu trabalho! 😉
I think this lesson would benefit from being broken up, it’s very long and I don’t think I’ll retain much of it.
Hi there. Why is it ‘frutas’ but ‘os legumes’ and ‘saladas’ but ‘as sopas’? When should we use the article and when not?
Sorry for the confusion here! Sometimes it’s just because of how it appears in the sentence. When we mix English and Portuguese together in the same sentence, it’s a little less clear when to include the definite article. 🙂 For example, when we say “let’s look at some laticínios“, we wouldn’t include the definite article because we already said “some” in English before it.
Other times, it’s just because of the recordings we had available in the database at the time. Some words were recorded with the definite article and others without. We’ve recently been working on including the definite articles more consistently for vocabulary words (since this is common in Portuguese and it’s helpful to learn them this way, knowing the gender), but it will take some time to get that fully consistent across the site.
In general, you use definite articles when you are referring to a specific instance of something, sort of like: I eat the fruit (the specific fruit that was referenced earlier) vs. I eat fruit (in general). There are times when the usage differs from how definite articles are used in English, though. Just to mention a few examples: it’s common to use a definite article before a person’s name (O Rui quer café? – Do you (Rui) want coffee?), with possessives (o teu livro – your book), before certain countries (a Alemanha – Germany), etc.
Thanks Molly (the only…). I understand your very full reply. Regards.
I know this word wasn’t on this lesson, but is “cardápio” the European Portuguese word for “menu”, or is it just the Brazilian Portuguese word for “menu”?
In European Portuguese we only use Ementa or Menu! Cardápio is only used in Brazilian Portuguese.
Qual é a diferença entre broa e pão? Pode-se dizer ‘broa de trigo? ” Ou não? Muito obrigada!
Olá! “Broa” e “pão” não são sinónimos – “broa” é o nome de um tipo específico de pão, que em Portugal normalmente é feito com farinha de milho e é grande, arredondado e denso, com uma côdea rija. Pode-se dizer “broa de trigo” se a broa for feita com farinha de trigo… mas essa não é a receita tradicional em Portugal 🙂
It’s funny that turkey is called Peru, while it’s Turkey in English and Dinde (literally « from India ») in French.
Where the **** these animals come from ? 😅
I like these topics very much. I would like to see such topics daily, this post is very good indeed. There are people like you in the world who put forth their views. Thank you so much for posting such a great post.
We have been studying that “pao” is bread but here Broa is used – any particular reason for that?
Olá! Yes, “pão” is the general word for bread. “Broa” is just the name of one specific, traditional Portuguese bread, made with corn flour (hence the name “broa de milho”).
In a previous portuguese class, I learnt that pineapple translates as ‘abacaxi’, but here it is translated as ‘ananás’. On the internet I find various and incongruent explanations about it being two different kinds of fruit or one being more used in Brazil. So I was wondering what is the difference between the two?
The terms “abacaxi” and “ananás” do indeed refer to the same fruit, commonly known as pineapple in English. This confusion is also very common among the Portuguese population! The truth is that the difference lies mainly in the place of production and regional usage.
In Brazil, “abacaxi” is the term commonly used, while “ananás” is more often used in Portugal. While there are botanical distinctions between different species of pineapples, in everyday language, the two terms are used to refer to the fruit you’re familiar with.
The confusion arises because there are many varieties of pineapples, and “abacaxi” and “ananás” can sometimes be used to distinguish between them.
“Ananás” come from southern Brazil and Paraguay, is typically grown in greenhouses and are only harvested when they are ripe. In Portugal, the Azores are its main producing region, hence the most common term used among the population.
“Abacaxi” can be sweeter and is usually grown outdoors and is the more commonly found variety in Brazilian markets.
However, for all practical purposes, when learning Portuguese or shopping for groceries, you can consider “abacaxi” and “ananás” as synonyms for pineapple. 🙂
Good morning.
I recently saw a video where someone cooked Salgado. But, there is a word of the recipe that haven’t been able to find the meaning. Perhaps, you can help me understand it.
The word is cara (500g de cara)
I add the link of the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMzhZu4hlzY&ab_channel=Receitasf%C3%A1ceisAprendaefa%C3%A7a
Thank you.
Olá 🙂 Not sure – could be ‘cará’, a type of yam. Best to confirm with the video author, if you can.