We all know Americans are crazy about pizza. Well, ok: who doesn’t like pizza, right? Pizza is Pizza! Enough said. But why is that Brazilians are the ones that came up with the best all you can eat pizza concept and not the Americans? As much as I love american pizza, I got say that the Brazilians might just have perfected the way of serving it in an all you can eat rodízio concept.
Among many differences between US pizza and BR pizza, definitely the all you can eat in the Brazilian style is the biggest one out of them. I hope you are not comparing it to a Cici’s pizza buffet style… No, no. It is a Brazilian “rodízio” of pizza! Two completely different things.
Don’t worry, if you are not familiar with the term “rodízio“, I will explain the main difference in the indulgence sin of this dish in Brazil vs USA….
Rodízio = imagine you seating in a chair for the whole time (no more getting up for the next round or having to get new plates & refills). No! Your butt won’t leave your seat the entire dine-in experience… the pizza will come to YOU!
The all you can eat brazilian rodízio concept is: super hot & fresh, just out of the oven pizzas coming to your table, rotating from 50+ different flavors (which you probably never heard of it).
Does it sounds like the pizza heaven right? It is… it’s the pizza heaven brazilian rodízio style. If you need a new plate (most likely you will) don’t worry, they will also bring it to you. Your waiter will leave an extra plate in the middle of the table just in case he is not fast enough to get you a new one if you end up with 8 slices stacked all at once. Although the extra plate is usually for the leftovers (in case you don’t like a specific flavor and want to pass on that one instead of stacking many slices on your main plate).
It’s litery a pizza madness… they keep coming one after the other, non-stopping, all interesting different flavors, freshly out of the oven. The servers come from the left, right and even behind you…
It gets you literally overwhelmed and it is easy to stack 5 slices on your plate all at once. That’s when you know you need a break: time to start trying to eat them first instead of collecting more crazy flavors.
The brazilian pizza rodízio concept is just like the brazilian steakhouses, but instead of meat, it’s pizza (and more flavors varieties that you could ever imagine). The term rodízio is what we call when the food just keep coming to your table, non-stopping, rotating with different types and flavors. But that is not all. The brazilian all you can eat rodízio style also comes with a salad and in this particular one in my college town – also a sushi buffet (not sure who came up with the idea of sushi and pizza, however, I save my appetite for the melted cheese indulgence).
Along with the pizza rodízio and the salad bar; you also get a rotation of freshly made pastas, gnocchi, meat dishes, french fries and fried polenta. Did you already start to get overwhelmed? It’s a lot of food. I need to say that the fried polenta topped with parmesan cheese is so addictive and a MUST have (almost better than French fries).
Watch the video…
A part from the way the pizza is served in a rodízio setting, the second biggest difference between brazilian pizza and american pizza is the crazy flavors Brazilians come up with.
We love to add weird things on our pizza, just like: corn. Yes… we also have a straight up “corn pizza” (cheese & corn = it is a top seller flavor in Brazil). Go figured.
Since I started going down the road of the unusual brazilian flavor, there are a lot more to come. Be ready for this: one of the most popular flavors of pizza in the south of brazil (my state, called Rio Grande do Sul) is…….. Chicken hearts! Right! I could guess an expression of discuss in the face of an american person right on this moment. Well, as a Brazilian I got reveal that it was never my favorite flavor. Although, since I can’t find it anywhere in the USA, I kind of find a delicatessen now and I somewhat crave it every time I go back to Brazil (I forgot to take a picture of the chicken hearts pizza).
Now, have you ever heard of a Strognoff pizza?
Yes, beef Strognoff – the Russian dish with sautéed pieces of beef served in a heavy creamy sauce. This pizza flavor comes tight in the score of the most popular pizza flavors in the south of Brazil. It is actually very yummy topping in the pizza but it does make it so sloppy! Remember that the gauchos (”the Brazilian cowboys”) are from the south of Brazil, so anything with meat or steak will be a prefered flavor for us.
I like the chicken strogonoff pizza with cheese and crispy potato sticks (stroganoff de frango com batata palha) 
Gaúcha Calzone pizza (cheese, steak stroganoff with onions, peppers, tomatoes, between a double layer of dough)
Here is another one: canned tuna pizza! Hahaha… Yes… we have it. Some people are crazy about it. I guess it reminds of the anchovies flavor a bit from the traditional italian pizza. Also shrimp (shrimp and tomato sauce) and bacalhau (dried fish) are very popular pizza flavors in the northern coastal parts of Brazil. Personally, it is not my cup of tea. Seafood on pizza is not me. One flavor we Brazilians still haven’t came up with yet is: rice & black beans. Lol It could be that I might just not be up to date in the trends.
It wouldn’t be fair to be talking about all of these crazy flavors of pizza and not mention about the brazilian pizza special ingredient (it will rock your world once you try it): the Catupiry cheese! You will label pizza as “before” and “after catupiry”. But by now you probably haven’t heard of it. Catupiry is a brazilian soft processed cheese made from cow’s milk mixed with sour cream, salt, and cheese cultures. It is one of a kind, type of cheese! In Miami I was able to find some pizza flavors with this cheese (off course it was called the “brazilian pizza” – with corn and Catupiry cheese)
That is not all. Once you are done with the salty crazy brazilian flavors of pizza…then it starts a whole new sweet round: the deserts pizza flavors.
I usually give myself a 10 minutes break in between or just until they are able to bring me a new clean plate and i already can’t resist the first sweet pizza flavor passing by. The smell of the melted chocolate on top of a hot gooey dough is unresistable. My sweet tooth won’t let me lie and the dessert pizzas are probably my favorite ones. But the sad part is… you can’t get it here in the USA! Why is that? Americans love sugar and pizza… why not putting the two together?
Dessert pizza – melted white chocolate with strawberries 
A close up of the white chocolate & strawberries 
Pizza bombom – waffer crispy chocolate chopped on top of melted white chocolate & Bella Trento 
Ice cream pizza 
White chocolate with Papaya & Cassis liquor 
White chocolate calzone pizza
Imagine: melted chocolate, sliced strawberries, crunched peanuts and whipped cream? Or what about a vanilla cream ice cream pizza with melted chocolate on top? Yeahh,,, it can get even better than that. But then will depend on your taste, I guess. Here is a few of the traditional famous dessert pizza flavors for you to have an idea:
- Banana with cinnamon – condensed milk, banana slices and cinnamon powder
- Brigadeiro – condensed milk mixed with chocolate powder and strawberry slices
- Romeo & Juliet – guava marmalade and mozzarella cheese
Funny fact in regards to brazilian sweet pizza flavors: when i was in Italy, a Neapolitan taxi driver asked me if Brazilians were crazy?
I kindly asked the reason of he question, I didn’t get it. He then said: “You guys put pineapple and banana in the pizza!!!! Why??!! He looked like mad person at me… But to make the story funnier, that flavor that he had mentioned Brazilians call it the “California pizza” (just like we are trying to come up with an American pizza flavor for our brazilian pizza creativity madness hahaha).
Perhaps because people in California are healthier and eat more fruits, even on top of their pizza? No idea lol. I would have to ask a Brazilian pizza historian/connoisseur for that answer.
After all of these crazy flavors we must agree that brazilian pizza tends to be a lot less “conservative”, I would say it leans on the alternative flavors side.
Another peculiarity which Brazilians do while eating pizza that is different than Americans is: Eat pizza with condiments: ketchup, mustard and mayonnaise. I know, I know, I know, it might also sounds weird for some people but we Brazilians can’t have our pizza without it. Me in particular, I grow up eating bread and Maria cookies with mayo (not bread and butter, bread and mayo). So for me, mayo in the pizza is just an addition of haveaness by adding some extra salty fat into my gooey dough and melted cheese paradise.
Lastly, unlike Americans, Brazilians prefer to eat their pizza with a fork and knife. I just now, after years living in the USA, finally understand the feeling of getting back to the primal mode of eating pizza with my hands, getting all messy and greased up. It kind of adds some flavor to the whole experience. However, I leave that custom to do it only when in the USA. I eat pizza in the “civilized way” when in Brazil. 😉
Besides the differences, I’m sure that Americans and Brazilians have the same customs once they are surfeited with so much pizza! A good soft drink and a tums! That is for sure a must have recipe every time i indulge in the best rodízio of pizza in my college town in Brazil – Bella Trento (I will add the pizzeria details in the end of the post). Sometimes, the hardest is the walk to the car (it is more like stumbling) since I still have 1 hour car drive to my hometown and get some digestion time before I crash with a pizza coma.
Address: Av. João Luiz Pozzobom, 1599 – Km Três, Santa Maria – RS, 97095-465, Brazil
I keep this type of Pry vs Pizza challenge to only once a year, usually for my birthday or special celebration, where i will have all of my pizza cravings for the year and probably feel so sick after that i won’t want to see pizza for a while lol. I surely have pizza calories for an entire week worth of food after that. But it is well worth it and I do recommend it for every American to try.
You haven’t lived till you try a brazilian rodízio style pizzeria and eat a dessert pizza!
Note: nobody has beaten my record of eating 27 slices of pizza yet. Who is up for the challenge? 😉
Please leave in the comments below if you know a place that serves all you can eat brazilian pizza rodízio style in the USA and any other differences between Brazilian vs American pizza or even crazy flavors that I might have forgotten to mention.
Bella Trento (the Best rodízio of pizza in Santa Maria)
Address: Avenida João Luiz Pozzobon, Santa Maria, Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil. Zip Code: 97095-465
