By Chesney Hearst, Senior Contributing Reporter
RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – With Easter a little under two weeks away (April 20th), displays of large chocolate Easter eggs fill the stores of Rio and Easter sweets line the shelves of cafés. For the season, one local artisanal confectionery, Fazendo Doce, has launched a new line of six chocolate Easter eggs and will open a new café, Café da Fábrica, on April 12th in Santo Cristo, Centro.
The new line of chocolate eggs come in six varieties with the specially chosen fillings of: milk and dark chocolate brownie, blondie stuffed with hazelnuts, dark chocolate ganache, truffles with bits of almonds, and creamy Belgian chocolate brigadeiro.
“The brownie has always been our flagship since the time we made sweets at home,” Fazendo Doce’s founder Marcella Morizot told The Rio Times. “The choice of this stuffing seemed natural to us. However, we also get tired of repeating, so we chose the other flavors with the thinking, ‘These are the eggs we’d like to eat!'”
Run by chefs Marcella Morizot and Anna Paula Bokel, Fazendo Doce (Making Sweet) prides itself on only using natural ingredients that are a hundred percent free of preservatives in all of their creations.
“I’m 33 years old, I am from a generation raised with a lot of industrial products,” Fazendo Doce’s founder Marcella Morizot told The Rio Times. “At the same time, my grandfather lives on a farm and always had direct access to cow’s milk, fruits and vegetables freshly picked, leaving eggs still warm from the hen-house.”
“It always amazed me eating things that I did not understand what they were with the product ingredient lists that had more than five lines. […] Today I see that it’s a trend, people are tired of chemical and pesticides, they care about what goes in your body. Fazendo Doce wants to serve this group of people, which we hope are growing.”
Fazendo Doce was born in Morizot’s home kitchen in 2006. After working for a time as a filmmaker, Morizot went in search of a fixed income. “I invested in some kitchen equipment with the intention of making quality pastries for restaurants,” Morizot explained. “My mother raised me to help her make sweets like she had learned from her mother.”
“By 2009, I already had a good production output and thought is was time to open a kitchen with industrial collaborators to be able to expand,” Morziot continued, adding “It was from there that I could enter the Zona Sul (South Zone) marketplaces.”
Chef Anna Paula Bokel then joined the company in 2011, bringing new styles to Fazendo Doce. Bokel had worked previously at well known Rio restaurants including Roberta Sudbrack and Miam Miam.
Fazendo Doce is now based out of the Fábrica Bhering, the former corporate headquarters of sweets and chocolates and current home to dozens of workshops and studios in Rio’s neighborhood of Santo Cristo, in the Port Zone of Centro.
It is there that they will open the new café, Café da Fábrica, on April 12th. Launching in partnership with graphic artist Carina Bokel Becker and through the help of architect Hélio Pelegrino, the café will offer menu selections including: pastries, cakes, and quiches; salads and side dishes for lunch; cheese bread, yogurt with fruit, sandwiches and ice cream.
Currently orders can also be made directly to Fazendo Doce from throughout the city of Rio on Tuesdays through Fridays. Delivery charge is R$10 with free delivery for orders over R$100. The new chocolate Easter eggs weigh 500 grams and are R$42 each. A complete menu of offerings and more information is also available on Fazendo Doce’s website here.
What: Fazendo Doce Café da Fábrica
When: Opening April 12th, service Monday through Friday, 11AM to 5PM
Where: Rua Orestes, 28 – Antiga Fábrica Bhering, Santo Cristo, Centro, RJ
Telephone: +55 (21) 4141-7859