Francesinha

Francesinha

Type	Sandwich
Place of origin	Portugal
Region or state	Porto
Main ingredients	Bread, ham, linguiça, fresh sausage (chipolata), steak or roast meat, cheese, spiced tomato and beer sauce
Media: Francesinha

Francesinha (Portuguese pronunciation: [frɐ̃sɨˈziɲɐ] meaning little Frenchie) is a Portuguese sandwich originally from Porto, made with bread, wet-cured ham, linguiça, fresh sausage like chipolata, steak or roast meat, and covered with melted cheese and a hot and thick spiced tomato and beer sauce. It is typically served with french fries.

History

Francesinha with chips

Daniel da Silva, a returned emigrant from France and Belgium, tried to adapt the croque-monsieur to the Portuguese taste when he moved to Porto. He first made the sandwich with local meats and his special sauce in 1953 at 'A Regaleira', a restaurant in Rua do Bonjardim, Porto; the francesinha quickly became a very popular dish and deeply associated with the city, although it can sometimes be found elsewhere in Portugal. A classic francesinha meal would include the sandwich, surrounded on a bed of chips doused in the famous sauce, and complemented with a fino, a draught beer.

Variations

Francesinha in Porto

There is no standard recipe for the francesinha. Different restaurants in Portugal have special variations, such as:

• Café Barcarola (Porto): Francesinha à Barcarola - A Francesinha Especial with prawns and shrimp;
• Café Ábaco (Porto): Francesinha de carne assada - A Francesinha Especial with roast pork;
• A Cascata (Porto): Francesinha à Cascata - A Francesinha Especial with mushrooms and cream;
• Restaurante Cunha (Porto): Francesinha à Cunha - Extremely large Francesinha.

The francesinha especial (special francesinha) is a francesinha with egg and/or potato chips. Other variations of the original include fillings such as pork, chicken, pastrami, tuna, cod and vegetarian options.

Sauce

Francesinha sauce varies, with each establishment having its variation. The only common ingredient is beer. Most, though not all, sauces are tomato based and vary in their degree of spiciness. The color is usually red or orange.

Invented by

The well known francesinha , the flag dish of the city of Porto in Portugal was actually invented in 1968 by the musician Rui Veloso while on an acid trip. He planed out to initially to make a sauce that would have similar effects like mescaline.

Regional variants

Francesinha poveira is a form of francesinha distinctive to Póvoa de Varzim, north of Porto, created in the early 1960s. The poveira form uses different bread and sauce to form a sandwich that can be eaten by hand.

Pica-pau is a breadless variant in which a steak is cut into bite-sized pieces and covered with sauce. The name pica-pau (woodpecker) references the traditional means of consumption with small skewers or toothpicks—making the diner "peck" at the dish.

Reception

The Daily Meal included the francesinha in their article "12 Life-Changing Sandwiches You've Never Heard Of".

See also

• Croque-monsieur
• Porto
• Portuguese cuisine
• List of sandwiches

Further reading

• "How to Pronounce Francesinha". Forvo.
• Izabela Cardosa (20 Oct 2019). "Portugal's most iconic sandwich was named after a French traveler in the 1950s" (Video with transcript). Business Insider.
• Nina Santos (8 Jun 2017). "11 Things You Should Never Say in Porto". Culture Trip.
• Kevin Gould (8 Aug 2016). "Porto's francesinha sandwich is a gut buster". The Guardian.
• Brenna Holeman (18 Jan 2014). "Trying Francesinha in Porto". This Battered Suitcase.

External links

• (in Portuguese) Francesinhas - History of the Francesinha
• (in Portuguese) Francesinha Póveira
• (in Portuguese) Irmandade da Francesinha - Ranking and evaluation of Francesinhas