Cachupa is the Cape Verdian national dish and comes in a various guises and recipes, depending on your social standing. It’s related to the French cassoulet and the Brazilian feijoada and combines influences from many parts of the world. At its simplest, a cachupa is a humble bean stew. At its best, a cachupa rica contains multitudes of ingredients, carefully and slowly cooked. Based on the staple ingredient of corn (hominy), beans and cassava, this slow cooked stew. Each island or region will have its own variation where fisherman will include fish by example, middle and upper classes would include meat, while the poorest in society would include offal and vegetables. The dish is typically served for evening meal and reheated for breakfast, delicious hot or cold. The version cachupa rica has more ingredients its simpler sibling, cachupa pobre.
Cachupa Frita
Uneaten leftovers can be re-fried. Also known as cachupa guisada or cachupa refogada, meaning fried cachupa the resulting dish being called cachupa frita. It will be served for breakfast with a fried egg and other ingredients including, fried local sausage or fried fish.
See also Percebes and Cracus.
