Mandacaru is a little bit of a different business model to the usual restaurants I visit. Chef and owner, Carla, is making delicious Brazilian dishes from a commercial kitchen just a little bit bigger than a shipping container out the back of an industrial-feeling complex in Port Melbourne. She feeds people through Menulog, Deliveroo, festivals and larger catering events. Carla’s eyes dance when she talks about food and cooking up dishes from her homeland. The Brazilian community is certainly happy she is doing what she is doing and once you try some of her food, I’m fairly certain you’ll want to be part of her community too.
How long have you been running Mandacaru?
Three months. It’s very new. It’s like a first step. Before that I went to Brazil for a month for my mum’s birthday and it was good because I was opening here so I needed to re-charge and I did some research for the business.
Who do you cater to?
Mostly Brazilians, but because we are on Menulog and Deliveroo and we have our website, Australians are getting to know about us as well. The business is divided into three; we have catering for birthdays and gatherings, we have the delivery meals and people coming to pick up meals Monday to Saturday and we also go to Brazilian events. Last Sunday we were at the Brazilian Day in the city and next month we will be at the Queen Victoria Market.
Do you have a food van?
No. We prep here, then go to the place. Queen Victoria Market has a tent, the Brazilian one in the city had a kitchen, and before that we did something at the Collingwood Townhall, so there was a kitchen there too.
It’s quite varied work then. What were you doing before you were here?
I will have been here seven years in December. I studied Gastronomy in Brazil and then I met my husband and decided to come here. I studied Business Management and did patisserie on that course. It was something I was interested in. Since then I was just working and studying.
Did you work in some restaurants here?
Yes. I worked in some pubs in the city and some kitchens in hotels in the city too. I was mostly in the CBD because there are a lot of restaurants and cafes there.
And did you always have a plan to have your own place and your own food?
Yes. I have always wanted to do my own thing. It can be very stressful in the big kitchens.
Do you want to have a restaurant at some stage though?
Yes, long term, that is the plan.
I didn’t even know all this was in here.
Yes, I guess it’s like a new concept where big delivery companies have created their own kitchens in warehouses and people order through their kitchens. There are a few of those. The owner of this warehouse has this one, one in North Melbourne and one in Footscray. There’s a warehouse divided into different kitchens. Our neighbours are the people from Cupcake Central. They make their cupcakes here and then take them to their stores to sell. Any of these small cafés you see that don’t have space for cooking or something like this where we make the food and sell it through delivery companies.
I was going to say it’s quite a small space, but it’s actually a good space, probably bigger than some restaurant kitchens in a way.
It is. I think my last job was almost the same size.
Is it just you doing the cooking?
Yes, it is pretty much me the whole way. My husband is a teachers so he comes after school and he helps me manage all the money and I do the marketing and finding the places to cater and the contact with people.
Tell me about the food. What do you cook?
It’s basically Brazilian food. Not many people know what Brazilian food is. The few that say they know think it’s just steak, barbecue. We are famous for barbecue. But I wanted to show a bit more the specialities from my city. We are on the coast, so in the north of Brazil. We have beautiful seafood and lots of stew. I do have two dishes with beef. I also have sweets; our carrot cake is different from here. Our carrot cake is just carrot. Here people put in pineapple and nuts, which is delicious as well, but ours is just carrot.
Do you still have cream cheese icing?
No, we do Brigadeiro, which is condensed milk and chocolate. We often make that into a chocolate truffle, but if you want it as a sauce, you can make it more liquid and pour it over the cake. We pretty much have it every weekend for breakfast. We love our sweets for breakfast.
Is Brazilian food spicy?
Not really. It depends on the region. In my region, we do like it spicy. We like condiments like a lot of paprika and cumin, a lot of salt, black and white pepper.
Mandacaru is named after a special type of cactus that is found in the northeast of Brazil, the same region I’m from. It can survive the driest weather conditions in Brazil and still manages to flower. It reminds me of my journey to Australia; leaving behind my family, trying to adapt to a new country when I couldn’t even speak a word of English, and now the challenge of starting a business here.
How many different dishes do you have for people to choose from?
We just updated the menu because the first month I was trying to understand what the people like. It’s hard to please everyone. At the moment we have entrée, main meal and dessert. For the entrée we have two options, and one of the options you can choose with or without prawn. For the main we have five options; two vegan, because it’s incredible how many vegans we have nowadays. Especially in the Brazilian communities. Five or ten years ago, if someone told you they were vegetarian, you would be really surprised. In Brazil it was very difficult to be vegetarian. And we also have two desserts. It was actually very busy today and I wondered how I would cope on my own but the experience in the other kitchens has helped in this context. And I create the dishes so it is easier to manage.
Did you always want to be a chef?
Not really. I didn’t know when I was 19 and finished high school, because we finish a bit later in Brazil, I didn’t know you could do a course for cooking. I was studying in a public school and the university came and offered us tests to see whether we wanted to go to university after, so I thought I could do it. I just wanted to spend a year and figure out what I wanted to do. My family all said I had to be a doctor or a lawyer, but I didn’t think so. I did these tests and I remember seeing gastronomy and asking my friend what it was. She told me it was learning to cook and I thought, yeah, I like cooking. I always cooked with my mum and watched all the cooking shows and looked at recipes, so I thought I would try that.
I did the test and passed and it was really nice, but at the same time not because my family said, no, we don’t want you to do that…why do you need to go to university to learn how to cook? You know how to cook. Go find something else, that won’t get you money. But I did the course and finished, I met my husband and came here. Here, hospitality is so different. Coming from my city in 2010 and I had been the second year of the gastronomy course in my state and coming here and it’s so huge. Then I did my training here and it was more real here.
I learned French, Italian and English cuisine, but I missed my own cuisine. At home I cooked the food I was used to. My husband loves Brazilian food, thank god! So I cooked for us and at least once a month, I would invite my friends and cook Brazilian food. I felt like I needed to do something of my own.
Are you happy when you’re cooking? Is it something that gives you pleasure and you feel like you’ve made the right choice?
Yes, definitely.
Has your family accepted it now?
They don’t talk about it as much. It was a big thing me coming here, leaving the family and so on. The Brazilian family is a bit like the Italian family and it’s like, we are all together and if you get married, the guy comes to your family. You never leave.
Had you done very much traveling before you came here?
Not at all. I had been to two other cities in my state and to another state, but not overseas. But now I have been in two countries.
Tell me about the meaning behind the name.
Mandacaru is named after a special type of cactus that is found in the northeast of Brazil, the same region I’m from. It can survive the driest weather conditions in Brazil and still manages to flower. It reminds me of my journey to Australia; leaving behind my family, trying to adapt to a new country when I couldn’t even speak a word of English, and now the challenge of starting a business here.
4/578 Plummer Street, Port Melbourne