Cozido à Portuguesa (Portuguese Boiled Dinner)
- Prep
- 20 min
- Total
- 1 h
- Servings
- 6
Cozido à portuguesa is the dish you make when the whole family is coming: several meats, smoked sausages and vegetables, all cooked in the same broth and served on a big platter in the middle of the table.
Like many traditional dishes, it started as a hearty meal for people who worked the land. It has relatives in the Spanish olla podrida and the French pot-au-feu, but the Portuguese version stands out for its sausages (farinheira, chouriço, morcela) and its pork cuts alongside the beef and chicken.
Recipe
Cozido à Portuguesa
The sharing dish of Portuguese cooking: beef, pork and chicken, smoked sausages and vegetables, cooked until tender. Hearty and comforting, for bringing the family together on a Sunday.
Ingredients
Method
- 1Wash the meats well and cook them in a pressure cooker for 25 minutes. Once cooked, set aside the meats and the broth.
- 2Wash the cabbage and the leek and cut them into pieces. Wash, peel and halve the potatoes, turnips, carrots and garlic, and put them in a large pot.
- 3Add the cooked meats. Pour in water to come halfway up, then fill the rest of the way with the broth from cooking the meats.
- 4Cover and cook for 15 minutes, or until the vegetables are tender.
- 5Take out the meats and cut them into pieces.
- 6Arrange the meats and vegetables on a large platter and serve.
- 7Serve it with white rice cooked in the rest of the meat broth.
Tips
Order matters. Beef takes much longer to cook than chicken or sausages, so if you cook them in an open pot rather than a pressure cooker, take each meat out as it’s done. The vegetables go in at the end, so they cook in the rich broth.
Adjust the meats to your household’s taste. Cabbage, carrot, turnip and potato are the vegetables you can’t leave out.
Put good extra virgin olive oil, mustard and piri-piri on the table, and let everyone help themselves.
Regional versions
Cozido changes from region to region. In the Azores, Cozido das Furnas cooks for hours in the volcanic heat of the ground and takes on a slightly smoky flavor. In the Minho and Trás-os-Montes it has plenty of homemade sausages and smoked meats, and in the Ribatejo chickpeas are often added.
Leftovers
Leftover cozido is almost as good as the first day. Shred the meats and fry everything in a pan with plenty of garlic and olive oil, a dish called roupa-velha (“old clothes”).
