Maculelê Maracatú

History and sentiment behind song

Maracatú is a Brazilian dance of African origin. In Pernambuco (Recife) it means a group of street dancing merrymakers at Carnival time.

Carurú refers to a vegetable and shrimp patty especially common in Bahia.

Angu is a northeastern Brazilian dish that harks back to the days of slavery. Prints by the French explorer and travel writer, Jean Baptiste Debret, show Brazilian women cooking large pots of angu over wood fires. Similar to the coocoos of the West Indies and the cornmeal mush of the southern United States, this corn angu is prepared simply from cornmeal and water, with the addition of a bit of butter or animal fat.