Fogueira brings Portuguese, Brazilian fare to East Longmeadow

Jan. 20, 2017 | Chris Goudreau
cgoudreau@thereminder.com

Fogueira is a Brazilian Portuguese Steakhouse that specializes in traditional fare from Portugal and Brazil.
Reminder Publications photo by Chris Goudreau

EAST LONGMEADOW – The first Brazilian Portuguese steakhouse in East Longmeadow, “Fogueira,” recently opened its doors at 621 N. Main St. The restaurant specializes in traditional dishes from Portugal and Brazil, including buffet style rodízio.

Jackie Rosa, who is the co-owner of the business alongside her father Manuel “Manny” Coelho, who owned the business for 27 years when it operated as Club Meadows, told Reminder Publications she believes Fogueria’s food sets the restaurant apart from others in the area.

“We have full rodízio, which you don’t have any restaurants at all in this area that offer rodízio,” she noted. “And then we have our traditional Portuguese plates on the menu that, again, you don’t see that type of a food.”

She explained the restaurant has waiters that provide customers with meats on skewers.

“They cut the meat right at the tables, so the meats are hand cut and carved right at the table side,” Rosa added. “[It’s] all-you-can-eat and we have an all-you-can-eat buffet, which has a hot and cold. Cold is more like salads and stuff like that and the hot – we have some traditional Brazilian dishes on there to accompany the meats being served tableside.”

Rosa said her family, whose heritage is Portuguese, decided to make the change from Club Meadows to Fogueira because they wanted to bring a unique food offering to the area.

“There’s a lot of Italian restaurants in this area,” she explained. “There’s burger places … We wanted to bring a piece of our tradition to this area. We wanted to implement the Brazilian, which brings the rodízio element into play.”

Some of the traditional Portuguese dishes featured on the menu include bacalhau – a grilled codfish meal served with green peppers and onions with olive oil and garlic, as well as a grilled octopus dish. Some dishes are served with “smashed potatoes,” oven roasted potatoes smashed with sea salt.

Every morning fresh cut fries are made in the shape of silver dollars, a Portuguese style, Rosa said.

“We have something that’s very popular on the menu,” Rosa noted. “It’s called beef a casa, which is a sirloin and it’s served with those hand cut Portuguese fries and rice and there’s sauce over the whole thing. It comes with a piece of prosciutto, which is Portuguese ham, and an egg on top. That’s one of our traditional dishes as well.”

A longtime fixture of Club Meadows was live music, whether it was shows with full bands or the venue’s weekly open mic night. Rosa said she hopes to continue to provide musical entertainment for Fogueira’s customers.

“We opened up not too long ago and we’re starting to add in the entertainment,” she explained. “We really want people to have that experience where they have a nice meal and they get to stay and relax and listen to some good music. We want to bring in some acoustic [acts and] maybe some smaller bands; maybe put on a couple traditional shows that we’re looking into – different types of Brazilian, Portuguese, and American music.”

The open mic night, which was hosted by resident Vicky Bordoni for several years, has ended for now at Fogueira, but Rosa said they are thinking about bringing an open mic night back.

In the meantime, Bordoni has started an open mic night at New O’Brien’s Corner in Springfield at 1082 Page Blvd., which is slated to begin on Jan. 18 and take place every Wednesday.

Rosa said small surface and stylistic renovations to the interior and exterior of the building took a year to complete and the businesses remained open during that time.

A grand opening event for Fogueira has yet to take place and an official date has yet to be scheduled.

Fogueira is open every day except for Tuesday and its kitchen hours are 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. on weekdays and 11:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. on weekends. The full liquor bar is open until 2 a.m. during weekdays and weekends.

For more information about Fogueira visit www.facebook.com/PortugueseBrazilianSteakhouse.

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