Paçoca, Brazilian Peanut and Date Bites
Paçoca is the peanut sweet of Brazil's June festivals, a dense, sandy candy of ground peanuts, sugar, and cassava flour pressed into little bars that crumble the moment you bite them. The peanut is the whole point, and it needs no help, so this keeps the roasted-peanut flavor and the signature crumble while dropping the sugar. Dates supply the sweetness and, more importantly, the stickiness that binds the sandy meal, and rolled oats stand in for the cassava flour, soaking up peanut oil so the bites stay dry rather than greasy. It is calorie-dense, the way any peanut candy is, so it is built for a bite or two rather than a bowlful. Press the mixture hard, because compression, not any binder, is what lets paçoca hold its shape.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups Peanuts, raw, unsalted
- 1/2 cup Rolled oats
- 8 Medjool dates, pitted
- 1 pinch Ceylon cinnamon, optional
Method
- Toast the peanuts in a dry pan over medium heat, shaking often, until they smell nutty and turn a shade darker, about 5 minutes. If they still have skins, rub them off in a towel afterward. Toasting wakes up the peanut oil that binds the whole thing, so do not skip it.
- Set aside a small handful of peanuts, then grind the rest with the oats in a food processor to a coarse, sandy meal. Stop before it turns to butter: paçoca is meant to be dry and crumbly, and the oats keep it from going oily by soaking up some of that fat.
- Add the pitted dates and the cinnamon and process until the mixture darkens and just starts to clump when pressed between your fingers. The dates are the only sweetener, replacing the sugar a traditional paçoca is packed with, and their stickiness is what holds the crumbly meal together.
- Pulse in the reserved whole peanuts for a few seconds, so the bites keep some crunch. Then press the mixture very firmly into a small pan lined with paper, or pack it hard into a tablespoon and turn out little cakes. Pressing firmly is the whole trick, since paçoca holds its shape from compression, not from binding.
- Chill for 20 minutes to set, then cut into squares or pop out the rounds. They keep a week in a tin and are meant to be crumbly, so expect them to sand apart a little as you eat them, exactly like the original.
Nutrition
Estimated per serving: 165 calories, 6 g protein, 3 g fiber, 5 mg sodium. Computed from USDA FoodData Central reference values for the main ingredients. This is an approximation, not a laboratory measurement. How these are computed.
Cost per serving is estimated from US national-average retail prices for cheap staple forms, using BLS dried-bean prices and USDA produce prices. Prices vary by store and season, so treat it as a guide, not a receipt. How this is computed.
