🇧🇷 Brazil · Pantanal (Mato Grosso, Mato Grosso do Sul)
Caldo de piranhaBrazilian piranha soup
A Pantanal broth of piranha cooked down (often in a pressure cooker, then blended or picked to remove the bones) with onion, garlic, tomato, lime and chilli, finished with coriander and chives.
Origin and history
Caldo de piranha belongs to the Pantanal, the great floodplain of Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul, where a cuisine shaped by Indigenous, African and European influences and by the cattle drives relies on river fish such as piranha, pacu, pintado and dourado. The bony piranha is cooked down, picked or blended and served as a thick broth; it is the fish's best-known form in the region, popularly credited with aphrodisiac powers.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 6 servings as a starter
- Total time
- 1 h 45 min
- Hands-on
- 40 min
Ingredients
- 1.2 kg2.6 lb whole piranhas, scaled and gutted, heads kept, each cut in 2 or 3 pieces
- 1 lime, juiced, plus wedges to serve
- salt and black pepper, to taste
- 3 tbsp vegetable oil or olive oil
- 2 onions, chopped
- 4 garlic cloves, crushed
- 1 green bell pepper (pimentão), chopped
- 2 ripe tomatoes, chopped
- 1 fresh hot chilli (pimenta), optional; or serve chilli sauce at the table
- 2 l8 1/2 cups water
- 1 bunch cheiro-verde (cilantro and spring onion), chopped
- toasted bread, to serve
Method
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1. Rinse the fish pieces, season them with the lime juice, salt and pepper and leave them in the fridge for 30 minutes.
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2. Heat the oil in a large pot over medium heat and cook the onion for 5 minutes until soft.
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3. Add the garlic, bell pepper, tomatoes and chilli, if using, and cook for about 5 minutes, until the tomatoes collapse.
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4. Add the fish with its marinade and turn it in the pan for 2 to 3 minutes.
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5. Pour in the water, bring to the boil and skim off the foam.
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6. Cover and simmer for about 40 minutes, until the flesh falls from the bones at a touch. (In a pressure cooker, 25 to 30 minutes once it reaches pressure.)
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7. Let it cool for 15 minutes, then pour everything through a colander set over a large bowl to catch the broth.
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8. Go through the solids piece by piece and keep only the flesh and the soft vegetables, discarding every bone, fin and hard part of the heads; piranha is very bony, so take your time.
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9. Blend the picked flesh and vegetables with the broth until smooth, then pass it through a fine sieve as a final check for small bones.
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10. Return the caldo to the pot, bring it back to the boil and simmer for 5 minutes, adding a little water if it is thicker than a pouring cream; adjust the salt.
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11. Stir in the cheiro-verde and serve very hot in cups or small bowls, with lime wedges, chilli sauce and toasted bread.
Notes
- Texture: in the Pantanal the fish is usually blended into the broth, which is what gives the caldo its body. Some cooks instead strain the broth and return the picked flesh in flakes, for a clearer soup with pieces of fish.
- Substitutions: piranha is sold frozen and cleaned in fish markets of Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul. Elsewhere use another bony river fish or any lean white fish with its head and frame; the caldo will be milder and less gelatinous.
- Some modern recipes enrich the finished caldo with cream or coconut milk; the Pantanal version is simply fish, vegetables and herbs.
- Serving: it is drunk hot as a starter, often in cups, with toast and chilli. Its local reputation as an aphrodisiac is popular lore.
- Related: Paraguay's pira caldo is a different soup, made with other river fish and enriched with cheese and milk.
Adapted from TudoGostoso, Caldo de piranha and Correio do Estado, Conheça as verdadeiras comidas típicas de Mato Grosso do Sul.
At the festivals
Served at 1 festival in Brazil.
Earlier editions
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June 20, 2026
🇧🇷 Aratiba, Brazil
18º Festival de Sopas e 1º Festival de Sopas das Etnias
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June 28, 2025
🇧🇷 Aratiba, Brazil
17º Festival da Sopa de Aratiba
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June 24, 2017
🇧🇷 Aratiba, Brazil
Festival da Sopa de Aratiba