São Paulo – The restaurant chain Fogo de Chão will open in January a restaurant in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, its first in the Middle East. A couple of months later, in mid-March, it will be Dubai’s turn to host the opening of a restaurant of the chain.
Both will focus on tourists but with a certain appeal to the local population – so much so that halal meats will be offered within the traditional serving system known as rodízio, which is very popular in the Brazilian market. “Only thing we are not serving is pork. Besides this, we will offer everything, including some elements of the Arab cuisine in the salad bar,” says Daniel Miranda, manager of the Fogo de Chão restaurant in Dubai. Halal is the food prepared according to the Muslim tradition. Pork is prohibited by the religion.
According to him, the plan of the steakhouse chain is to open ten restaurants throughout the Middle East, North Africa and some places in Asia until 2020. In Dubai, the restaurant will occupy an area of 13,000 square meters at the Dubai Festival City, a special area in the emirate where sales and consumption of alcoholic beverages are allowed.
The waiters will wear the traditional garb from Rio Grande do Sul state. Miranda said he spent the last three months in Brazil selecting the 40-strong, mostly Brazilian staff for the Dubai restaurant.
“More than the beef itself, we want to sell Brazil in these sites: the product, the staff and the serving style. Dubai is a cosmopolitan city with more than 200 nationalities and it’s important to show the world that the Brazilian product is of high quality,” says the manager.
Brazilian wine
Due to the fact it’s located inside a special area in Dubai where consumption of alcoholic beverages is allowed (this does not apply to Saudi Arabia, since alcohol is prohibited), Fogo de Chão will serve wine, among other things. And Brazilian wines will be on Miranda’s shopping list.
Last week he and other international buyers visited vineyards in the Serra Gaúcha area at the invitation of the Brazilian Wine Institute (Ibravin). The initiative is part of a Buyer Project within the sector project Wines of Brazil, carried out jointly with the Brazilian Trade and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex-Brasil).
During five days the group visited the Aurora, Casa Perini, Casa Valduga, Don Guerino, Lídio Carraro, Miolo, Mioranza, Pizzato and Salton vineyards, tasted the wines and saw how production takes place. The high quality and professionalism seen on the vineyards were praised by Miranda: “The idea is to take some of these wines to Dubai, not just one, and to promote the Brazilian wine. Of course, we will offer wines from other nationalities, but we will try to promote the national product,” he said.
In the last few days, the manager has been sending emails asking for prices so he can start to put together the wine list that will be offered at Fogo de Chão Dubai starting on March.
However, this will not be the first wine export from the region to the UAE. According to Rodolfo Lucchese, foreign market promotion assistant at Ibravin, a couple of shipments were made to Arab countries in the past, although they were low-value orders. “In the range of USD 10,000 to USD 15,000 in a year,” he explains.
Fogo de Chão’s initiative, however, has producers thrilled, since the possibility to open a new market for Brazilian wine just turns greater.
*Translated by Sérgio Kakitani
