Portugalia Marketplace combines Old World vibe with contemporary foodie mentality

Not to be smug, but South Coast foodies live a life that others can only experience on cable TV. We’ve got the farms. We have the boutique food producers. We’ve got the farmers markets, the independent grocers, the locavore restaurants. Our local cuisine is a mélange of indigenous and international influences. We drink wine that many Americans don’t even know about. We’ve got great bakeries, some of the best sausages in the world and flan. Every American should have access to flan. But they don’t.

Okay, that might have seemed a little smug, but if you live around here, you know it to be fact. What you might not yet know about is a relatively new entry into the local food scene – Portugalia Marketplace in Fall River. More than an ethnic market, Portugalia is bringing together the exotic and the familiar, the old and the new, the past and the future.

The building itself is a textbook example of the preservation and reuse of an old industrial edifice. The Benevides Family, which has been in the food importing business for many years, spared no expense in the refit and expansion of the small brick mill, nominally on Bedford Street, but fronting on 12th Street, between Bedford and Pleasant.

The original structure has been kept intact but an atrium has been added to the front of the building, providing a modern entrance to the store. Beyond, what were once floor-to-ceiling window bays have become arched passageways to the old mill, now converted to a meticulously clean and light-filled retail space.

From the moment you walk in the door, you know you’re not in your grandmother’s Portuguese market. Portugalia is that, but it’s so much more.

Fresh fruits and vegetables, attractively yet simply displayed, will be the first thing you see. Then, the wooden barrels of nuts, dried beans and various snack mixes. Favas, navy beans, dried peas – these old school staples have been the basis for many a home-cooked and hardy dinner and are now found in the finest gourmet meals, as well.

You’ll also see various and sundry goodies. In fact, there are goodies of all kinds all over the store. Don’t say you haven’t been warned.

And here’s another warning – you may walk into Portugalia in a hurry, but there’s something about this place that relaxes you, that slows you down. For whatever reason, it’s a place where you want to take your time, to enjoy and indulge yourself, where grocery shopping is suddenly not a chore, a task to be dispensed with as quickly as possible.

Yes, you can get the basics, fill your cupboards, stock the fridge – “do the shopping” – at this store. But if you’re a true foodie, you’ll stop by Portugalia Marketplace as much for recreation and relaxation as for mere food shopping.

There’s a small café, for one thing. Coffee, cappuccino, espresso, latte – yes, of course. Gourmet sandwiches – goes without saying. But this is Portugalia’s Goodie Central! Custards and pastries and chocolate concoctions – all manner of goodies. It’s not that you wouldn’t expect to find them here – it’s that they are so unexpectedly irresistible.

That’s your third warning. Enter the café at your own risk. But enter it.

Just don’t stop there. There’s so much more. The wine selection is extensive, but even so, has a handpicked quality to it. Of course, there are many Portuguese wines to choose from, but there are also some of the best and best-known low and mid-priced domestic wines available. If you’ve ever wondered where to get a bottle of wine that you have first encountered at an area restaurant, Portugalia Marketplace is a very good bet.

The deli section – the charcutaria – features cheese from Westport’s Shy Brothers Farm as well as entire wheels from Portugal. Fall River made chourico. Milk from Tiverton, Rhode Island. Marinated olives and roasted red peppers from – well, who cares where they’re from? They’re delicious and that’s what really counts.

One of the iconic foods of the region is cod, of course. Cod has been dried and salted for at least five hundred years in North Atlantic countries, and it can be fairly stated that the codfish is the original New England staple. At Portugalia Marketplace, you will find an entire room of salt cod.

Yes, an entire room. Every grade and size of salt cod is offered here – mostly from Canada and Norway – it’s another example of the way that Portugalia brings together the local and the exotic – in a delicious way.

And now, your final warning – the prepared foods section (follow your nose to find this). Know this now – you will go home with something from the prepared foods section. Try the chicken dinner. Or the bacalhau. Or anything.

Portugalia Marketplace is a food purveyor that combines a decidedly Old World vibe with a thoroughly contemporary foodie mentality. Foods from (literally) down the street and food from across the ocean. Traditional favorites in a modern venue.

The regional food economy is changing fast – new food producers, new growers and new ways to access the food they provide are coming on line every year. It’s an exciting time for area foodies. Portugalia Markeplace is at the center of that excitement. At once a cutting-edge niche food retailer and a traditional ethnic market, Portugalia is a must-visit, an essential – a no-brainer.

And they have goodies. Lots of goodies.

And there’s even more to look forward to. In season, Portugalia Marketplace has an expanded role in the local food scene, offering with the produce of local farmers. The old, the new, the familiar, the exotic – Portugalia Markeplace is destined to become a local foodie mecca, bringing together the best of traditional Portuguese foods with the finest that the local agricultural economy can offer.

It’s a little slice of foodie heaven.

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