Blessing (Benta Maria da Conceição Torres)

Benta Maria da Conceição Torres, known as Mother Benta, was an iconic figure on the streets of Rio de Janeiro in the early nineteenth century. Black, like many of those who circulated on the sidewalks of nineteenth-century Rio de Janeiro, she sold sweets exposed on a tray she carried on her head or rested on her lap. It is said that she had created a special type of dumpling, made from eggs and (a lot of) sugar. By selling her sweets, she paid for the education of her biological son, canon Geraldo Leite Barros, whose career led him to work as a senior official in the Senate secretariat. After Benta’s death, her famous recipe was kept secret under the guardianship of the Ajuda Convent’s nuns, in Rio de Janeiro.