Rapadura and regional sweets at the Mercado de Artesanato Paraibano

The MAP, in Tambaú, has for more than 30 years brought together rapadura, cachaças and typical sweets alongside Paraíba crafts.

Built in the early 1990s near the Manaíra waterfront, the Mercado de Artesanato Paraibano (MAP) is a mandatory stop for anyone visiting João Pessoa in search of popular art made by local artisans. With more than 120 shops spread over two floors, in the Tambaú neighborhood, the venue is one of the spots most visited by the capital's city tour companies.

Alongside renascença lace, ceramics and leather pieces, the MAP sets aside space for typical food products: beyond the lacework, the venue is described as a sales point for cachaças and typical Paraíba foods, functioning as a kind of culinary showcase within the waterfront's shopping circuit.

Rapadura, a sweet made from cooked and solidified sugarcane juice, is one of the products most associated with this Northeastern culinary tradition, with artisanal production still active in mills in Paraíba's interior, such as in the Vale do Piancó, where the production of sugarcane honey, alfenim and rapadura continues to be done by hand in old regional mills.

This link between Tambaú's urban market and artisanal production from the interior is what still sustains, to this day, the presence of rapadura and regional sweets as a typical souvenir taken home by visitors to João Pessoa.