Aly’s Grill from Brazil introduces South American flavors to the Santa Ynez Valley

Garlic, onion, tomatoes, coconut milk, bell pepper, and red palm oil imbue mild white fish with tons of flavor in the classic Brazilian stew moqueca baiana. 

“It has a redness base to it and it just gives the fish stew like an exotic color to it. It has a distinct taste to it, and it’s fresh too,” Aly’s Grill from Brazil chef and co-owner Richard Bruce said. 

Palm oil gives the stew its distinctive color and an almost meaty flavor with hints of anise. Moqueca baiana hails from the same jungle-laden area of Brazil as Bruce: the Amazon. 

“I was born and raised in the Amazon jungle,” he said. “My mom is a chef, and so I learned from her, the culinary part of tasting, freshness, fish—that kind of thing—at early ages.”

Specifically, Bruce is from Itacoatiara, a city of around 86,000 in the state of Amazonas just east of Manaus along the Amazon River. His mother was a private chef, the kind who cooked food from all over the world and traveled across Brazil to cook in private homes and at private parties. So you could say that food is in Bruce’s blood.

“I can’t stay away from the kitchen,” he said with a laugh. 

Bruce and his wife, Aly, opened Aly’s Grill from Brazil in Buellton about six months ago, but the spot isn’t their first foray into the Santa Ynez Valley restaurant scene. The Bruces owned Aly’s restaurant in Solvang for about a decade, serving up plates of high-end French cuisine to tourists and locals alike. 

They took over the Mirabelle Inn’s restaurant after the previous owner sold it to a hotelier without any kitchen experience. Bruce had already been working in the restaurant for a few years and said he jumped at the opportunity to run his own place. 

“It was a really great experience for me because I was able to learn a lot of French techniques,” Bruce said. “I kind of created my own style a little bit, but [kept it] very similar to what he had before.” 

As the pandemic hit, Bruce said, he and Aly decided to close the restaurant. Bruce said he didn’t want to do to-go boxes because he didn’t think it would work with the kind of food they were serving. They also weren’t sure how long the pandemic would last, so they just waited to figure out their next steps. 

About eight months into the pandemic, they decided to try to open a Brazilian restaurant, which they’d been talking about for years. Aly is also from Brazil and grew up around food. Her grandmother ran a bakery in the northern coastal city of Recife.  

“It’s kind of a dream of mine because my dad always wanted to open a Brazilian restaurant in Brazil but never got the chance,” he said. “We wanted to do something where the locals would be most of my clients, where I could have them come back daily … or once a week. … That’s a more stable business, when you have the locals support you, than a tourism business, which is up and down.” 

The Bruces also wanted to serve up food that was accessible and affordable. Similar to their previous restaurant, Aly takes care of the bills and the front of the house, while Bruce focuses on the food and the kitchen. 

Although the fish stew is a staple that Bruce often makes to serve during the dinner hour, the real stars of Aly’s Grill from Brazil are the stacked skewers of meat rotating on the rotisserie. 

“I have 10 types of meat grilling,” he said. “We have pork sausage, pork tenderloin wrapped in bacon, chicken breast wrapped in bacon … chicken legs with olive oil and garlic—it’s such a simple thing, but it’s super, super good. … I do a leg of lamb, pork chops.”

He also has the top sirloin cap, a beloved cut of beef in Brazil called picanha, and for vegetarians, pineapple with brown sugar and cinnamon makes the rounds.

“It’s amazingly good,” he said. “It’s a beautiful grill, and I don’t want people to just have the salads. I want them to participate on the grill, so they don’t feel left out.” 

Similar to the meat, salads such as the cherry tomatoes with hearts of palm and beets with orange and fresh mint, feijoada—a black bean stew traditionally made with pork and sausage (he has that and a vegetarian version), fried plantains, fried yucca, and the rest of the items on the menu are sold by the pound. 

“I have all the basic dishes that Brazil carries, and it’s pretty cool,” he said. “The base of our food here at the restaurant is fresh, organic, healthy meals—healthy daily meals, you know, and fast at the same time. …. Fast, healthy, organic.”

Editor Camillia Lanham will take a skewer of picanha. Reach her at clanham@santamariasun.com.

This article appears in Mar 17-24, 2022.