With Brazil’s vast continental expanse, it’s hard to pinpoint specific landscapes or places that represent the country as a whole – our geography is so rich and diverse that it defies generalization. But I dare say that Iguazu Falls, bordering Paraguay and Argentina, considered one of the Seven Wonders of the World, is an imposing and iconic gateway to Brazil. And it’s there that Hotel Cataratas, A Belmond Hotel, resides – the only hotel within Iguazu National Park, now home to Y, a new restaurant helmed by Chef Luiz Filipe Souza, a fitting tribute to this gateway to our country’s wonders.
Inspired by the waters that bathe the park and flow at the confluence of the two rivers in the region, marking the tri-border between Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina, the restaurant’s name refers to the phoneme YY (ii) – a representation of water in Guarani and the root of the word Iguazu or Yguaxu, meaning “big water.” It’s there that the chef embarks on a journey with his own unique culinary identity – his trademark, in fact – now dedicated to Brazilian cuisine, featuring ingredients, preparations, and flavors from different regions of the country, all given a creative and technical reinterpretation.
This is where dishes like the minimalist version of Capixaba moqueca emerge, with char-grilled carabinero shrimp and smoked tomato, duck coxinha with smoked ricotta in Brazilian rosewood, and churrasco with cassava and Atlantic Forest chimichurri, covering the country’s culinary culture from north to south. A golden egg with tucupi and cassava also figures among the creations – a tribute to indigenous food culture, which has the planting of the tuber as one of its foundations. “Gradually, we will explore ingredients and flavors that make the region a unique terroir, as well as bring to it culinary peculiarities from different parts of Brazil with a special, playful, and creative approach,” says the chef, whose research work brings to the table the leaves of the native vegetation that surrounds the park and spreads throughout the São Paulo coast, the muripi pepper he learned about in a course by Laurent Suaudeau, or the Uarini flour he used when representing Brazil at Bocuse D’Or, one of the most prestigious culinary competitions in the world, in 2019. “There are cuts from the south of the country, Bahia, Maranhão, Amazonas, Pará, southeast… Each place has a gastronomic history represented,” he defines.
Luiz Filipe’s creations at Y can be enjoyed in the nine-course tasting menu or on the à la carte menu, where the client chooses their preferred snacks, appetizers, main courses, and desserts from a range of options. Three pairing proposals are also available: exclusively with Brazilian wines, only with international wines, or a hybrid of both. I’ve followed Luiz Filipe’s work from the beginning. He was a student at the Anhembi Morumbi Gastronomy course and began his career alongside Salvatore Loi at Fasano. He then went on to work at Reale Casadonna, by Italian chef Niko Romito (three Michelin stars), and at the São Paulo restaurants Girarrosto, Mozza, and Ristorantino, and worked as a consulting chef at Piselli and Piselli no Sud, in Shopping Iguatemi. This strong foundation in classic Italian cuisine was the starting point for the opening of Evvai, where Luiz Filipe began to develop unique and original work around Italian cuisine and Brazilian ingredients. But the “boy” went further. Nothing was ever obvious on Evvai’s tasting menus, which freely explore the chef’s gustatory and sensory experiments. And it was this work that earned the restaurant its two Michelin stars in 2024 and 21st place on the Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants list in 2023. Expanding his creative talent to Brazilian cuisine, therefore, is a challenge Luiz Filipe embraced with enthusiasm – and where he promises to expand his gastronomic research to new horizons.
“It’s a privilege and a huge responsibility,” he affirms, remembering that he had the support of a top-notch team in implementing the project: in addition to cooks André Tognini and João Rodrigues, who will be the restaurant’s full-time executive chef, and pastry chef Bianca Mirabili, dining room manager Jaqueline Pessoa was key to building the Y concept. “It’s a complement to my professional career that allows me to have a space where we can extend the technique, research, and skills we developed at Evvai, but with a positive socio-environmental impact that would be limited in São Paulo,” the chef concludes.
