Brazil’s Michelin milestone
At the April 13 Michelin Guide Rio de Janeiro & São Paulo 2026 ceremony, São Paulo restaurants Evvai and Tuju were each awarded three Michelin stars, marking the first time three-star distinctions were given to establishments in Brazil and Latin America ( ). Reports placed the announcement at the Copacabana Palace and described the awards as a historic regional development for fine dining (portaltela.com).
Brazil now has its first three-star Michelin restaurants: Evvai and Tuju in São Paulo were elevated on April 13. (guide.michelin.com) The awards were announced at the Michelin Guide Rio de Janeiro & São Paulo 2026 ceremony at the Copacabana Palace in Rio de Janeiro. Michelin said it was the first time any restaurant in Brazil or Latin America had received three stars. (guide.michelin.com) Michelin uses stars to rank restaurants by the quality of the cooking, not by décor or luxury alone. In Michelin’s system, one star signals “high-quality cooking,” two stars mean cooking “worth a detour,” and three stars mean cuisine “worth a special journey.” (guide.michelin.com) Evvai and Tuju were not newcomers to the guide. Both restaurants held two stars before this year’s ceremony and were promoted to three, while D.O.M. in São Paulo and Lasai and Oro in Rio de Janeiro kept their two-star status. (g1.globo.com) The Michelin Guide’s Brazil edition covers only Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, not the whole country. Michelin said the 2026 selection still included 149 establishments across the two cities, with 12 new additions this year. (guide.michelin.com) That narrow footprint helps explain why the milestone lands as both recognition and limitation. Brazil now has Latin America’s first three-star restaurants, but Michelin’s own published guide in the country still evaluates just two urban markets. (guide.michelin.com) The two winners also represent distinct versions of São Paulo fine dining. Michelin said Evvai, led by chef Luiz Filipe Souza, builds its tasting menu around Brazilian ingredients and Italian roots, while Tuju, led by chef Ivan Ralston, stages a multi-floor meal centered on Brazilian products, research, and technique. (guide.michelin.com, guide.michelin.com) The 2026 ceremony also brought a new one-star restaurant in Rio de Janeiro: Madame Olympe. G1 reported that no restaurant in Rio de Janeiro or São Paulo lost stars in this edition. (g1.globo.com) Michelin returned to Brazil in 2024 after a four-year absence, restoring a guide that had last published a Rio-São Paulo selection in 2020. Two years later, the guide’s top distinction has arrived in São Paulo before anywhere else in Latin America. (guide.michelin.com, guide.michelin.com)
