Thaina Ceribelli, 31, grew up in Brazil eating the popular golden cheese ball pão de queijo, but her American husband did not.

Josh Ceribelli, 32, of northern Baltimore County, loved the taste, but didn’t understand the art of the popular snack sold throughout Brazil’s malls, airports and bakeries.

“I remember getting home and he was making it and he was saying it was Brazilian cheese bread, but it wasn’t,” said Thaina Ceribelli. “He was using like, mozzarella.”

So, she stepped in. Now the couple are a few months short of their first year in the pão de queijo-making business — a dish woefully lacking in the Baltimore area, despite the global popularity of the food.

The cheese ball is made with multiple flours: both a sour and sweet tapioca, or cassava starch, and a mixture of cheeses — the most notable being a Brazilian queijo minas, or semi-hard and salted cheese that creates a cured, smoky flavor inside the ball.

For many locals, the Ceribellis’ product is their first introduction to the Brazilian snack outside of steakhouse chains like Fogo de Chao. The Ceribellis say they hope the cheese breads spark more interest in Brazilian food. The newfound family business sells the balls frozen through their Instagram account and fresh at the Fells Point Farmers Market, the first of multiple markets they’ve applied to join.

The business, Panzînos, began in May as Thaina Ceribelli worked out ways to adapt a recipe her brother had found while working in Brazilian restaurants, using ingredients easy to find in Baltimore.

She substituted the traditional Brazilian cheese for a smoked cheddar that when mixed with another cheddar cheese and the nuttiness of Parmigiano, reminded her of the rolls she’s had in Minas Gerais, a southeastern Brazilian state widely referred to as the birthplace of pão de queijo.

The snack has a rich history: When the Portuguese arrived in Brazil in the 1500s, they discovered the land wasn’t fit for growing wheat, and turned to native cassava, which indigenous people had been pounding into bread. Enslaved people peeling and soaking the cassava rolled the starchy tapioca residue into balls for food, later adding aged cheeses that became increasingly popular in the late 19th century, according to a report by The Guardian.

Now, the naturally gluten-free snacks are served with coffee in the morning or as a midnight treat. Ceribelli learned to make them when she was young and brought them to parties around Maryland when she was in her 20s. Each time she was shocked by the reception: “They were always asking me to make more,” she said.

The Panzîno’s name came from Josh Ceribelli’s efforts to say the Portuguese word for little bread, pãozinho. The mispronunciation reminded the owners how few of their Baltimore customers would be familiar with Brazilian food. Less than 1% of the city’s population is Brazilian and most people Thaina Ceribelli tried to introduce to the snack appeared thrown off by the name.

They struggled to say it, she said, and over time the couple learned more people were willing to add the food to their palate when it was instead introduced as “cheesy bread.” The Ceribellis also added flavors deviating from the traditional smoky and guava, which is achieved with guava paste in addition to the base cheese mixture. The owners created a more savory, garlic version and another using an everything bagel-inspired mix: “America, they love everything[seasoning],” Thaina Ceribelli said.

At the request of customers, the Ceribellis also added sauces for dipping, including a scallion cream cheese, garlicky pesto and chimichurri.

“I wanted people to learn and experience [this],” she said. “I don’t care if we add some things that are not traditional.”

The approach has worked so far: The Ceribellis sold their pão de queijo at the Feast St. Anthony’s June Festival and now run a stall every Saturday in Fells Point.

“It was a big jump from not at the farmer’s market to now,” Josh Ceribelli said of sales, adding that the business wouldn’t have been able to grow at this rate without it. They now operate out of a commissary kitchen in Remington.

Aided by Josh Ceribelli’s mother, Arlene, who’s recently trained in the art of homemade pão de queijo, and father, Paul, the business is optimistic about eventually scaling into retail sales.

“Occasionally my dad will try to help out with sales. He’ll ask people that don’t know about it [pão de queijo], ‘Do you know what the special ingredient is?’ Ceribelli said. ”It’s love."