Quem chega cedo à barraca costuma encontrar pastel mais quente.

Quem means who or whoever, depending on context. In sentences like this, it often means the person who or whoever.

So:

• Quem chega cedo... = Whoever arrives early...
• A more literal expansion would be A pessoa que chega cedo...

It is very common in Portuguese to use quem this way.

After quem, Portuguese normally uses the verb in the 3rd person singular, even if the meaning is general.

So:

• Quem chega cedo...
• not usually Quem chegam cedo...

This is standard grammar. Even though quem can refer to people in general, the verb stays singular.

Here, cedo is an adverb, meaning early.

It modifies the verb chega:

• chega cedo = arrives early

Do not confuse this with the noun cedo in other contexts; in this sentence it is simply an adverb.

À is the contraction of:

• a = the preposition
• a = the feminine singular definite article

So:

• chegar a = to arrive at
• a barraca = the stall / the stand
• together: chegar à barraca

This phenomenon is called crase.

So à barraca means to/at the stall.

Yes. In everyday Brazilian Portuguese, chegar em is very common in speech:

• chegar na barraca

However, chegar à barraca is more traditional and often considered more formal or more standard in careful writing.

So both are heard, but à barraca is a good model to learn.

Here, barraca means a stall, stand, or food booth, especially in a street market, fair, or festival.

In other contexts, barraca can also mean tent, so the exact translation depends on the situation. In this sentence, because of pastel, it strongly suggests a food stall.

Costumar + infinitive means to usually, to tend to, or to be in the habit of doing something.

So:

• costuma encontrar = usually finds / tends to find

This gives the sentence a general, habitual meaning, not a one-time event.

Examples:

• Ela costuma acordar cedo. = She usually wakes up early.
• Eles costumam comer aqui. = They usually eat here.

Not exactly.

• sempre = always
• costuma = usually / tends to

So costuma is weaker than sempre. It suggests what normally happens, but not an absolute rule.

In Brazil, pastel usually means a popular fried snack: thin dough with filling, folded and deep-fried.

So it does not mean:

• the color pastel
• a delicate sweet pastry in the English sense

At a Brazilian street market, pastel almost always refers to that savory fried snack.

Leaving out um makes the phrase sound more generic and proverb-like.

• encontrar pastel mais quente = to find hotter pastel / get a hotter pastel
• encontrar um pastel mais quente = to find a hotter pastel

Adding um would also be possible and might sound a little more explicit. Without um, the sentence feels more like a general observation.

Mais quente is a comparative:

• quente = hot
• mais quente = hotter

It does not necessarily mean the hottest. That would be:

• o mais quente = the hottest

So the sentence suggests that the pastel is hotter than it would be later, or hotter than other available ones, without explicitly saying than what. Portuguese often leaves that comparison implied.

Because it agrees with pastel, which is masculine singular.

So:

• pastel mais quente = singular
• pastéis mais quentes = plural

Agreement in Portuguese affects adjectives, so if the noun changes, the adjective usually changes too.

Sometimes yes, but encontrar is the more natural choice here.

• encontrar = to find, come across, encounter
• achar can also mean find, but very often it means to think / to believe

In this sentence, encontrar clearly expresses finding/getting a hotter pastel, with no ambiguity.

It is a general statement.

Several things make it general:

• quem = whoever / anyone who
• costuma = usually / tends to
• no specific person or specific stall is mentioned

So the sentence works almost like a small piece of common wisdom: arrive early, and you will probably get hotter food.