Of all the ways to while away your time in the has-to-be-seen-to-be-believed South American Mecca that is Buenos Aires, eating and drinking have to be amongst the top... er... two. During our six weeks in the Argentinian capital, we ate and drank more and better than anywhere else on our travels before or since.
Indeed, after a glass or six of a good meaty Malbec, I'd go as far as to say that Argentinian cuisine, as enjoyed in Buenos Aires, is my favourite of anywhere in the world (sorry, Italy – I still love you. Just a bit less than I used to.) Top dog. Head honcho. Numero uno. From the panchos in warm bread you can snap up pretty much anywhere to the fresh pasta shops that litter every neighbourhood, the fab little delis that kick out eight types of salami and triple the number of cheeses without breaking a sweat, or the ice-cream that is simply to die for – it's so damned good. And all that, of course, is without even mentioning the steak and red wine, both of which are almost sexual in their sheer, can't-get-enough, “where have you been all my life” fabulousness.
Perhaps it's the weather, possibly it's the setting, more likely it's BA's strong Italian history. I don't know for sure. What I do know is that eating and drinking in BA is reason enough to visit. And so, without further ado (and because I've been living of canned food for three weeks in New Zealand, and it makes me feel good to remember), here's our run down of the places to spend your pesos on food and booze in South America's finest city.
El Pinguino de Palermo, Borges and Praguay, Palermo ViejoFirst up is our local neighbourhood eatery in Palermo, the Penguin. We ate here on Christmas Eve (what would be our Christmas Day meal back home), and returned umpteen times over the next six weeks for lunches, dinners and the occasional litre bottle of Quilmes on the few tables outside.
El Pinguino may not be the flashiest, and is certainly not the best, of the hundreds of Parilla that litter BA, but it is symbolic of the great love that locals have for food, and a superb example of a damned fine neighbourhood restaurant. The waist-coat wearing waiters make you feel like part of the family, the salads are always fresh and heavy on the onion, the chips are superb and the meat is reliable, moist and well-cooked. You can also pick up a bottle of strangely drinkable red for six pesos (just under pound), and get a fry-up to take away on New Years day when you feel like a money has shat in your head and nothing else is open. It' also cheap as chips. On Christmas Eve, the busiest day in the year for many restaurants, our four courses, with two good bottles of red, glass of bubbles, coffee and extra sweet tray, cost us forty quid. All in, not each. Magic.
What I wouldn't give to have one of these back home in Cardiff. Or, for that matter, London...
Any table outside Serrano Square, Palermo ViejoOkay, okay – two selections so far, both in the “so hip it hurts” Palermo Viejo neighbourhood. Well apologies and all that, but (a) it's where we lived and (b) it's fit to burst with good restaurants, and amazing bar. Oh, and (c) get used to it, as a few more of the selections are near by.
Anyhow, back to Serrano Square. The bars are pretty much interchangeable, the prices broadly speaking about thirty percent more than you'd pay anywhere else in the city, the music almost exclusively classic rock (as in Springsteen, not Whitesnake). But the atmosphere is just fantastic. The waitresses, elaborately tattooed and wonderfully disinterested in their jobs, bob and weave amongst the thronging crowds and tables as if on some sort of other-worldly autopilot. Children play happily in one of the most incongruously placed play areas I've ever seen. Street-vendors hawk their wares on market stalls or table-to-table, while the entertainers and street magicians are both entertaining and magical (unlike the stage-school rejects that clutter up Covent Garden.) Most impressively, the clientèle is a wonderful exercise in “who gives a shit”, comprising as it does young trendy travellers, local families, bemused Nordic couples in matching socks and sandles – you name it, you'll find them here.
And, running through it all like trendily-attired blood cells are the portenos (BA residents). Dressed to kill, barking into mobile phones, laughing, gesticulating and like the waitresses, wearing better art on their arms and legs than most BA galleries have on their walls, you can watch them for hours. Which we did – I have the bank balance to prove it. Sunday afternoon is a great time to visit, though the party run seven days a week, well into the next day Thursday through Sunday.
El Desnivel, Defensa 855, San TelmoWe ate in El Desnivel, a San Telmo institution that is as ramshackle as it is venerable, when our good friend Chris came to stay with us for a week. Love him as we do, he's a fussy sod, and the look on his face when a surly waiter ushered us to a seat next to clunky air-conditioning unit was a sight to behold. That, when we left nearly three hours later, he was grinning from ear to ear and had eaten himself silly is testament to the top-class food we'd been served, and the sly sense of humour of the people that served it to us.
A Parilla straight out of the top drawer, El Desnivel delivers on every level. Fit to burst with portenos and visitors alike, this most rumbustious of eateries is bookended by two massive barbecues, each running constantly and manned by hulking men with hands like shovels. We drank a litre of perfectly acceptable house red, before upgrading to a pleasingly ballsy Los Andes Malbec. Food wise, it delivered across the board. Chris's crypto-vegetarianism was no problem, and the fresh ricotta pasta with home-made four cheese sauce was a hit. The house steak for two, served on a bed of fresh chips and smothered in a sauce bursting with tomatoes, peppers, ham, onions and any number of other ingredients, was out of this world. The steak itself, a gargantuan 'chorizo' cut, was cooked to perfection, with just enough blood to please both Lou and I. Just as impressive as its juiciness and filleting, however, was its size. Almost a foot in length, and so thick it had been sliced down the middle and stuffed with mozzarella and peppers, it was truly a sight to behold. And even better to taste.
All in all, not ideal for a romantic meal, but if you want to talk loudly, eat lots, and get slowly rat-arsed, there's nowhere better.
Morelia, Baez 260, Palermo Soho As painful as it is to pay money for a meal in the city that doesn't involve eating some sort of cow, events can sometimes conspire against even the most hardcore carnivore. And so it came to pass one evening during Chris “scared of beef” Binding's stay with us. The under the breath muttering I'd managed to sustain during the walk to Morelia was halted abruptly upon arrival, though, as the smell of fresh basil and pizza dough wafted out of the impressively full restaurant. Even more impressive was the ease and politeness with which the manageress whipped us up a table, not always a given in a part of town where style often wins over substance and many of waiting staff would be better suited to a catwalk than a kitchen.
But all of this would be worth nothing if the food didn't come up to scratch. Thankfully it did – and how. The basket of bread that greeted us was a meal in itself, freshly baked and in four varieties. A request for some oil brought balsamic, olive and chilli – and yet more bread with which to soak the oil up. Pizzas, served either fat crusted or grilled, were better still. Lou opted for thin while Chris and I allotted for fat crusted. Chris's pepperoni was as good a version of the classic as I've seen,i with a variety of antipasto salamis replacing the mechanically-removed circles that sit atop cheaper examples. Lou's vegetable and pesto was fantastic, too, wafer thin but bursting with freshness and flavour. Fresh asparagus stalks jostled for space with peppers, mushrooms and sweet peas while tangy tomatoes and cheese bottomed things out nicely. But the clear winner – even if I may say so myself – was my blue cheese calzone, which was simply sublime. More soul satisfying than any cathedral, more beautiful than Iguazu Falls, more memorable then Machu Pichu... well, almost. Perfectly baked pizza dough filled with four molten cheeses but heavy on the blue, it was an exercise in perfectly-judged excess, the hand-torn strips of prosciutto nestled in the middle with a scattering of olives a particularly nice, salty touch. Far larger than necessary, but not big enough to bore or challenge, it was pizza as it should be. In fact, so swept away were we on the crest of an Italian wave, that we snubbed the Malbec for the night and opted for a damned fine 2007 Montepulciano. Or, in all honesty, two damned fine 2007 Montepulcianos.
Last, but certainly not least, were the fresh raspberries and vanilla ice-cream that I finished the night off with. Louise and Chris had retired hurt by this point, but I had no trouble managing the lot – the soft, slightly acidic berries rubbing exotically against the superb, vanilla pod scoop. Bliss.
Las Pizarras, Thames 2296, Palermo Perhaps our finest meal in Buenos Aires came courtesy of our mate Hosk, who spent a week with us battling heroically against the many obstacles faced by a vegetarian in the city. On any number of occasions when we'd eaten out, Lou and I had finished the evening happy at yet another fine steak while David was left a little underwhelmed. Barring the fact that this was, of course, his own fault, it was fantastic to finish his time with us on an undeniable high-point, with a meal that no superlatives could really do justice to. You'd need to eat there yourself to appreciate just how good it was.
Owned and operated by Rodrigo Castilla, an Anglophile and former pupil of Gary Rhodes at London's Gherkin, everything about this venture is pretty much perfect. For a start, the premises are a good walk away from Palermo's swanky restaurants and clubs, and only a stones throw away from the far more prosaic hustle and bustle of Avenue Santa Fe. Poorly advertised from the outside, you could be forgiven for thinking the place a junk store at first glance, were it not for a small clipping from Time Out (a rave review from one of the few city guides that actually knows its food) on the window and a chalk board of that day's offerings on the far wall. There is no menu – just a constantly evolving board of mains and starters, coupled with five deserts and a fine wine list. With Italian, Spanish and South American influences very much to the fore of the mains and wine, the starters and deserts carried a few nod and winks to Britain. Thankfully, neither the nods or winks extended to the British disease of obscene overpricing, as everything from the food to the wine was very reasonably priced.
We ate and drank so much that to list it all would be something of an indulgence, but here are a few highlights. The feather-light cappuccino spread that accompanied our bread basket shouldn't have worked, but did, while the bread itself was note-perfect. My Ojo de Bife was the best I ate in Buenos Aires, while the accompanying vegetables and potatoes were perfectly judged in their crisp saltiness. Lou and David both opted for fish, taking a whole body of a local Argentinian variety that – embarrassingly – I can't now name for the life of me. What I do know is that the milky flesh simply fell from the bones, singing with all of the many herbs that lay caked on the its blackened scales. Deserts were, if possible, even better. My apple crumble and ice cream was as sumptuous as it was British, the sort of sticky-sweet confection that could happily grace a feast at Hogwarts. David's cherries and ice cream were a small, tangy work of art, while the wine was dangerously quaffable. Mix in a personal, and surprisingly welcome, visit to the table from the owner himself and we had ourselves a truly special evening. All the more special, it must be said, because Hosk paid.
Honourable mentions
Any list of places to eat and drink in a place like Buenos Aires is invariably incomplete and far to short. As such, honourable mentions should go to the Steak and a tango, Micro centre, where we ate good grub and limitless wine wine watching a truly charming tango show a world away from the tacky, tourist crowds nearby.
Cumen Cumen Empaňadas, Palermo offer the best versions of these typically Argentinian snacks as any. Leaving the traditional meat, cheese or chicken fillings behind, here you can grab baked-to-order versions with every filling imaginable, from blue cheese to olive and mushroom, green vegetables to egg, cheese and ham. Worth the Subte journey.
Parilla 69, San Telmo, is a perfect stop for a slice of old-school Parilla action that seems purpose built for tourists but remains full of locals. Lacking the dirty charm of Desnivel of the rock bottom rices of El Penguino, Parilla 69 is a more high-end affair but with prices that belie this fact. Waiting staff, complete with bow-ties and scowls, are amusing in themselves, while the mashed potato is the best I've ever tasted.
Spanglish, held in various bars and clubs across BA, is a great place to meet people and practice your Spanish – a little like multi-lingual speed dating, but (for some, at least) without the pressure to get laid. Drinking usually ensues – a free drink comes as standard – and at least two anecdotes to take away are virtually guaranteed.
Lastly comes
Sitges. A gay bar that remains open until past breakfast the next day, it thankfully eschews the clichés that accompany some similar places back home, replacing the feel of an open brothel and smell of poppers with a dirt cheap all you can drink bar (with cocktails and champagne!) and air conditioning. It should be noted that the guy friend we went with would have preferred all four of these things, but thems the breaks.
