El Baqueano

El Baqueano 

Address: Chile Nº 495 esquina Bolivar

Phone: 4342-0802

This gem of a restaurant located in San Telmo, a barrio in the city where we rarely get to for dinner. It's a shame too, because this is a fantastic place to eat.

Reservations are a must and they don't print menus.  The inside is modestly decorated but comfortable with a large bar - though it doesn't look like the bar seats are used much. There is a set "degustacion" that changes every 3 months or so, presented on a chalkboard to each table as you sit down.  The set menu has eight steps for AR$230 with the three supplemental steps available for an additional price per dish.

There is also the wine pairing available for an additional AR$135, we skipped this option but it was an ample amount of wine for the price.

The meal started with a choice of freshly baked oregano or whole grain bread along with an olive oil tasting.  I can't pretend that my pallet is refined enough to know the difference between the oils, but they were all good with bread and we ate all of them and asked for seconds.

The first step off of the menu started a theme that continued through the meal.  Degustacion de papas was potatoes served a few different ways.  There were mashed, roasted, fried and delicious.

Each step was completely different.  We enjoyed llama, shrimp, deer, beets and all of them made with ingredients from Argentina.  It helped that they were all quite pretty to look at too.

Beets served multiple ways, delicious just like the potatoes, but there is something about pureed beets that makes me think of the opening credits to Dexter.

I also appreciate a pre-dessert palate cleanser.  It doesn't take away from the dessert, but gives you something sweet prior to the real deal.  This particular course had a great fruit sorbet, topped with peppercorns, a strange and surprisingly solid pairing.

For the next degustacion we had apples.  This time there were more ways than I thought possible to prepare apples on the plate; a fried apple chip, pureed apples, thinly sliced "raw" apples, an apple sorbet, some sort of apple gelatin surrounded by a cold apple broth.  Good, clean, fresh except the gelatin, which is never a good idea in my mind.

The final course, the real dessert was a ying/yang chocolate dish.  The chocolate was rich and tasty, and the presentation was cool, the waitress poured the two sauces at the table, but the white chocolate was a miss.  It was served cold while the dark chocolate was served hot, which added to the fact that in contrast there was no flavor to the white chocolate - it was more milk-y than dessert-y.  Don't get me wrong, I ate the whole thing, but that would be my response if anyone ever asked :).

This was a great meal, quiet atmosphere and interesting food all at a decent price here in Buenos Aires.  It also gives me more reason to return to San Telmo, a place I rarely go after dark.  Our next visitors looking for a fun place to eat should keep this one in mind!  We will certainly be back.

One Table with Hernan Gipponi

 As I alluded to in my previous post, last week we tried a different, semi-closed restaurant while Ted and Kyra were in town.  We first heard the name Hernan Gipponi when he partnered with our friend Chef Mun last month to host a joint dinner in Buenos Aires.  After that, Pick Up The Fork wrote a thorough post regarding the entire experience, which was enough to make me pick up the phone and make a reservation.  The restaurant is in the hotel Fierro in Palermo (Soler 5862, Palermo, 3220-6820), reservations are required, and the One Table concept is only available on Monday nights.  If you are able to jump through those hoops, clear your calendar for Mondays and jump on in.

As expected, there is one, joined table in the restaurant with 14 seats, so you'll be sitting with anyone else who has a reservation that night. We were hoping for a local experience with a local chef for our visitors, hilariously, there was only one Argentine at the table.  And he is married to an American.  Chef Hernan seemed slightly uneasy by the 100% English speaking dinner, and he cut some of his food descriptions a bit short - I think for fear that we weren't all keeping up.

The restaurant is small, but perfectly decorated. One wall has a large window to see right into the kitchen action.  The opposite wall has one of the coolest photography collages I have ever seen. Black and white, close-up and long distance, they are all food related photos - a mix of ingredients, cooking utensils, and food preparation methods that set the mood for the rest of the evening.  This brilliant idea may make it's way into my home someday...

We were met at the restaurant door by an English speaking hostess that offered us a bloody mary while we waited for the rest of the guests - and after seeing my super-baby-belly, immediately asked if I wanted a virgin version.  Strangely enough, I received a virgin bloody mary while everyone else received some sort of refreshing grapefruit-lime-vodka-spritzer garnished with either a sage leaf or bay leaf that I was told was very good.

We were served a panko-breaded shrimp in tzatziki sauce as we waited to sit down, and then again once we were seated. The shrimp was crispy and hot, the sauce was tangy and citric but it was one of the less memorable dishes of the night - not the one I would choose to offer twice.

The set table has some great touches. Handwritten menus (written by the chef) both in English and Spanish, pristine kitchen towels that matched the menu colors which served as napkins, bread served in small burlap sacks and condiments like olive oil, Patagonian sea salt, pickled turnips and cucumbers available for all to share.  

The second tapa course was a smoked salmon dish served with a sour-cream-based-creme-fraise-style sauce and a thinly shaved fennel salad. There was one dish for every two diners, and ours was gone in a matter of minutes. I forget how good fennel is when someone knows what they're doing, for me it always tastes like licorice.

The next tapa was steak tartar with crispy onion rings served with a side of guacamole.  The combination itself is interesting, but everything went together with a great mix of textures, flavors and temperatures.

Another nice service note, the staff brought me a plate of tiny empanadas during these courses, again due to the pregnancy.  I enjoyed the garnishes and sides on both of these dishes, but only taste-tested the proteins themselves.  Por las dudas...

So, here's where it got a little more interesting for me.  Something I have never seen on a menu, veal heart.  It looks and tastes just like beef, not surprising I guess - since it is beef, but the concept just messed with my mind for this course.  It was served with oversized lima beans and a salad of pickled items, both of which added to the texture of the dish but remained neutral with regard to flavor.

I really enjoyed the fact that the chef was visible throughout our meal, and personally served a few of the courses.  The first appearance he made for the presentation of a dish was the final tapa, a soft-boiled egg served over a bed of hummus with veal broth poured by Hernan himself.  Cool presentation and I loved the serving dishes - though submerging hummus in broth was a mix of items that I would have done without. The dish was flavorful and interesting - and especially for those that love a yolk-y egg.

On to the main dishes.  That's right - we were still at appetizers until now.  This was a huge plus in the evening, there were so many dishes to try, each one more interesting and creative than the other and there was enough food to leave everyone satisfied.

The catch of the day was linguado (sole, for all of us English speakers...) and it was cooked perfectly.  Flaky, moist and served over fresh veggies - delicious.

Next up, a dish called Bomba Rice Abanda whose description had me lost in translation. Basically, it is a rice and seafood dish, plated at the table and served with aioli sauce on the side.  I have to say, this dish could have been skipped.  In contrast to the other courses, this one lacked flavor and took up lots of valuable real estate with the amount of rice.  Considering how much food was served, I left space for the other dishes that had more wow factor for me.

Then came the rabbit.  Yep, we had Peter Cottontail and his baby cow friend in the same night. 

The chef, again, came out to wow the table - this time he cooked the meal right in front of us. He took rabbit tenderloins (or the equivalent of, I'm not up to speed on my rabbit meat cuts) and placed them on a fire-hot griddle in the middle of the table.  He then plated the meat on a spiced carrot puree with a handful of steamed vegetables.

This dish was outstanding.  The meat was cooked perfectly, the vegetables were light and al dente. A great course all around.

One of the smartest moves of the evening was to end with a light and fresh dessert.  After all of this food, something like a chocolate volcano or a dulce de leche stuffed crepe is far too heavy (though don't misunderstand, I would scarf down almost any dessert in its entirety).  The mixture of tangerine sherbert, fresh strawberries and what the chef refers to as a vanilla cloud was perfect.

Of the other guests around the table, there were at least three people referring to the blog posts they were going to write on their experience at One Table, so there are sure to be lots of opinions available soon.  In my opinion, this was a great place to take guests, a unique dining experience - even in a city full of surprises - and you should absolutely jump at the opportunity to spend a Monday night at One Table.

New York, New York Resto Bar Gourmet

We celebrated another birthday here in Buenos Aires, Jon turned 32!  As I searched for candles for this year's cake, it amazed me that we had the "29" candles from the first year we lived here.  That means we've been in Buenos Aires for FOUR birthdays, incredible.

Anyways, after our family party at home, we spent last weekend at dinner with friends at a new place called New York, New York Resto Bar Gourmet in Palermo (Fitz Roy 2192, Palermo, 4776-6118).  We heard about this place from the SaltShaker blog, which gave the place a favorable recommendation.

Our reservation was at 9:30pm, and we sat down to a completely empty restaurant.  There are only 10 - 12 tables in the place, though it feels smaller than it should due to all of the decorating "noise"; Christmas lights, sparkly red, white and blue garland, large patriotic flower arrangements and Marilyn Monroe fabrics everywhere.

The menu was all over the place, which we knew going in.  There is KFC-style chicken alongside macaroni and cheese, tacos, Thai salad and BBQ pork, so when the waiter suggested a 5-course tasting menu, we jumped on board.  The waiter gave us the option of 5 courses chosen by the chef, or choose whichever 5 courses we wanted off of the menu.  In a stranger turn, each of our 7-person party could choose their own 5 courses.  This seemed an unlikely situation for a restaurant of this size, there were at most, two people in the kitchen working, we were no expecting these two people to make up to 35 different dishes for our table.  I'm still convinced that the waiter was unsure of the options and was making it up as he went.  Either way, we asked for the chef's selections for the entire table.

We started with the Thai salad, which was very good and presented in a really pretty bowl.  It was the best Thai-style salad that I've had in Buenos Aires.  Tasty, light, and full of a variety of vegetables.  Good going, course 1.

Course 2 was a squash soup.  Also tasty, nicely presented, and served with a delicious toasted bread slice with basil oil drizzled on top.  Another win, though the time between courses was a disturbing 45 minutes.  It seemed excessive considering that at this point, there were only 4 other people in the restaurant outside of our table.

Moving to course 3, the taco.  It was a tasting menu, so we only received one taco, but it was served with a large flower holder candle holder filled with salsa.  The taco was great, filled with pulled chicken and a little bit of spice.  Again, the only complaint was the time that it took to get to this point in the meal. It was a solid 45 minute wait for this little taco, and at this point it is getting late in the evening...

The meal continued with a sushi course, which did not live up to the quality expectations we had from the rest of the food.  The rice was undercooked and the sushi was pretty tasteless.  Admittedly, I am pregnant, so we asked for all cooked items so the sushi was a bit limited.  That being said, the chef was able to choose any items off of the menu, why he chose this course is unknown.

The main dish was a BBQ pork rib that was outstanding.  The pork fell off of the bone, it was smoky and delicious, and the sauce could have been eaten with a spoon.  It was the highlight of the evening!

At this point, it was 12:30am.  One of our friends had to leave and relieve their babysitter so they missed the delicious BBQ.  The waiter came to the table now and asked if we wanted the next course - which he claimed was part of our tasting menu.  By my count, we are already at 5 courses, so we turned the next dish down - which was salmon - but I'm still perplexed as to why we were even given the option.  Since it was a birthday dinner, we stayed for dessert - which took another 45 minutes and had the option of a cupcake, banana split or brownie.  I was the only one who ordered the cupcake, which was just ask well, and as it was delivered the entire dish was dropped in front of me, flipped over and went all over the table.  No worries, everything was cleaned up and a new cupcake was served.  Or the same one with some new sprinkles on top....  The cupcake was dry, my search for a good cupcake in Buenos Aires continues.

So at the end of the day, it was a four hour dinner.  We left at 1:30am.  The food was good, but with the competition in the area, one block from Osaka, Sudestada next door, I'm not sure that this place will survive.  Between the confusion of the staff and the time it took to eat a meal, I'm certain that no one in our group will return.  The menu prices are right, we had 2 bottles of wine and the food mentioned above for AR$200 per person - but we just about fell asleep at the table waiting for the next dish to arrive.

Olsen

After years of enjoying Tegui on special occasions, we finally visited Olsen, the original restaurant opened by Germán Martitegui.  Olsen (Gorriti 5870, Palermo; 4776-7677) is a Scandinavian restaurant that has been highly recommended since the day we arrived, it was due time to give it a try.  The front wall of the restaurant was completely open and spilled onto an outdoor covered terrace, which is where we sat.  The waiter greeted us in Spanish, but then switched to English for the remainder of the meal.  This is something that doesn't bother me as it does some people, I'm fully aware of my appearances as a foreigner, but it was funny that we were fully capable of communicating in Spanish and yet he tried desperately to struggle through in English anyway.

The first item given to us was the vodka list, then the drink list, then the wine list....followed by the food menu - so you know where their priorities lie.  I know virtually nothing about vodka, but our friends were impressed with a specific traditional style of vodka and the way it is served, ice cold in shot glass which is then kept on ice at the table.  It looked very chic, though my pregnant belly prohibited me from doing anything but look.  The inevitable bread course, a staple in Buenos Aires, was a spindle of bagels - interesting and fun, though they were quite dry.

The menu had just undergone a change, and the night we visited Olsen was the first night of a few of their menu items.  The items were so new that after 20 minutes of sitting at our table a hostess said that the English versions had just been delivered to the restaurant if we wanted an English menu.  We did quite alright with the Spanish version - though I appreciate the offer.

Between the four of us at the table, we tried all three new dishes:

I had a grilled chicken with goat cheese potato cakes.  This was outstanding.  The chicken was moist and flavorful and nicely accompanied by a non-cream based dill sauce.  I will take this opportunity to say that there have been very few times I come across dill on any menu in Argentina, Olsen was an exception.  Dill was present in the majority of menu items, in interesting ways that I completely appreciate.  Hats off to dill.
The goat cheese potato cakes were also quite tasty, though there was so much cheese that they were almost overpowering.  I ended up eating them separate from the chicken - they were almost a meal in their own right.  Goat cheese, another rarity in BA, though I will say this version was for the extreme salt-lover.

Jon ordered the lomo, I think.  At this point the dinner was a few weeks ago and we are both a bit sleep deprived so neither of us can remember.  This is not a poor reflection on the restaurant, I do remember his plate being clean when he was done...

Our friends went for the seafood items on the menu.  The first was also a new addition to the menu, the mussels, strangely enough served with large-cut french fries (shown in the background).  The only suggestion here was that the sauce is so good, there should have been some bread to help make the most of the dish.

The second item was a salmon pizza, made without flour.  I'm still trying to figure out how this works.  I believe it was a polenta-based crust, covered with salmon, arugula and pancetta.  I would make a terrible food critic, all I remember was that this was also very good.  Salmon pizza, who knew??

The dessert was, unfortunately, the lamest of the courses.  We ordered the "Giant Oreo Cookie" with high hopes, and though it was a fine dessert that we all finished, there was no comparison to the other dishes.  The cookie itself was a bit dry, the filling was a strange middle-ground between cream and icing.

The moral of the story is: Don't save room for dessert.  The meals are so packed with flavor, interesting combinations and quality ingredients that there is no need to stop yourself during the primary food courses.  I didn't even get a picture of the appetizer, we ordered a 3-part smoked fish plate (this had a much nicer name on the menu, though the menu is not posted on their bare-bones webpage and I cannot remember the name to save my life...).  The dish consisted of smoked salmon, trout and caviar - the salmon and trout were delicious, I wasn't brave enough for the caviar.

Olsen lived up to it's numerous recommendations, the food was outstanding and the atmosphere was great on a summer night. The interior of the restaurant is a modern, angular warehouse feel, so I will reserve this spot for terrace-friendly evenings.  Preferably when I can enjoy one of their numerous cocktails the next time around....

Bar Sur Tango Show

"Have you and Jon started tango lessons?" is one of the most asked questions we get - especially from visitors.  The answer is that we have not, and really don't intend to - it's just not our scene.

It is absolutely a scene here though, if you want to tango, you can pretty much choose when, where and with whom you would like to go.  There are private and formal lessons, shows, clubs, shoes, clothes, books and everything in between.  I know people who claim to go tango dancing 6 nights a week.  And I believe them.  And I'm simultaneously impressed and confused by this obsession.

We waited until we had a group of visitors that were interested in attending a tango show, and finally, 3.5 years into us living in the world of tango, we visited a show.  We took a recommendation from a co-worker of Jon's to avoid the "tourist-y" tango shows and go to a local place that offer a more intimate experience.

Let me just say right now: Tango Show = Touristy Tango Show.  There is no other show.

Don't get me wrong, there are a zillion shows to choose from, some of the most popular being Tango Porteño, Madero Tango and Los Angelitos, but they are all aimed at tourists, no matter what anyone (including TripAdvisor) says.  Now, this isn't necessarily a bad thing.  It's funny how people visiting another country or culture seem to want to steer clear of being a tourist.  But, you are a tourist when you visit somewhere new - it cannot be helped.  Sometimes, the things that make something touristy is the exact reason you want to do it, some other person who visited told you how great it was.  They were also tourists!  Moving on.

Bar Sur was the recommended show we made the reservation for both dinner and the show and took the trip out to San Telmo.  Now, I will say that the day we had available for attending a tango show was during the week, which played into our decision to attend Bar Sur.  They have a "rolling" show that starts at 9pm and you can leave whenever you're ready.  Most of the other shows have a start and finish time, and we were worried that we wouldn't get home until early the next morning if we went somewhere else.  And Jon has this pesky job that he has to get up for.

Bar Sur is located in San Telmo (Estados Unidos 299 & Balcarce), at a corner place that looks really cool from the outside.  Before even walking in, the waiter (who wore many different hats, he was the only employee I saw interacting with customers) advised us that for a group our size (7 people) we would want to sit in the "balcony". Now, this place is tiny.  The balcony was nothing more than a 3-step-up platform where the owners were storing extra tables.  There were only 5 normal chairs in said balcony, and the 2 lucky extra folks got to sit at high top chairs and tables - each at their own since there was so much extra storage around us we couldn't even get them at one table.  The 5 of us that had normal-height chairs sat around 2 tiny round cocktail tables.  It was less than comfortable.

But that's alright, we weren't there to have a conversation  we were there to watch tango.  There were two options when it came to food/drinks/show: the dinner and show option (according to the menu and website includes a 5-course meal and the show) or just pay for the show and buy food and drink a la carte.  I will add that the menu price was 20% more than the price listed on their website (not super-surprising, considering the 30% inflation rate here), but that both options were, let's say, not cheap. The waiter came to take our drink order and informed me that the dinner & show option was a rip off and we should go a la carte.  This was good advice - and he rattled it off in speedy Spanish, thank goodness for language lessons.  Even with the a la carte option, the food, drinks and prices were laughably expensive.  Jon ordered a soda, which was AR$40 (even at the more expensive restaurants in the city, this would be $25 or $30) and only got one small glass of non-refillable Coke.  I'm pretty sure the staff was enjoying the rest of the Coke bottle (there is little to no fountain beverages seen in restaurants here).  Wine was easily four times the amount we've paid elsewhere.  The price for an order of pizza (which was one of the 5 courses included in the dinner price) was three times the normal price and only included 3 slices of a personal sized pizza.  It was ridiculous.  I will say that the prices - in conjunction with the horribly presented and possibly microwaved food - ruined the experience for me.  Luckily, we have very tolerant guests, and they were able to completely enjoy the show.

As I mentioned above, I don't have a point of comparison, but the show seemed good. There were 2 sets of dancers, a singer, and this 3-man-band that was great to watch.  Especially the accordion player. Talk about a dying breed! This guy was great - his expressions, the feeling in the music and the cool velvet blanket that goes with his instrument - very cool.  He was who we were all talking about on the ride home.

The dancers were great, two different couples that had very different styles.  They made the most out of the very small space available to dance.  The women's legs seemed to be on hinges with the way they could swing them around, very cool to watch.

There was also a singer, who did an introduction to the bar and welcomed everyone.  She was good, though the most striking feature about her was her height - she must have been six feet tall.  She had a nice voice, though the way she stood in the middle of a restaurant and sang bleeding heart tango songs had a slight awkward sense to it.  I give her credit - I couldn't do it.

We stayed until 11:00pm or so, then decided to head home.  Our bill was absurd considering the product, but we consoled ourselves with hoping that the entertainers got a cut.  I'll also point out that the doors behind all of the entertainers in these photos were the single bathroom doors - so be sure to make a bathroom stop before heading out for Bar Sur - unless you want a whole restaurant of people to see you walking in under the spotlight. Not a place we will go again - or recommend to friends. We may decide to try another tango show at some point, but it will take a while to get the sour taste of this place out of my mouth.

El Mirasol

After three years of avoiding the Recova area, we finally gave in and went to dinner at El Mirasol.  The Recova is a little pocket of restaurants on Posadas between Cerrito and 9 de Julio.  We have heard good things about El Mirasol, but were always hesitant to try it since these restaurants tend to attract a largely tourist crowd.  We were missing out - the place was packed and the food was really great - we should have been more open minded.

We started out with the provoleta and the fried beef empanadas - our friends were specific - they had to be the fried empanadas even though they can be ordered alternative ways.  Cooked cheese is always delicious, it's hard to mess that up.  The empanada was great, crispy on the outside and shredded beef on the inside - a real winner.  You need to be careful at this stage though, there are some large cuts of meet on the menu - prepare yourself.

We shared a side of vegetables, we ordered them grilled and they were really simple and tasty. In the background you'll see the potatoes noisette that we ate very little of.  They were good, but the rest of the meal trumped the little potatoes.

The Lomo

The menu was typical of a parilla, lots of meat options including strange parts that we do not order, but the sizes were enormous.  There is a tenderloin to share that was listed as 1650 grams (~3 1/2 pounds), so you know they're not joking around.  The guys decided on more normal cuts, a 300g lomo and a normal sized ojo de bife both of which were perfectly cooked.  I think this lomo wins for the best flavor I've had in the city - it was really great.

I ordered the peruvian chicken, the 1/4 chicken option (which was the smallest one) and it was still enormous.  Moral of the story, you don't need to orde as much as you think - the portions are large and in charge!

Ojo de Bife

The chicken dish - you can't even see the chicken

El Mirasol is a great local option, it's too bad that we waited so long to try it out.  If you're looking for a nice parilla with large portions this is a great place.

El Burladero

Two of our favorite restaurants, Fervor and Sottovoce, are owned by the same company.  One of Jon's coworkers told him about a new concept to the same company, El Burladero, and we went to try it out 2 days later.

El Burladero (Uriburu 1488, between Peña & French, 4806-9247) is the newest theme for this restaurant group, and though it just opened in August of this year, it has received overwhelmingly great reviews in every outlet I have found.

We just barely got a reservation for the night we wanted to come in, the only time slot they had available was 10:30pm, and it was completely packed when we arrived AND when we left.

The restaurant is simply decorated, lots of framed pictures and Spanish artifacts lining the walls.  There are large chalkboards advertising signature dishes and a few seats at the bar for folks - like us - who need to wait until their table is ready.  As as perk of waiting, they offer you the choice between a glass of champagne or a small draft beer - the beer is nothing special but it is rare to find anything on draft in the city.

Once we were at a table, we were offered the same great selection of bread they have at Sottovoce and Fervor, and they have an appetizer list filled with tapas and seafood.

Each main course dish is large enough to share, though we decided to go against the waiter's suggestion and order three dishes for our group of 4 people.  As a result, we had enough food for 8 people, and the waiter gave us an "I told you so" look that was virtually caught on film.  This was him dishing out our paella, the smaller portion which was more than sufficient for 4 people.  There are a few different types of paella to choose from, we chose the seafood option, though there are at least 3 other varieties.

Many of the dishes can be ordered a la carte, you can choose the protein (fish, chicken, beef, seafood...) the side and the way you want it to be prepared.  We chose the fish of the day, served with grilled vegetables "Spanish style"and a chicken dish served with rice and a saffron sauce.

 All of the entrees were tasty, fresh and quite different from anywhere else we've eaten in the city.  The chicken dish was a little low on meat, but considering the amount of extra food we had, I'm not complaining.  This is a great addition to our eating out repertoire, we are happy campers!