Cow Eating Status

BEFORE AND AFTER….

(1) Brad persevering (2) blood sausage (3) kidneys (4) chimichurri sauce

Brad and I FINALLY went to eat an Argentina parrilla, or steakhouse. Parilla is actually more what you order, which is a roundup of meat cuts grilled slowly with little seasoning other than salt. And instead of A1, they use freshly prepared chimichurri sauce, that’s a mixture of garlic, olive oil, vinegar, peppers and salt.

Brad always researches restaurants thoroughly when we’re going somewhere new and exciting, and our trip to La Florencia around the corner was no different. We were VERY surprised that it had a review in the New York Times. We actually think it was only written 5 days ago, so perhaps we have a critic in our midst.

Anyhow, we were very impressed when a waiter, now our friend Patricio, whisked us into the restaurant and gave us incredible service (he managed to include a lesson on world politics with the meal). Funny enough, Brad and I came in determined to order a parilla for two, and Patricio tried to talk us OUT of it, saying we wouldn’t like it. After conferring briefly, we stuck to our guns. For better or worse…

To explain, a parilla generally includes not only traditional cuts such as asado de tira (ribs), vacio, chorizo (beef sausage) and chicken, but also morcilla (blood sausage), molleja (throat), chiculines (intestines), rinones (kidneys) and teta de vaca (cow teat).

We tried it all. Can’t say we’d do it all again, but we tried it all. We couldn’t determine if we didn’t care for sweetbreads (the inner parts) because we knew what they were or because of the taste and texture.

SO, I will probably not be following through on my plan of eating all of the parts of the cow, inspired by a great blog: http://soundsgoodonpaper.com/.

But I do have plans to eat lamb (cordero) and goat (chivo) here.

Parapente

 

Brad and I decided we needed some adventure in our lives last Wednesday so we thought jumping off a mountain would do the trick. Parapente, or paragliding, is basically jumping off a mountain with a parachute. Do note that the parachute is already deployed, so there’s not that awful falling feeling. I could never skydive.

Trying to make Linda Cooper proud, I found a group that does parapente in our Mendoza coupon book, (in retrospect, that’s probably not how you should choose your paragliding company) and we headed out on Saturday afternoon.

Notes on our Parapente adventure

• The scariest part is not the actual paragliding; it’s the bus ride up the mountain.
• Wind conditions are somewhat important for this activity. Our guides had us wait 15 minutes after we got up there for the winds to calm down. When they didn’t, the guides decided we might as well go anyhow.
• Do not do parapente if you get motion sick easily, such as myself. I was really trying to enjoy the amazingness of the ride and the scenery, but with the wind pulling us up and down and in circles, I had my helmet off in the air ready to hurl. Luckily, I kept it together. But seriously, just barely.
• However, if you are not in the aforementioned category, this is a very calming experience with amazing views, and you should definitely do it. ~$60 US/person

 

From the air

From the ground after I landed

La Vendimia Gaucha or Cowboy Wine Harvest Festival

I read in the newspaper about an upcoming festival in Lujan de Cuyo so I recruited Brad and Gillian to go on an adventure with me. La Vendimia Gaucha is a three-day festival celebrating the gaucho way of life: tradition, folklore, food, dance, artisan products, etc. A gaucho is loosely equivalent to a cowboy.

TRANSPORTATION: The festival was located outside of town in Lujan de Cuyo so it was quite a challenge getting there as no one knew how to get there, including the tourist office. We hopped on a bus to the center of Lujan but found out on the bus that the fairgrounds of Lujan are not even close to the center. So we follow the advice of a kind fellow passenger, get off the bus in the middle of the nowhere, and switch buses. THEN we get off the next bus at the side of a highway. You can’t see the fairgrounds right when you get off the bus so for a good ten seconds we looked at each other like uhh what now?

THEN on the way home, we had to wait a full hour by the side of the highway in the freezing cold. It’s perfect weather during the day but can get pretty cold some nights. Luckily, per usual, locals were extremely friendly and helpful, showing us where to get off the bus and entertained us with their love of Red Hot Chili Peppers, Friends, the Simpsons, Michael Jackson, etc. One of the guys even named his daughter after Liv Tyler because he loved her so much.

To get to the Lujan fairgrounds, you take the 850 bus at Rioja & Pardo. FYI

FOOD: Highlight of the night, obviously. This is only the grill or parrilla of one vendor.

 

Choripan: Grilled sausage on french bread that came with mustard, mayonnaise, lettuce and tomato. We paired our choripan with wine and empanadas. Our wine also came with soda water as many Argentineans like to mix the two but we decided we prefer our wine untainted.

DANCE: Check these videos out to see the traditional dances of the Italian, Spanish and Middle Eastern ancestors that make up Argentina’s diverse population today.

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Asado #2

Brad and I met an expat who’s married to a Mendocina, and they kindly invited us to their house for an asado. Mike and Agustina also have a cute son named Salvador. The asado included chorizo, three kinds of steak including our favorite asado de tira (ribs), salad, grilled onions, garlic, potatoes, squash and of course, Malbec red wine. Mike and Agustina usually eat vegetarian meals (surprising in a country that is known for its red meat) and said they were impressed with how much meat we were able to eat.

Brad’s take on his first asado: “It was delicious. I loved it. ”

Pollo Al Disco!

To pick up where I left off, last Saturday after a full day at the zoo, Brad and I went over to our good friend Pauli’s house (her family had me over for my first asado—sorry, I keep forgetting to get the James Taylor rendition!) for pollo al disco. For anyone who’s been to a Mexican restaurant, you should know pollo is chicken. However, this is not chicken doing the disco.

Pollo al disco is a typical Argentinean dish, which originates from farm workers in rural areas who used to cook on a plow disc.  See photo below.

Our new friend Cristian was the grill master for the evening—it seems among the young couples I’ve met so far in Mendoza, the men do most of the cooking! Including my relationship with Brad  

Brad also finally tried the infamous Fernet, which is a very sour aperitif that is commonly drank here mixed with coke. I actually kinda like it but that’s probably because mine are 90% coke. Brad is trying to pretend to like it—not a very good actor…

Finally, one last discovery for the night: BOP IT also exists in Argentina. See video below.

Technorati Tags: Argentina,pollo al disco,fernet,bop it,mendoza,argentina food,mendoza food

PANCHOS & THE ZOO!

Brad and I experienced several phenomenon over the weekend, including: 1) The Zoo 2) Panchos
1. The Zoo, or Zoologico, in Mendoza is located within San Martin Park.  Brad and I had planned to visit Cerro de la Gloria, which is a bronze monument of fourteen tons that pays tribute to the Army of the Andes for its successful campaign of liberation.  The monument is on top of a high hilltop and on the side of the hill is the zoo.  No one here ever talks about the zoo, in fact they seem kind of embarrassed about it.  But let me clarify:  this is an awesome zoo.  You can get much closer to the animals, and all of them seem a lot livelier than the ones in the U.S.  However, I am concerned about the polar bears as it is very warm and dry in Mendoza.  Additionally, we saw people feeding Chips Ahoy cookies to the monkeys, which is also concerning. 
*Note:  Brad and I saw a squirrel in a cage at a nearby pet store. However, it’s not for sale.
 

Unfortunately, my camera died pretty early on…but we will be visiting the zoo soon enough so I will post more photos in the future.
2. Panchos, or hot dogs, are very popular here. In fact, there’s a whole fast food chain dedicated to them called Mr. Dog. Argentineans are much more creative with their hot dogs, as they can come with avocado, french fries, tomatoes, mustard, mayonnaise, ham, bacon, with cheese, etc.
So, of course, we had to have a pancho once we walked ALL the way to the zoo (bus line #3 that goes to the zoo came by twice and kept going b/c it was already full of people so we had no choice really)…it was already about 2 and we hadn’t eaten anything…Brad gets pretty grumpy when he’s starving so we broke down and had hot dogs.

We ordered ours “raining with fries,” or lluvia de papas fritas.

Bike & Wine with Mr. Hugo

So Brad and I decided to do the famous bike and wine tour in Maipu (just outside of Mendoza) yesterday and it was fantastic. Basically, you take a bus outside of town to Maipu, rent a bike and ride around to the wineries all day. Can’t really beat that.

Things to Note:

1.  Go to Mr. Hugo’s Bikes, not Bike & Wine, etc. There’s a legendary couple, Mr. and Mrs. Hugo, that rent bikes to you all day for 30 pesos ($7) and then when you get back, supply you with unlimited free red wine. I have to share how great of a deal this is: we visited Bike&Wine in town, and although they were very friendly, they wanted to charge us $100 pesos or $150 pesos with lunch. Still doable but 3x the price…and minus the free wine..

In addition to their gregarious, hospitable attitudes and great prices, they also have a great atmosphere and lots of nice animals roaming around. Brad made a new friend…not exaggerating when I say this cat sat in his lap for half an hour and then came back and sat in his lap for another hour.

2. Note that the roads are VERY bumpy after Mitre street. It was pretty painful at moments. They are doing some construction on the main road between the first and second half of the wineries so if you’d like to avoid that, there are plenty of places to visit before that area.

3. This is a MUST do if you can ride a bike…and I’ve heard Maipu is better than Lujan but I’ll have to confirm that for myself.

4. Get some breakfast before you go. We rushed out there for no reason really (although the bus ride on line 10 took about 40 minutes) and there weren’t many places for coffee.

Our Stops:

1) Museo del Vino La Rural: free tour, great museum and explanations, free glass of wine

2) Gas station for coffee (I was dying w/o it)

3) Historias y Sabores: this isn’t really a tour, but more of a tasting of their chocolate, spreads and liqueurs. I wish we had done this after lunch, but I would definitely do this one again. 10 pesos/person for a tasting and we bought the green olive spread and the dulce de leche with hazelnuts spread all for about US $7.

4) Beer Garden: we loved this place. It was like Carrboro all over again with artesanal beer. Also, I must admit on a warm day after biking, I prefer a beer over red wine. I would also suggest eating here if you’re on a budget. Eating at the wineries can be expensive and the beer garden has delicious empanadas (carne) and pizza (only one type: mozzarella and tomato).

		Beer Garden VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

5) Tempus Alba: not really much of a tour—their self-guided tour involves walking outside, up the stairs and down again to read 4 posters on their wine-making, but it’s a classy place with a nice patio to drink a glass of wine. $12 pesos/glass of wine; There’s also a sampling of several of their wines for $30 pesos.

6) Back to Beer Garden for food

7) Mr. Hugo’s

I heard we made a big mistake in not going to A la Antigua to see their olive oil and chocolate. I also heard that Trapiche, one of the biggest wineries, doesn’t do that great of a job with the tour. But all in all, this was a GREAT experience, learned a lot and met a lot of cool people.