Buenos Aires – Had an invitation from an old friend from New York who picked up and moved to Buenos Aires about 7 months ago. She’d never been here before, but friends told her she’d like it, and she does! Kudos to Heather for the gumption to just up and go!
Anyway, she is now working with local wineries to help them establish export routes, and sponsors local wine and art evenings at the local Galeria Sara García Uriburu. She supplies the wine, the gallery owner supplies the art. It all works out. Fascinating works of artist Pedro Zel, simple but powerfully graphic.
Afterwards, went with my friend Michael (who also picked up and moved here about the same time, but he’d been here on vacation before) to Bis-a-bis, a trendy and rather well designed restaurant in the Bel Air Hotel (Arenales 1462). The menu is all over the map, but I guess you could call it “fusion” cuisine – Argentinian with whatever the chef wanted to fuse it with. Had a delicious mussel soup with saffron, a very nice plate of sweetbreads and kidneys, and a spectacular lime mousse.
Tried two different wines from the Don Cristobal winery, their Verdelho (amazing!) and their Bonarda (good but light). The verdelho is highly recommended… by me!
[…] For dinner we had planned on re-visiting the szechuan restaurant I’ve enjoyed in the past, El Dragón (see July 27th), but unfortunately it turned out to be closed. Maureen had noticed Bis-a-bis, which I’d also enjoyed, and we headed there. I wish I could say I was equally happy this time, but I’d be lying. Service was scattered, starting with an argument between two waitresses about 20 feet away from us over who had to take our table. It was slow, our waitress was carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders and wasn’t above making it obvious. And the food this time was rather disappointing. A decent salad, but a plate of half a dozen soggy, flavorless fried calamari rings started dinner. For main courses a steak that was clearly overdone and a bowl of insipid argula gnocchi tossed with cherry tomato halves and canned black olives and nothing else. At least there was salt, pepper, olive oil, and parmesan on the table to toss it with. Even the lime mousse that I’d liked so much the last time seemed a bit listless, though that may just have been that the meal had been colored by the rest of the experience. We also were served the wrong wine, though didn’t notice it until midway through the evening – not that we were charged more or anything, it just wasn’t what we’d picked (my own fault for not asking to see the label before the waitress served it, but we were deep in conversation). […]