I’d forgotten how much more expensive things are here than back home. I mean, I know that Uruguay has always been pricier than in Argentina on past visits, but the difference seems pretty stark right now.

 

From past experience, I know that Montevideo tends to be pretty closed up on Sundays. In nice weather there are lots of street fairs and outdoor music, but with rain and cold, we were afraid that there wouldn’t be a lot to do. Luckily, the weekly “big” street fair, Feria de Tristán Narvaja, primarily focused along the street of the same name, was jammed with not only vendors but shoppers. Not much in the way of things to eat – a few folk selling a fried bite or two, but lots of places to buy either fruits and vegetables, or the wide array of flea market sort of things that pop up at these fairs. Out of the blue, I stumbled across two things of note – a stand selling Boar artesanal beers, from which I picked up a bottle of a “carrot saison” beer, and further investigation led to finding they had some other peculiar beers… more below; and, I found an antique pasta rolling pin, one of those classic, heavy monsters, made out of local lapacha wood.

 

Having had a kind of just average chivito uruguayo on the first round, albeit a classic street food/bar food version, noted in the last post, I felt like I owed Steven a taste of something a bit better than that level. With solid recommendations from two friends, and the agreement of our Uber driver, we headed to Nuevo Expreso Pocitos, Juan Benito Blanco 956 and ordered up a completo. Pluses? A really good steak, and they also grill both the ham and bacon on it, plenty of fresh tomato and lettuce, and bubbly, browned cheese. Minuses? A bun that turned to paste within seconds, a hard boiled egg that was both overcooked and just kind of left whole in the middle of the sandwich, and iffy fries (plus, they don’t have an option to order just the sandwich, without the fries). An expensive sandwich, though, coming in at 425 pesos (and the Uruguayan and Argentine pesos aren’t that different right now, so in home currency, this was 380 pesos, or $14… for a steak sandwich and fries).

 

I’d already had a spot in mind, one I’ve been to a couple of times over the years, and that was my first introduction to the sandwich, 12 years ago, Chiviteria Marcos, Av. Sarmiento 2640 – not the branch I’ve been to in the past. So, I’d declared unilaterally that we’d split one chivito at each of the two spots, just a few blocks apart. Marcos puts out the whole Dagwood (for those of you old enough to get the reference). Pluses? All the flavors, the combinations of pickles and olives and hot peppers and mushrooms, a choice of sauces, and all fresh. Minuses? The steak itself is more “bar” quality, and the ham is just wispy slices of lunchmeat, and, like the one above, the bun just doesn’t hold up, in fact this one, we resorted to knife and fork pretty quickly. Put the three grilled meats from the one above on this sandwich with all the fixings, and the bun from the bar the day before, and we’d have the gold standard. Much cheaper here, too, though, here without fries, still, 310 uruguayan, 275 argentine, $10, isn’t an inexpensive sandwich.

 

There’s not a lot in Uruguayan cooking that’s all that different from Buenos Aires’ classic dishes – it’s a lot of parrilla, steaks, and all the other sorts of dishes that go along with that. Outside of the chivito uruguayo, and a couple of desserts, it looks a lot like home. So, we decided to continue our Sunday Asian food tradition, hoping that we’d have a better experience than the Chinese spot of the night before. Montevideo’s sole Korean restaurant is Myeong Ga, Ciudadela 1347. The place was rocking, especially for a Sunday night – or maybe because of it, there are so few places open, but it was close to full most of the evening. Decent ban chan, though we had to ask for kimchi, which our waitress hadn’t brought, apparently assuming we wouldn’t eat something that spicy.

The biggest issue with the menu is the number of dishes not available as individual portions. I’d guess roughly half of the items on the menu have a “price per person” and then a stated minimum of 2 or 4 people, which, if you’re just two, and want to try more than one dish, eliminates all those dishes from what you might choose. Good dumplings – I liked them more than Steven did. Quite good spicy-sweet fried chicken. But a very disappointing shellfish and noodle dish that turned out to be noodles and cabbage with a desultory few bits of seafood – 3 calamari rings, 2 mussels, and 3 small shrimp (we’d wanted a spicy seafood stir-fry, but it was one of the dishes that required a minimum of a two person order – they said they’d make this noodle dish spicy for us, but didn’t, although they were willing to bring us some gochujang to kick it up a notch).

Outrageously expensive for what you get, and it’s also cash only. For dumplings, two main dishes, a bottle of water and a small bottle of soju, we shelled out 1800 local pesos, 1600 argentine, $59 – for a meal we could eat in Barrio Correa in Buenos Aires for 2/3 of that, or less.

 

The single bottle of carrot beer from the fair above (yes, yes, but we shall see), led me to contact the brewery, and they steered me towards a little coffee shop and gourmet store, located inside a book store, Escaramuza, Dr. Pablo de María 1185, where I popped over to the next morning, had a lovely coffee and a cheese scone (with tip, 240 Uruguayan, 215 Argentine, $7.80). I picked up a beet infused smoked ale and a cardamom infused red ale – 220 apiece (200/$7), expensive, though not ridiculous for craft beers, and they are 635ml bottles.

 

We had originally planned Saturday’s lunch with Eduardo and Adriana at Jacinto, Sarandí 349, a much talked about new addition to the Ciudad Vieja culinary scene, but they’d called and cancelled our reservation at the last minute because they had a private party. It wasn’t clear if they’d forgotten about it when taking the reservation, or simply decided to take the party and cancel the reservations they’d already taken – either way isn’t good customer relations. But I really wanted to try it, so we popped over for lunch on Monday. The food – absolutely delicious, beautiful. We had a very nice starter of cured pork shoulder with pickled pears and whole grain mustard, then this perfectly tender and absolutely amazing octopus with cilantro, chilies, potatoes, and pink peppercorn; and a nearly as good roasted cauliflower dish with prosciutto, almonds, and a citrus fluid gel of some sort. One of the better places I’ve eaten at in Montevideo – it does come at a price – each of those plates ran around 400 local pesos, 355 Argentine, $13 – which by itself wouldn’t be ridiculous, but they tack on a 90 peso apiece cubierto charge (I think the first time I’ve gotten charged a cubierto in Montevideo), and charge 180 apiece for lemonade. I mean, 180 pesos for a bread basket, even if filled with four different kinds of in-house baked breads? All told we shelled out 1800 local for lunch (1600 Argentine, $59).

 

I said I was only going to post standout dishes, and when I said it, I meant that in a good way. But, sometimes something stands out for the opposite reason. We’d decided to grab coffee and dessert at a nearby, and once again highly recommended, cafe, Ceibo Cantina, Sarandí 413. Decent enough coffees, they use Lavazza, so no surprise there. But the two sweets just didn’t do it for us. A dense and dry lemon cream cheese cake was at least edible, but this yerba mate infused creme brulee was… icky. Over-infused, it was so strong it tasted like grass clippings, the custard was broken and grainy, and the sugar topping, instead of a thin, “bruleed” layer that creates a crispy shell, was just a thick layer of coarse, raw sugar that had been melted into a gooey sludge. 600 pesos for two coffees and two bad desserts (533 Argentine, $20).

 

And, finishing up last night, as we’re shortly off to the Buquebus for our return trip across the river, we wanted seafood, and went with one of the highest rated spots in town, El Italiano, República Federal de Alemania Número 1. Now, how this spot got to be one of the top spots, I have no idea. It’s basically a seafood diner, on the rambla, the boardwalk, but hey, maybe they have amazing food? Not so much. Dour service, chilly, and the food, while exactly what the menu states it to be – a plate of prawns al ajillo were cooked right, deveined, and nice and garlicky, and two plates of grilled fish were more or less fine (salmon was overcooked, sole was a little mushy, Chilean sea bass cooked just right), they were accompanied by frozen vegetables – a plate of mixed peas, carrots, corn, and green beans, right out of the bag, boiled, and noisette potatoes right out off the freezer and into the deep fryer. Basically, the only options here are fried and al ajillo shrimp, prawns, or baby calamari for appetizers, and grilled fish or paella for main courses. Pretty much a yawn, until you get the bill, which for those three plates, a bottle of water, and a bottle of local wine (they have limited options), piled up to a massive 2800 local pesos (2500 Argentine, $91) for pretty mediocre fare. That also included a 70 peso apiece, so 140 peso cubierto, for a bread basket that contained 3 individually plastic wrapped dinner rolls from a commercial bakery.

So, that wraps up another visit here. Most of the food, a bit disappointing – two outstanding meals, one really good meal, a couple of really good sandwiches, and the rest, not so much. And pricey. Home will be a welcome sight in a few hours.