It was a lovely birthday weekend, thanks for asking!
Friday launched it, with a delightful lunch outdoors at Roux, Peña 2300, Recoleta, just around the corner from us. Among the delights sampled, a plate of fried frog’s legs with a cilantro based provencal sauce and roasted vegetables; and a whole quail, which was supposed to be stuffed with carrot puree, though it seemed to be a fresh corn humita, more or less like a tamale filling, perhaps it was a mix of corn and carrot. Either way, everything we had, delicious! And later, a quiet eve at home, solo, and a pizza, which I’ll get to in another post on, yes, pizzas (half for dinner, half for Saturday lunch).
I have been thinking about “getting away”, taking a long weekend somewhere. It’s been a year and a half that we’ve been in restricted travel, and as things have loosened up, I keep thinking about just getting out of town, visiting somewhere else in Argentina (international travel still restricted). But each time I approach arranging it, I talk myself out of it, mostly a bit of paranoia about spending hours on a bus, or the onerous procedures at the airport, plus wondering how much stuff I’ll really be able to do in another city – many things are still shuttered, or with heavy restrictions on visiting.
So, baby steps… I went to the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, the national fine arts museum. Pre-pandemic, it’s a place I visited probably once a month, just to wander through and see the new exhibits. This time it was more about just revisiting the permanent collection, and for me, simply doing something that involved going into a public space that wasn’t outdoors. I don’t know if it’s that there’s been a rotation in the permanent collection, only a percentage of it is on display at any given time, or if it’s my last year plus’ delving into the Talmud, but my eye was caught by the first painting above, realizing that amidst all the Catholic New Testament religious imagery, here were Hebrew Bible Esther and Mordecai, writing out the first scroll for Purim, a 1675 painting by Dutch artist Aert de Gelder. That set me looking, and I quickly spotted two more, Belgian painter Hans Speckaert’s 1577 Moses Raising the Bronze Serpent, and Italian artist Luca Giordano’s 1680 Presentation to Jacob of Isaac. I’m sure there are more… next visit!
Saturday evening was a night out with a good friend for some wonderful traditional Japanese food at Izakaya Niji, Iberá 2424 in Nuñez. They’ve expanded their sushi and sashimi options, and I’d asked them in advance to just prepare a started platter for two (you still have to order sushi when you reserve from them), followed by dumplings and pancakes, and, of course, their rocking good clam ramen.
And, Sunday was out with a group of local friends – I made it an open invite – and eight of us met up at KU:L, Av. Carabobo 1107, Flores, my long time favorite spot for traditional Korean fare. We covered the table with way too much food, though we gamely made it through the vast majority of it – dumplings, spicy-sweet chicken wings, seafood and kimchi pancake, and different stir fries of pork, calamari, beef, and chicken gizzards. All, as always, yummy.
