You Can't Go Home Again? Or Mistaken Ordering?

 I am no vegetarian.
My last trip to Argentina I had a mind-blowingly delicious steak at tourist and local stalwart La Brigada. Delicious though it is, La Brigada is not generally the kind of restaurant I frequent. It is fairly expensive in a country where good, affordable, delicious food is everywhere. The menu has an English translation (which generally sends me running for the hills). La Brigada is not a secret dive. The waiters are all charming, serve with a flourish and generally speak English. More strikes against it.
But, even Anthony Bourdain could not argue with the beef I remember from my last trip.

 Seated for an early lunch I quickly perused the near endless list of beef, lamb, goat cuts and offal available.

Mojellas, Argentine style grilled sweetbreads, are the food I crave and can rarely find outside of the land of the gaucho. These are maybe the best I have ever had -- and believe me, I've had them everywhere. Crisp exterior, delicate creamy interior, brought to life with just a squeeze of lemon. I think my eyes rolled back in my head after just one bite.

I should have stopped there.

 Next from the a la carte menu of grilled delights, chinchulines de cordero -- grilled lamb's intestines. Why did I decide to branch out? I usually order the beef version of these crispy, fatty, crunchy oddities and love them. The lamb version, at least as served at La Brigada,  just don't have the same depth of flavor, the same ratio of chewy to brittle, the same overwhelming whoosh of delight.

Clearly I was flustered when the waiter questioned my choice to not order, as he called it, "meat." I capitulated and allowed him to steer (no pun intended) me towards bife de chorizo, a monster sized strip loin steak.  I know better. This more than man-sized cut did not have the toothsome flavor of thinner or more exercised Argentine cuts I prefer (and will be tasting soon). In fact -- in a first for any steak I have had in this beef loving country -- La Brigada's offering was actually dry and chewy. I was so shocked I left it standing on the plate. Another first.

I blame myself. Like a restaurant rookie I ordered fast and -- in a hurry to get to an afternoon meeting, didn't order well. I'll go back to La Brigada and try again. In the meantime I will linger in the memory of the most delicious sweetbreads ever -- and make sure to order them again.

Restaurante Botin

I stood there on the street waiting with the other saps. As passing tourists, guide books in hand, gazed anxiously into the window of the still closed restaurant, I resented Botin more and more. I felt my inner Anthony Bourdain welling up from the pit of my stomach.

I resented Botin, purported to be the oldest continually operating restaurant in the world, because I wanted to go. More specifically because everyone wanted to go. It wasn't a secret. I wasn't the only American. And yet. I couldn't walk away. I had to know I could be granted a table. I hated myself for being such a sucker. I was loosing food cred by the second.

"Pity," said the officious gentleman guarding the door when I revealed I did not have a reservation. Steeling myself to be turned away I heard him instruct one of the staff to escort me downstairs. I was in.

Clearly this charming cellar, a room that would have delighted me in any other restaurant, is where Botin chooses to corral their foreigners. Americans, Germans, English and a lovely pair of Italian girls on vacation. Everything but Spaniards. I assume the upper floors where passer-bys can see in were filled with Spanish speakers to give the next group of excited eaters, tour books in hand, a moment's joy thinking they were the only ones to have tracked down the locale -- which in spite of it's obvious fame - is a bit tricky to locate.

Thus far Spain has been a three ham a day country. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But I decided to branch out. Roasted peppers and salt cod. Buttery vegetable crowned with a light vaguely vinegary dressing of fish. Crusty bread and I was starting to feel pretty good.All that resentment melted away into abject joy when I spied the irresistibly crispy exterior of this mountain of roast lamb. Cooked on the bone in the wood fired oven that is the restaurant's claim to fame, every bite brought a rush of juicy well done meat and the crunch, that intoxicating crunch. Crisp, delicious savory meat. I could tell the Germans across the room, who had ordered badly, were jealous when they saw my plate. Potatoes are nice, anywhere else fried eggplant would have been a star but at Botin meat is the hero.

I skipped dessert to carry the flavor of that charred meat on my walk to the hotel.

I am a sucker. A sucker who eats well.

In The Footsteps of Anthony Bourdain

I don't generally try to walk where Bourdain has walked. I don't see a meal of seal in my future or even cobra heart. But here in Vancouver I found myself literally across the street from one of the milder weird food outlets he has profiled, the local phenom known as Japadog. That's right, hot dogs (and brats, sausages, veggie and turkey dogs) done Japanese style with wasabi mayo, teriyaki sauce, bonito flakes, grated radish, edamame -- all the usual suspects layered on a toasty bun. The photo above shows our Tonkatsu -- fried pork cutlet (instead of a dog), below is one of today's specials -- a rice cake instead of a roll and really delicious stewed beef (Japanese chili?) on a waiting frank. On the side? Shaken fries treated to your choice of topping. We went for chopped crisp seaweed -- now that's a snack worth going back for.

That little yellow bag? Just one store down waits a great Japanese import. The custom filled, painfully delicious, cream puff's from Beard Papa on a great lunch block in Vancouver, BC.

Italian Fried Chicken

Giada De Laurentiis brings out the secret, hidden Anthony Bourdain (culinary bad boy, demon seed, professional hater -- take your pick) in me. She seems like a perfectly nice woman and yet everything about her irritates me. I cannot stand to watch her show (any of them) or hear her voice, am annoyed by her Italian style made in China cookware, and think her recipes are pedestrian at best -- except for one. Without knowing where it came from I tried a recipe for Italian fried chicken which became an immediate hit around here. And it's so simple. I marinate a cut up chicken in 1/4 cup of lemon juice, 1/4 cup of olive oil and 1 1/2 tsp salt. I let that sit in the fridge for at least a couple hours if not a whole day. Then I sprinkle the chicken with pepper, dredge it in flour and fry it in hot olive oil until it is golden brown and superbly crisp. Fried in hot olive oil, crispy delicious, lemony, and I got the idea from Giada. The shame of it all.

Les Halles

Culinary bad boy Anthony Bourdain's orignal New York outpost, Les Halles, is a busy cheerful restaurant specializing in the straight forward fare of French bistros. Not particularly inventive (although when it first opened there were few like it in the states) but unpretentious and executed with finesse.

The menu features onion soup, classic terrines, and the specialty -- steak frites. I had to order the dish what many claim are the city's best fries.

Reliable and something for everyone, that's Les Halles. Feeding the city like it's Paris market name sake once did.