Restaurants

Buenos Aires offers world-class dining and cuisine at a variety of Argentine and international restaurants. With the collapse of the peso, fine dining in Buenos Aires now is also marvelously inexpensive.

Nothing matches the meat from the Pampas grass-fed Argentine cows, and that meat is the focus of the dining experience throughout the city, from the humblest parrilla (grill) to the finest business-class restaurant. Empanadas, dough pockets filled with minced meat and other ingredients, are also an Argentine staple, sold almost everywhere.

In this section, I'll go over what you can expect to find in Buenos Aires's different restaurants and where certain types of food are found within the city's various neighborhoods.

Buenos Aires's most fashionable places for eating out are all found in Palermo. Palermo Hollywood and Palermo Soho, the two divisions of this neighborhood, are full of trendy hot spots combining fine dining with a bohemian atmosphere in small, renovated, turn-of-the-20th-century houses. These restaurants have attracted some of the city's top chefs, many of whom have received their training in France and Spain. Some of the most exquisite and interesting cuisine in the city is available in the restaurants in Palermo Viejo. The only issue in this trendy area is that many places come and go quite quickly. Both Palermo Viejo and Las Cañitas, another division of Palermo well known for dining and nightlife, are near the D subway line, but the best restaurants are often a long walk from metro stations. That and the 11pm closing of the subway stations means you are best off with cabs to and from these restaurants.

Puerto Madero's docks are lined with more top restaurants, along with a mix of chains and hit-or-miss spots. The Microcentro and Recoleta offer many outstanding restaurants and cafes, some of which have been on the map for decades. Buenos Aires's cafe life, where friends meet over coffee, is as sacred a ritual to Porteños as it is to Parisians. Excellent places to enjoy a cafe con leche (coffee with milk) include La Biela in Recoleta, across from the world-famous Recoleta Cemetery, and Café Tortoni, one of the city's most beautiful and traditional cafes, on Avenida de Mayo close to Plaza de Mayo. These are two places you should not miss if you want to experience Buenos Aires's cafe life.

Porteños eat breakfast until 10am, lunch between noon and 4pm, and dinner late -- usually after 9pm, though some restaurants open as early as 7pm. If you are an early bird diner in the North American and British style, wanting to eat from 5pm on, look for restaurants in my listings that remain open between lunch and dinner. If you can make a reservation, I highly recommend doing so. If you do not want to commit, go to a restaurant at the typical 8pm opening time, when you will almost always arrive to a nearly empty restaurant. However, as the clock hits 9pm, virtually every table at the best restaurants will suddenly become completely filled.

Executive lunch menus (usually fixed-price three-course meals) are served at many restaurants beginning at noon, but most dinner menus are a la carte. There is sometimes a small "cover" or "service" charge for bread and other items placed at the table. In restaurants that serve pasta, the pasta and its sauce are sometimes priced separately. Standard tipping is 10% in Buenos Aires, more for exceptional service. When paying by credit card, you will often be expected to leave the propina (tip) in cash, since many credit card receipts don't provide a place to include the tip. Many restaurants close between lunch and dinner, and some close on Sunday or Monday completely, or only serve dinner. In late December, January, and February, many restaurants have limited hours and service, or close for vacations, as this is the traditional time when Porteños flee the city to the beach resorts. It's a good idea to call ahead of time during these months to make sure you don't make a trip out, only to become disappointed by a closed and locked door.

Though Buenos Aires is a very cosmopolitan city, it is surprisingly not a very ethnically diverse place, at least on the surface. However, the influences of Middle Eastern and Jewish immigrants who came to this city in the wake of World War I are reflected in a few areas. Middle Eastern restaurants are clustered in Palermo Viejo, near the subte station Scalabrini Ortiz, and also on Calle Armenia. Because Once and Abasto were the traditional neighborhoods for Jewish immigrants, you'll find many kosher restaurants along Calle Tucumán in particular. And, because many Buenos Aires Jews are Sephardic or of Middle Eastern descent, you'll also find Arabic influences here.

As there are almost as many Italian last names as Spanish ones, it's hard to call those of Italian descent a specific ethnic group within Argentina as you can in the United States, Canada, or Australia. As such, Buenos Aires's Italian food is Argentine food in essence, and pastas and other Italian dishes are usually folded in with traditional Argentine offerings such as grilled beef. La Boca is Buenos Aires's historic Little Italy, the place where Italian immigrants first settled in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The atmosphere in these restaurants plays on this past and caters to tourists, but this is not where the city's best Italian food is served. Instead, it is usually found in old, simple parrillas that have operated for decades and include pastas on their menus. Throughout this chapter, most of these are in the "Inexpensive" or "Moderate" categories all over the city. Though on the pricey side, check out Piegari in Recoleta's La Recova restaurant area, which has some of the best northern Italian cuisine in the city.

Asians only make up a tiny portion of Buenos Aires's population and, as a whole, have had little effect on cuisine offerings. Still, in keeping with international trends, you'll find sushi bars and other restaurants with Japanese and Chinese influences throughout Buenos Aires. All over the city, you will find sushi fast-food-chain restaurants as well. For Asian authenticity, I also point you to Belgrano's very tiny and little-known Chinatown district. Many Peruvian restaurants have opened up, such as Ceviche, which combine Japanese influences.

If you are looking through these listings and still cannot decide what you want to eat, three areas are so loaded with restaurants of all types, one after another, that you are bound to find something that pleases you. Puerto Madero's historic dock buildings are one such place, and it's a bonus that many of the restaurants here are a bargain. Calle Báez in the Las Cañitas area of Palermo is another such area and is also one of the most happening restaurant scenes in the whole city. Finally, restaurants and bars that serve food surround Plaza Serrano in Palermo Hollywood, with many a good choice for the young, funky, and bargain-minded. All of these areas also have plenty of nearby places for heading out for after-dinner drinks and dancing, so you won't have to move all over the city to spend a night out.

If you still can't make up your mind and want some second opinions, check out www.restaurant.com.ar. It provides information in English and Spanish on restaurants in Buenos Aires and other major cities, and allows you to search by neighborhood as well as cuisine type. Also check out www.guiaoleo.com.ar. Though only in Spanish, it provides a similar excellent service. Finally, look to www.gastronomique.com.ar, which also provides a great overview of Argentine cuisine.

Once in Buenos Aires, look for the De Dios map company's excellent restaurant map in bookstores everywhere, or order it ahead of time at www.dediosonline.com. Many Palermo Viejo restaurants are on a special Palermo Viejo dining map available at most of the restaurants listed in this neighborhood. Many other neighborhoods, such as San Telmo, also have similar maps.

I list exact prices for main courses and group restaurants into general price categories. Many restaurants have gone up significantly in price recently, jumping categories. However, it's all relative, as in many cases, prices overlap within categories, and sometimes a single menu item, such as lobster, might push an ordinarily "Inexpensive" restaurant into a "Very Expensive" category. In short, take a look at the specific prices, which are expressed in a range. With the current exchange rates, it is difficult to overspend on food in Argentina and you rarely go wrong anywhere you eat in this city. Inexpensive restaurants have main courses ranging from under $3 (£2.15) to about $8 (£5.70). Moderate restaurants have prices ranging from around $5 to $12 (£3.55-£8.50). Expensive restaurants have main courses at about $10 to $20 (£7.10-£14). Very Expensive restaurants range from about $15 to $50 or more (£11-£36). Remember that in all restaurants, lunch is usually cheaper, and that there may also be Executive or Tourist menus, which afford a very reasonably priced, three-course meal. Tips, drinks, desserts, other menu items, as well as table service and the unavoidable charge for bread and spreads, will add to your costs. Keep in mind also that, while English is becoming more and more prevalent in Buenos Aires, less expensive restaurants tend to have fewer English speakers on staff.

Bares y Cafés Notables -- If you want to dine in an atmosphere recalling the glory days of Buenos Aires's past, choose one from the list of nearly 40 bares y cafés notables, historic restaurants, cafes, and bars that have been specially protected by a law stating that their interiors cannot be changed. Known as Law No. 35, this special protection granted by the city of Buenos Aires was passed in 1998 and updated in 2002. I list many of these special establishments in this section, including Café Tortoni, La Biela, and Bar El Federal. Naturally, based on age, these notables cluster in Monserrat, Congreso, La Boca, and San Telmo, the city's oldest areas. Ask the tourism office for the map Bares y Cafés Notables de Buenos Aires, which lists them all and includes photographs of their interiors. If you really like the atmosphere in these unique spots, you can bring a part of them home with you, as they all sell a coffee-table book with photos from these wonderful places.

Wine Tasting -- Part of what makes a meal in Buenos Aires so good is the fine wine selection, specially chosen to complement beef, chicken, fish, and other items on the menu. Most Argentine wine comes from the Mendoza district, bordering the Andean mountains. Malbecs make up most of the best, with cabernets, champagnes, and even grappas on the menus in the humblest restaurants. If you know nothing about wine, you may want to take a wine-tasting class, to make sense of the selections and suggestions offered by the waiter or sommelier. One of the city's best is run by the Hotel Alvear's Cave de Vines, which will run you about $50 (£36) per person. You'll get about an hour with a sommelier, who will explain the grape-growing process, the harvest, and how the wine is actually produced as you sample different wines and taste with various appetizers from different regions of Argentina. Like fine diamonds, wine is judged by color and clarity, and you'll learn what to look for in every glass, as well as how to pair wines with food. Other points include discerning taste and scent points, as well as how to hold a glass of wine without damaging its contents with your hand's own body heat.