Category: Food

Asado: the language of love

Published on by Juliet ELeave a comment

I have been lucky enough to make friends with several local Argentines these last two months. Most of them I met through a classmate, another international student who happens to be well-connected here. It can be difficult to create close friendships across the language and culture barrier, so I’m grateful to have had that opportunity. 

Anyway, one of these friends invited me to an asado last Saturday! An Asado is just the Argentine version of an American barbecue, and if you ever have the chance to go, you absolutely must. I met up at a friend’s house beforehand and played some fútbol video games before heading to the asado around 8 p.m. It was in a provincial suburb about an hour from the center of Buenos Aires, so we took my friend’s car and bumped to Taylor Swift on the way. 

When we arrived, we were greeted by our host and his father and brothers, who were sweating over the grill (la parrilla) while trying to distract their dog from the delicious smell of steak. While we waited for the meat to cook, we drank red wine and Fernet and played ping-pong. Soon enough, our friend and his dad started ferrying plates and plates of meat from the grill to the table: asado and chorizo and pork and kidney and blood sausage and ribs and chicken and more. As you can see, an asado is not quite vegan-friendly. Everything was delicious and perfectly cooked. In Argentina the meat is of such high quality that people hardly season it and rarely use condiments – although I’ll admit I do miss barbecue sauce. 

Here’s just some of the food we enjoyed

As we ate, we discussed politics (of course) and other Argentine affairs. Having local friends has been the absolute best addition to my education because they know the culture at a corporal level and I learn by listening. Plus it’s a great way to learn swear words.

I tried a bit of everything and when I thought I might finally burst, someone ordered several kilograms of ice cream. And once we really truly couldn’t eat anymore, we all laid around like you do after Thanksgiving when you’re so full and so content that you just can’t move. It was beautiful.

It was a blessing to have been welcomed into this world by such wonderful people. I felt so Argentine. I’m confident that this asado will remain one of my favorite memories of studying abroad, not because we ate so well or because we had such a fun time, but because I felt like I belonged there. I was able to fully immerse myself in an entirely new cultural tradition with new friends who were gracious enough to accept me. It didn’t matter how competent I was at Spanish or how much I understood Argentine politics because we were all of us bonding over a meal together. And that truly is a universal language.

Weekend Trip to Capri and Sorrento (Part 1)

Published on by lhnevarezLeave a comment

I was able to go on a school-sponsored weekend trip to Pompei, the Sorrento Coast, and a nice visit to the island city of Capri. This is covering the first day of my three-day, two-night trip.

To start off, I had to wake up early to meet at Piazza Trilussa at 8:30 AM to get on the 4-hour bus ride to start the weekend off with a visit to Pompei. It was a surreal experience walking through the preserved city. It was essentially the same size as some of the other cities I’ve visited but yet it was literally a ghost town lost to time. Our tour guide would point out the markets and the food stalls that used to line the streets, as we walked on the walking stones that would allow room for the carriages and the horses to do their business without causing the citizens to step on the horse’s personal business. We walked through a few houses and were able to get an amazing view of the city of Pompei from on top of a hill made to allow archeologists to survey the land as they unearthed more and more structures. It provided such a wonderful view of the expanse of the city and really allowed you to just appreciate the decades of work people have put into slowly and carefully uncovering a city buried in ash and dust. After we were done exploring the ruins, we had a delicious lunch just outside before heading off to our next location.

We toured a small family-owned pasta-making business, Pasta Cuomo, in Gragnano. One of the owners, Alfonso Cuomo, was incredibly passionate about his craft because he had the chance to reopen and reinvent his family’s business that began in the 1820s. He told us about the way that the city was once built entirely around pasta and how so much of the current block that he resides on used to be a part of the larger structure to help make the pasta for the city. He showed us the way that they used to make pasta and how the old machines used to function and work together to provide the proper foundation needed for creating the pasta. He was a wonderful host, and his passion was very evident in every word he said. Their company also works as a cooking class, bistro, museum, and BNB. I highly recommend checking them out and maybe ordering some pasta from them to help support and maintain a family business that started in the 1820s.

Once we were done there, we arrived at the 4-star hotel that was booked for us and set our stuff down before eating a 3-course Italian meal paired with dessert and more bread than we could handle. The people at the hotel were truly kind and made sure that we had enough water and food to allow us to just relax before we got to rest before our day in Capri.