Headed to the San Telmo market this afternoon, while trying to avoid the prolific number of dog droppings, I noticed that all the side walks are different. It appears that each store owner/building owner is responsible for the side walk in front of their building. Most seem to be some sort of tile, some fancier than others, and many are often broken. This combination of broken tile, occasional gaping hole, and smattering of dog feces invariably means that 99.8% of your time while walking is spent looking at the ground. A bit of a shame in Buenos Aires since the architecture is pretty amazing, especially in the old part of San Telmo, where I was heading.
Sundays in San Telmo there is a market. It is huge. San Telmo is mostly antique stores to begin with (hundreds and hundreds of them with practically anything you can imagine) but on Sunday the road fills with all sorts of vendors, artists, musicians (you can never have enough accordions,) tango dancers, puppeteers, as well as hundreds and hundreds of tourists.
If you want a belt... San Telmo´s the place to go.
Mate gourd? San Telmo.
Handmade three foot princess marionette? You guessed it, San Telmo.
I need none of these things. I decided, being towards the end of the trip, I´d go out on a limb and eat my lunch from the street. A stand selling candied apples, kettle corn and candy coated peanuts (one of my staples in Bolivia) had candied strawberries... with kettle corn precariously stuck to the hard red shell. Had to try it. Next I decided to give the meat and cheese sandwich stand a try. At first slightly turned of by the fact that the meat and cheese was obviously not refrigerated, I reassured myself with the idea that:
a)it was cured meat (my personal choice was the salami)
b)the same stand was here last weekend, and if they were killing tourists with their food they probably wouldn´t be asked back.
It was great. Becoming a little gutsier (and figuring if i did get food poisoning what better place to do it than on my plane to Lima tomorrow) I wanted one of the empanadas a woman was selling from a basket. She was wandering thru the crowd but by the time I had finished my salami and cheese sandwich she had disappeared into the throng of tourists never to be seen again.
Surrounded by shoes, belts, jewelery, clothes, and tacky souvenirs, I realized I needed none of it. I also realized that I was looking at things and no longer translating prices into dollars, I am translating pesos into steak dinners.
"That is a cute shirt... but $35 pesos? I could get a steak and an ice cream for that."
My main reasoning for heading to San Telmo to day was exercise (some how I have to work off the half a cow I eat daily) and of course to steak out restaurants where I can eat another half a cow. I have 2 meals left in Buenos Aires and damn it if I´m going to waste them on bad food.
I was looking for a restaurant with one of the highest ratings in town from guiaoleo.com... a 27 out of 30, with a decent price point $21 pesos. I of course hadn´t written down the address, assuming i could remember it... 747 Boliviar? I know it was 747 some street starting with a B. Well, apparently it wasn´t Boliviar because that appeared to be a boarded up warehouse.
Lucky for me I stumbled across a corner restaurant a bit off the beaten path (meaning the road full of vendors and hundreds of tourists.) Ignoring the man trying to give me a flyer for the place, and not noting the name, I passed by the window to practically be stopped in my tracks. There was a man with what might have been the best looking meal I´ve ever seen. It was a simple white plate with a pastry bowl filled with some kind of extraordinary looking beef bourginone like mixture. Salivating, I had to keep myself from turning around and walking into the restaurant then and there.
Attempting to keep the drool from escaping my mouth and heading for my chin, I made the decision then and there, I know where i´m eating lunch tomorrow... if i can find the place again.
Getting a Cafe Latte Doble at a local cafe I planned out the rest of my day. Eat at Brocollino.
Brocollino is best restaurant I have eaten at while here in BA (actually eaten there twice.) I´ll be getting the Bife de Lomo in the mushroom leek sauce with a side of mashed potatoes. I´ve been looking forward to it all day. It was the best steak i´ve ever had (and at $50 pesos, not the cheapest) but I´ll split it with Rick, maybe have a side of lasagna, roll myself home, fat and happy, to pack up my bags, go to sleep, wake up and have that amazing looking beef and pastry dish for lunch.
I´m going to miss Buenos Aires.
