Cuisine of Argentina

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Regional differences

Although there exists an Argentine cuisine that is common to the whole country—asados (grilled meats), dulce de leche (a sweet caramel-like custard), empanadas and mate—there is a cuisine that is specific to each of four regions of Argentina, which follow in order of population (2005):

Related Topics:
Asado - Dulce de leche - Empanadas - Mate

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• Central/Pampean
• North-west/Cuyo
• North-east
• Patagonia/Tierra del Fuego

Central region and las Pampas

This region comprises of the provinces of Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Santa Fe, La Pampa, part of Entre Ríos, and all of the Autonomos City of Buenos Aires.

Related Topics:
Buenos Aires - Córdoba - Santa Fe - La Pampa - Entre Ríos - Buenos Aires

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This region of Argentina has received the greatest direct European influence, most visibly from Italy. It is also a crucial center of cattle production for Argentina and is thus the origin of the quintessentially Argentine dishes carne asada (roasted beef) and dulce de leche. It is here that red-meat-based foods are combined with white meat, diary products and pasta, producing a high-protein diet.

Related Topics:
Italy - Cattle - Carne asada - Dulce de leche - Protein - Diet

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In addition to the aforementioned carne asada and dulce de leche, other dishes that typify the region are milanesas, or breaded meats. A common dish of this variety is the milanesa napolitana (the name comes from Naples, Italy). Milanesa napolitana is an Argentine innovation despite its name. In addition to roast beef, bifes, and churrascos, a visitor to the central region will find many dishes of Italian origin that have been incorporated into the Argentine cuisine and heavily modified from their original forms.

Related Topics:
Naples - Italy

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Pizza (locally pronounced pisa), for example, has been wholly subsumed and in its Argentine form more closely resembles Italian calzones than it does its Italian ancestor. Typical or exclusively Argentine pizzas include pizza canchera, pizza rellena (stuffed pizza), pizza por metro (pizza by the meter), and pizza a la parrilla (grilled pizza). While Argentine pizza, derives from Neapolitan cuisine, the Argentine fugaza/fugazza comes from the focaccia xeneise (Genoan), but in any case its preparation is rather different. It is rather different in preparation from its Italian counterpart, and the addition of cheese to make the dish fugaza con queso or fugazzeta is an Argentine invention.

Related Topics:
Pizza - Calzone - Neapolitan - Genoa

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Another Argentine invention is fainá, a type of fugazza made with chickpea flour (adopted from Spain). During the 20th century, people in pizza shops in Buenos Aires, Rosario or Córdoba have commonly ordered a "combo" of moscato, pizza, and fainá. This is a large glass of a sweet wine called moscato (muscat), plus two triangular stacked pieces (the lower one being pizza and the upper one fainá).

Related Topics:
Fainá - Chickpea - 20th century - Moscato - Muscat

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Nevertheless, the pastas (pasta, always in the plural) surpass pizzas in consumption levels. Among them are tallarines (fettuccine), ravioles (ravioli), ñoquis (gnocchi, and canelones (cannelloni). They are usually cooked, served, and consumed in Argentine fashion, called al-uso-nostro, a phrase of Italian origin.

Related Topics:
Pasta - Fettuccine - Ravioli - Gnocchi - Cannelloni

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For example, it is common for pasta to be eaten together with white bread ("French bread"), which is unusual in Italy. This can be explained by the low cost of bread and the fact that Argentine pastas tend to come together with a large amount of tuco sauce (Italian suco "juice"), and accompanied by estofado (stew). Less commonly, pastas are eaten with a dressing of pesto, a green sauce based on basil, or salsa blanca (Béchamel sauce).

Related Topics:
Estofado - Pesto - Basil - Béchamel sauce

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The sorrentinos are also a local dish with a misleading name (they do not come from Sorrento, but were invented in Mar del Plata). They look like big round ravioles stuffed with mozzarella, cottage cheese and basil in tomato sauce.

Related Topics:
Sorrento - Mar del Plata - Mozzarella - Cottage cheese - Basil - Tomato sauce

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Polenta comes from northern Italy and is very common throughout Argentina. But unlike in Italy, this cornmeal is eaten as a main dish, with sauce and melted cheese.

Related Topics:
Polenta - Cornmeal

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Spanish influences are abundant: desserts like the churros (cylinders of pastry, usually fried, sometimes filled with dulce de leche) and ensaimadas, alfajores, and dishes such as the tortillas (omelets, especially made of potato, and having little to do with the Mexican dish of the same name), most kinds of stew, and puchero. Many of the guisos and pucheros (stews) are derived from Spain.

Related Topics:
Churros - Dulce de leche - Alfajor - Tortillas - Omelet - Guiso - Puchero - Stew

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Empanadas, though typically South American, have an Andalucian origin (they derived from the Near-Eastern lahmayim and fatay), and they can be also traced to the Galician empanada and to certain stuffed calzoni.

Related Topics:
Empanada - Andalucia - Near-Eastern - Fatay - Galicia - Calzoni

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Germanic influence is comparatively small, but appears remarkable in the field of sweet dishes. The pastries known as facturas are Germanic in origin: croissants, known as medialunas, are the most popular of these, and can be found in two varieties: butter- and fat-based. Also German in origin are the "Berlinese" known as bolas de fraile ("friar's balls"), and the rolls called piononos. The facturas were re-christened with local names given the difficult phonology of German, and usually Argentinized by the addition of a dulce of leche filling.

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Most dishes of the Central/Pampean region are urban, often requiring a gas oven of a type not found in the countryside. This is not strange considering that more than 80% of the Argentine population is concentrated in the main cities of this region (Buenos Aires, Rosario, Córdoba, etc.). Not much is left of the gaucho food, except asado, dulce de leche, mate (the yerba mate infusion), tortas fritas, and arroz con leche (rice pudding).

Related Topics:
Oven - Argentine population - Buenos Aires - Rosario - Córdoba - Rice pudding

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The scene was different until the first half of the 19th century. Lucio V. Mansilla in his Memorias records that that in the cities of Buenos Aires province (which at that time also included Montevideo, now in Uruguay) common foods were quibebe, mazamorra (a sweet, milky corn pudding) as a dessert, chancaca (a sugary, brown, corn cake), the pacú fish, surubí, sábalo, asados (roasts) etc.

Related Topics:
Lucio V. Mansilla - Montevideo - Uruguay - Quibebe - Mazamorra - Chancaca - Pacú - Surubí - Sábalo

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When the Salta-born Juana Manuela Gorriti wrote her book La cocina ecléctica ("Eclectic Cuisine") in the last years of the 19th century, already a large part of the Argentine preparations mentioned in this book were forgotten among the people of the Central region and the Pampas. It was precisely in this era that the great innovative influx of Italian immigrants and Italian food occurred. The aforementioned L.V. Mansilla noted the existence of ravioles in principal cities of the River Plate basin around the 1880s; Jorge Luis Borges said that "the first time" that he came to know ravioli was at the beginning of the 20th century, while very young, at the home of Italian immigrants whose Argentine son invited him.

Related Topics:
Salta - Juana Manuela Gorriti - River Plate - 1880s - Jorge Luis Borges

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In the rural areas of the Pampas corresponding to la Pampa Húmeda, principally in the center and south of Santa Fe, center, east and south of Córdoba and north Buenos Aires, sausage preparations such as salames (salami), bondiolas, codeguines, salamines, etc. are very common.

Related Topics:
Pampa Húmeda - Salami - Bondiola - Codeguines - Salamines

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The preparation of ham is inherited as much from the Spanish jabugos as from the prosciutti of Parma (Italy). The most famous Argentine hams are probably the jamones serranos (Serrano hams) from Sierras de Córdoba and environs.

Related Topics:
Ham - Jabugo - Prosciutti - Sierras de Córdoba

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Despite the fact that many Italian and Spanish immigrants came from coastal areas and pese a ser enjundiosa Argentina en recursos ictícolas, during the entire 20th century, the level of fish consumption has been relatively low. The main explanation of this phenomenon was the abundant oferta de carne vacuna y aviar (principalmente pollo) y a que este tipo de carnes produce mucha más saciedad que la mayoría de los pescados, mariscos y frutos de mar; las preparaciones más comunes de pescados han sido simples escalopes de filet de merluza y chupines. Aunque desde la segunda mitad de s XX el porcentaje de católicos practicantes ha disminuido de continuo y en el 2005 quizás sólo sean un 20% de la población total, se mantienen en gran medida las festividades y los platos asociados a ellas: Christmas *ndash; para esta fecha es tradicional el consumo de pavo al horno, o chancho (puerco)al horno, acompañado de turrones, y pan dulce directamente derivado del panettone milanés. Para la pascua cristiana se consumen huevos de pascua. En tanto que para Semana Santa fechas en que la iglesia exige ayuno de carnes salvo las de pescados, son típicas las empanadas de vigilia (principalmente las rellenas de atún), y guisados con bacalao (cod or, in its absence, cazón.

Related Topics:
Escalope - Merluza - Chupin - Christmas - Pavo - Turron - Pan dulce - Panettone - Pascua - Huevos de pascua - Semana Santa - Cod - Cazón

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Wine production in this part og Argentina is qualitatively and quantitatively inferior than that in the Northeast and the Cuyo; nonetheless, there are some interesting wines: in the colonial era, famous wines were made by the Jesuits en Alta Gracia (in the Sierras de Córdoba), and since the end of the 19th century notable wines have come from Caroya, also in the province of Córdoba though not in the sierra but the piedemontof the Cordobam pampa. También se ha producido y producen vinos de humilde calidad en la región llamada "La Costa", which is to say las zonas ribereñas del río Paraná y del Río de La Plata desde la ciudad de Santa Fe hasta las adyacencias de La Plata; del otro lado del Río de La Plata ,en Uruguay , se ha logrado la producción de un vino de más calidad ,principalmente en Juanicó.

Related Topics:
Alta Gracia - Sierras de Córdoba - Caroya - Juanicó

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La producción láctea de la región pampeana es ingente (pese a que se vio perjudicada durante la década de los 90 de s XX y el primer lustro de s XXI por la llamada "soyización" o "sojización" del campo argentino). Aunque la gran producción láctea de la región aún no se ve reflejada en la producción a una escala importante de quesos típicos, sin embargo puede hacerse mención del queso Mar del Plata y del queso Colonia (el queso Colonia es de procedencia uruguaya, fabricado inicialmente en Colonia Suiza, aunque su elaboración se ha difundido en zonas de Buenos Aires y Santa Fe). También originado fuera de esta zona, tal como su nombre lo señala, es el queso Chubut sin embargo durante el s XX el sur de la provincia de Buenos Aires ha sido importante productor de este tipo de queso. Las pizzas argentinas suelen ser preparadas con musarela ,queso que imita al italiano llamado mozzarella, aunque por lo general la musarela es realizada con leche de oveja o leche de vaca, a diferencia de la leche de búfala que es la usada para la mozzarella, los fideos y otras pastas (inclusive la polenta) suelen ser cubiertas con queso rallado] de tipo parmigiano or regiano. Otro queso of Italian origin bastante apreciado en Argentina (y muchas veces cocinado junto a los asados) es el provolone.

Related Topics:
Queso Mar del Plata - Queso Colonia - Colonia Suiza - Queso Chubut - Musarela - Mozzarella - Queso rallado - Parmigiano - Regiano - Provolone

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En líneas generales, durante el s XX el gusto más común entre los argentinos se ha dirigido a los quesos de tipo francés, y es debido a esto que en Argentina se logran buenas o aceptables imitations of French cheeses.

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