Diario las Américas Newspaper, March 3, 1957, Page 11

Panini q of men. The air smelled of roast meat, with that tenacious aroma that saturates the atmosphere of eertain Buenos Aires streets at noon. Poeple entered and left. Those who remained were eating unhurriedly. To serve the cocido, the waiter brought to the table an earthen easserole of the size and type used anywhere else to prepare arroz con pollo for at least six people. This was for two. It had everything ecocido should have, plus distinc- tion in quality and quantity. The beef was of prime grade, the chic- ken likewise. The pork sausages, the blood pudding, and the ham, just right. The cabbage, delicious. The chickpeas, tender. The clery, just the beverage for the moment. After relishing a piece of prac- tically every solid material in the easserole L risked taking two spoonfuls of the broth, remember- ing the sententious remarks of the landowner aboard the Inca, ___ . For dessert, the waiter recom- mended an omelette that, with its combination of frittered fresh ap- ples, burnt sugar, and beaten eggs was equal in delicacy of flavor to the Frenchman’s crepe Suzette. At cocktail time at La Queren- eia I had a chance to see the fa- mous El Cachafaz dance his “low- down” tango (tango arrabalero). The “apache tangos” I had seen in Paris and New York were not even the shadow of the dance El Cachafaz performed. This was the real thing, pure 1900. Until the day of his death some years ago, El Cachafaz held the distinction of being the most popular dancer in his field in Argentina. When I saw him at La Querencia he was ar- .round sixty years old, but he had lost none of his skill, precision or style, and his star still shone high. Dressed in the traditional outfit of the “compadrito” or neigh- borhood tough —white kerchief ar- ound the neck, black jacket, strip- ed trousers, and light kidskin shoes he wove the most intricate series of steps I have even seen in a ballroom dance. And all with the masculine assurance and aggressive posture of a fighting cock. There are people who proudly cherish the memory of seeing Nijinsky in Spectre de la Rose. Without any intention of making comparisons, I confess that I am very proud to have seen El Ca- chafaz in action. By a providen- tial coincidence, I had ordered a bottle of the choice old white wine of La Colina just before he came on. The flavor of the wine corres- ponded, at this moment, to the ri- tual of baptism with champagne at a ship launching. If I am not mistaken, La Que- rencia was the first spot in Bue- nos Aires to present exclusively the music and regional dances of Argentine folklore. It is still in existence, but others of a similar character have joined it, such as Mi Rincon, which specializes in the criollo music and dances of north- ern Argentina, and Mi Refugio, which includes Guarani airs from Paraguay in its variety acts, along with typical Argentine music. The interior of La Querencia re- minds you of the Spanish musi- cal cafés. It has a platform im the middle, a kind of open stage, with compact rows of tables around it. Alghough you can order dinner there, most people come principal- ly to drink and to enjoy the songs and dances of country and city. The tango alternates with the chacarera and native guitars with piano, vio- lin, and accordion combos. You can understand a people best if you observe how they amuse themselves. In their intimate en- joyment of recreation they tend to be their real selves. This ap- Plies to the music, dances, and eat- ing habits of almost all, if not all, the peoples of Latin American. To eat good meat, I have been told emphatically by many Argen- tine epicures, there is no place like Argentina. And it’s true that you don’t have to walk far to find proof of their claim. Without leav- ing Buenos Aires, in the Félix they 4 ‘SUNDAY, MARCH 3, 1957 serve the best ‘sirloin I can re- member; for barbecued kid there is the Armonia restaurant; char- coal-broiled “baby beef” is the spe- cialty of the place at 11 Corrientes. (Not only meat —Scofidi offers all the Italian macaroni dishes, and you can get a piece of pizza with a glass of the aromatic Semillon wine from Mendoza at any little stand in the Plaza de Abastos). Nevertheless, as real as the merits of Argentine meat may be, the best filet I have ever had I got not long ago in the Santiago restaurant in the Chilean capital. It had been cooked whole and then divided, at the table, into four pie- ces. As the knife cut throug it, the juice of the meat gushed out as if you were pressing a sponge. To crown this masterpiece we had a bottle of Carta Vieja red wine. It is very likely that- this filet was actually Argentine meat import- ed into Chile. In any case, a toast to the Chilean chef. What gives Chilean food its per- sonality, though, is not so much the meat as the seafood. The con- ger eel is Chile’s national fish, and caldillo de congrio (a soup served with a massive piece of the fish, onions, and potato balls) is the monumental work of ‘Chilean cooking. There are many other dishes that can be considered re- presentative of the nation, for our menu is extraordinarily varied and rich, but caldillo de congrio stands at the top of the list. In a recent series of poems, Pablo Neruda de- dicated one of his most inspired compositions to this soup, ex- pressing himself in language of majestic simplicity. The Huaso Adan restaurant, near the Mapocho railroad- station, be- came famous in Santiago for its caldillo de congrio. It was one of the first restaurants in the coun- try to install an open kitchen, with the cooks in full sight of the diners. Although the Huaso Adan no long- er exists, there are other places in Santiago that deserve immortality for their seafood. La Playa, near the market, for example. Enter. it on Sunday noon and the noise of conversation is like the sustained, sonorous vibration of breaking wa- ves. Only in Chile and in Cuba have I experienced this sensation of a sea in motion, produced by groups of people talking in loud voices. At La Playa the paila chonchi is the dish de rigueur. This is some- thing you have to eat to believe it exists. Native to the island of Chi- loé, it has been compared to bouil- labaisse because it contains a var- iety of seafoods. But that’s as far as the comparison goes. The paila chonchi has more flavor, more bo- dy, and more ingredients than any similar dish in any part of the world. (Let’s render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s.) To quench the thirst that eating all this seafood gives you, Chile has a superabundance of wonder- ful wines. There is so much de- mand for them that bar owners have had to build cabinets like lib- rary stacks to keep an adequate supply within reach. The bar of the old and popular La Bahia re- staurant in Santiago is a good ex- ample of this sort of wincellar- library. Here hundreds of bottles, scrupulously classified according to their baptismal certificates, await: the customer’s order. In Chile I was reminded of the U. S. schoolteacher I met aboard the Inca. Not by the wine, the caldillo de congrio, or the paila chonchi, which she, almost certain- ly, would have emphatically refus- ed. No, it was because Santiago has the most famous vegetarian restaurant in the world. It is called Naturista and is located on Calle Estado, in the center of town. Na- turista’s salads can make even the least herbivorous person’s mouth water. This is a restaurant dedicat- ed to the sensuality of green things. They serve olives the size of lemons, just the heart of the arti- choke, the tender yellow centers of lettuce, hearts of celery, the firm pulp of tomatoes, watercress, cu- cumbers, carrots, and all the other edible products of orchard and gar- den. Naturista is also renowned for its soup of fresh kidney beans with squash and ears of corn. I hope the U. S. schoolteacher, on her way through Chile, manag- ed to enjoy the unique experience the Naturista ofters lovers of greens. She of all people, for de- spite the difficulties she was deter- mined to see the inside of Latin America, and 1 can still remember her bitter lament at having gone for four days without tasting a leaf of Iettuce. The Chilean critie and essayist Rieardo A. Latcham, in a witty study entitled Meditacién del Aji (Meditation on Chili Pepper) spe- culates about “the psychological complexity of Peri” and points out that to understand the Peru- vian you must comprehend the im- portance of the hot pepper. The In- cas cultivated many varietes, giv- ing wide circulation to this ingred- ient that Latcham calls “the sauce of a neolithic culture.” El Pildorin, in the Magdalena del Mar section of Lima, is a living monument to the glory of the hot pepper. authentic native cooking it is ¢all- ed. the Sistine Chapel of Peruvian Culinary Art. Its founder was a horse-racing fan, and when he opened the busi- ness he gave it the name of his favorite nag. On the outside, there is nothing about El Pildorin, to reveal its importance. Anyone who hadn’t either been there before or heard about it from others would almost certainly pass it by. Nor is it at all pretentious inside. It is rus- tic in style, with most of the tables in the open-air patio. There are a few private dining rooms. And that’s all. But when you taste its food, the place takes on the air of a cathedral. The anticuche mixto, a broiled combination of pieces of corvina fish, meat, and shrimp, with a special: sauce of lemon juice- and minced hot pepper, is some- thing never to be forgotten. The Peruvian pepper bites your tongue and leaves your mouth burning. The sting persists, no matter how much chilled white wine of oSucaje you down. But it persists admirably intermixed with the extraordinary flavor of the corvina, shrimp, and meat. Perhaps this hot pepper sets a limit to the geographic spread of Peruvian cooking .Except in un- usual cases, it is impossible to im- provise a taste for the hot stuff. One has to grow accustomed to what Latcham calls “the climate of the hot pepper.” After that let the flood come! Another place that seems like a country tavern is the Bodeguita del Medio on Calle Empedrado in Old Havana. For everything typically Peruvian and limefio at El Pildo- rin, you can find a Cuban, habane- ro parallel at La Bodeguita del Me- dio. In. this case too, one who does not know it might easily pass it by. A small colonial patio, three rusti¢ Argentina’s most famous tango dancer, El Cac HEMISPWER Among connoisseurs of La Bodeguita del Medio in Havana offers real Cuban cooking in rustic setting, draws many celebrities. rooms with very high ceilings, a consumed were plates of rice with narrow hallway leading to the street, a glass case of bottles in front. That is La Bodeguita del Me- dio. But especially at Iunch time — from noon to three — the place overflows with humanity. And what a riot! A hurricane in miniature. In one corner a trio sings, with guitérs and maracas. More people arrive. Now there is no place to sit, but somehow those who have just come in manage to get settled. The waiters miraculously make their way between the tables with plates or rice and black beans, bottles of rum and beer, and tall glases adorned with mint. Just a few months ago, on my last visit to Havana, I had the pleasant surprise of seeing. two North American boys in La Bode- guita del Medio, lunching in the purest popular Cuban style. On the already half table before them, beans, roast pig, tamales, and fried bananas —a combination that would have horrified my school teacher friend. But times change, and travel develops your imagina- tion and broadens the scope of your senses. Who knows but what at the end of the trip, she may have succumbed to the temptation to try the pisco? After all, she kasn’t making the journey just to contem- plate the landscape. Friendly hum- an relations are encouraged at the dinner table by the conversation and the sharing of food. The Greeks bequeathed us that marvel- ous lesson. The enjoyment of a dish of food in common is general- ly a stronger force for unity than a mutual interest in a book. The stomach’s functions are not, entire ly biological. Often prilliant ideas are merely the resul of good diges tion. Open-air café provides Continental atmosphere on Avenida de Mayq Buenos Aires, in 1941, hafaz, performing at La Querencia café, Buenos Aireg AG, 1