Cuisine

Argentine, Uruguayan and Chilean

The Southern Cone's beef-centred cooking (asado and parrilla), Italian- and Spanish-immigrant dishes, empanadas, dulce de leche and mate; Chile adds a Pacific seafood tradition.

Flavour character: Beefy and straightforward: salt-seasoned grilled meat, garlicky parsley-and-oregano chimichurri, sweet milky dulce de leche, fresh tomato-onion salsas, corn sweetness.

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Authentic Argentine asado grilling beef ribs over open flames in Uribelarrea.

History

Cattle brought by the Spanish multiplied on the pampas, and gaucho herders roasted beef over open fires, the root of the asado. Mate, an infusion of yerba mate, was drunk by the Guaraní before the Spanish arrived. Massive Italian and Spanish immigration from the late 19th century gave Buenos Aires and Montevideo pasta, pizza, milanesa and fainá. Chile's long Pacific coast and Mapuche heritage gave it seafood dishes, corn-based pastel de choclo and the smoked chilli merkén.

Well documented

Geography and influences

The grassy pampas of Argentina and Uruguay, the Andes, the subtropical Paraguayan north-east and Chile's long Pacific coast with its central-valley vineyards.

Gaucho cattle culture
Guaraní (mate, cassava)
Mapuche (Chile)
Spanish colonial cooking
Italian immigrants

Regional variations

Argentina (pampas and Buenos Aires): Asado, Italian-Argentine pasta and pizza, milanesas.
North-west Argentina (Salta, Tucumán): Andean empanadas, locro, humita, tamales.
Uruguay: Asado on wood embers, chivito sandwich, the highest mate consumption.
Chile: Seafood, pastel de choclo, cazuela, pebre and merkén.