El Piso and the Promenade

Post by Grubb.

(Bariloche) On Tuesday we made dinner reservations at El Piso, a narrow, unassuming restaurant along Ave. San Martin in Bariloche.

Squeezed behind a tiny coffee shop in a back room that had six small tables, this little restaurant had a five star reputation among traveling gourmets. It didn’t open until eight, so when we got back from our seven lake tour (wonder if there’s a water-worshipper sect I could join?), we still had a couple hours to kill walking around downtown Bariloche. If Llao Llao (up the highway where musical roads converge) translated from the native Mapuche tongue, means “Sweet Sweet”, then the streets of Bariloche are “Llao Llao Llao.” Every other shop is either selling chocolate, ice cream, or dessert pastries. Sprinkled among the sugar shacks, as a nod to the natives, are stores selling long-handled knives that could skin a bear, or silver embossed maté cups. Eight o’clock couldn’t come too soon.

We got to El Piso early, but the chef was already in the kitchen and the waitress/hostess/cashier was as sweet as a Bariloche alfajores. We had the dining nook to ourselves.

Ella had the Malbec, I had the agua con gas, and we ate like Michelin vagabonds happening upon the enchanted table. Melted provolone mixed with caramelized red onions and arugula for starters.

As a main course my fish I had a twist of caramelized carrot set in a sauce made out of puréed peas seasoned with mint. Ella had what looked like a small mountain of tenderized beef resting on a swirl of creamed potatoes. And then there was the brûlée for dessert….

When we left, the remaining tables were full and the conversation, in the confined space, loud. It was worth the prolonged walk to be the first to dine.

And right across the street was a bus stop! It was already dark, so I told Ella when we got on the bus that I’d let her know when we should get off by my spotting the windmill landmark as we drove by. But…because it was night, the reflection in the windows of the interior lights on the bus made it impossible for me to see anything, much less a windmill. Luckily Ella could see out the front windshield and we didn’t miss our stop. Successful exits from a foreign bus are an excellent way to finish an evening of fine dining.

And the Bariloche promenade? Well, that was the next day. We like to stroll the waterside walkways in places we stay for more than a couple days. There were the cats of Cádiz nosing around the rocky shore, the windsurfers off the beach of Essaouira, and along the promenade in Bariloche, a sort of skateboarders’ steeplechase.

And, down some steps in a grove of trees, the Paleontology Museum of Bariloche. Inside what looked like a rusted do-it-yourself corrugated iron shipping container there was a room divided in half with fossils behind glass. In geological time Bariloche has just surfaced from an extensive sea.