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Argentina 2019: Vegetables

So, we were in Argentina for a while. Specifically, we were in the Buenos Aires area for a good amount of time. I normally leave off some of those details because I figure they won't really add too much to the story, but in this case, it might be relevant (I will allow you to decide). During that time, we got to explore a little bit and see a bit of the city. More importantly to the Mild Wife and me, though, that also meant we got to sample some of the food.

We had actually scouted out particular dishes before we got there, so there was something of a list to try. Argentina is known for its steak and wine, so those were givens. However, empanadas and medialunas also made it on to the scout list, in part because the Mild Wife did a bit of homework (side note: in looking for good sites to link the two items in this sentence, I discovered a piece that says the pastry names are actually a form of political dissidence. Who knew?). Basically, we had a few items that we were intent on trying once we got there.

However, after a few days, we'd actually managed to try the majority of these items. That left us with a bit of a dilemma: what next? Around the same time, we also noticed that many of the lunch options were all variations on the same basic principle: bread and meat. I figured that I was largely eating the same type of thing because I was near the office, but the Mild Wife reported that when she ventured to some food trucks, they all basically served sandwiches of some sort.

Again, it's entirely possible that we didn't have as many options because of where we stayed, so I'm not going to generalize the entire country's cuisine based on our experience. What I will report, however, is that the Mild Wife and I started to miss vegetables after a few days. It wasn't just that we ignored the vegetarian/vegetable options, either; many menus simply did not have many vegetables on them. I kid you not, we both started craving greens and roots.

Funnily enough, around the same time. we decided to try some Asian restaurants in the area. There were various reasons for this, but if you're ever in the area, we appreciated Chifa Man San and Sunae Asian Cantina. Both were quite good, and we liked the food quite a bit. However, the best, and funniest, part was that both of these places had vegetables on the menu as a legitimate, first-class citizen. Right around the time that we started to feel the urge to have vegetables, these joints delivered that fix in spades.

To recap, we went to Buenos Aires, got our fill of steak, wine, empanadas, medialunas, and alfajores, and then had some delicious, delicious vegetables at Asian restaurants in the area. Both the fact that it took going to restaurants of an entirely different cuisine and the fact that the vegetables were delicious cracked me up. Also, I would like to point out that my Mild Mother would be quite proud of me for eating my vegetables even when I could have skipped out on them entirely. Food is always a bit of an adventure when traveling, but this one took me by surprise. I don't think I'll ever look at a plate of broccoli the same.

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