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Vasalissa in Recoleta...a pink and celadon paradise of chocolate While I didn't manage to get to any sort of fiber-y shop in Buenos Aires, how can a place teeming with shoes, bags, and sweets be bad?
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That bag came home with me...
In addition to eating my weight in beef (sorry, my vegan friends...but when in Argentina...although actually I eat plenty of beef right here at home so it's not a good excuse) I also managed to consume a fair amount of chocolate, pastries both straight from the bakery and in the million and one cafes I sat in, cheese, nuts, and olives. In other words, my ideal diet: chocolate, cheese, olives, nuts and coffee, chased down with pastry and steak. The minute I manage to look like
Valerie Bertinelli I plan on cashing in.
If you are in BA, don't miss
Fervor. We had a fantastic dinner there, the ambience is warm and lively, and the dessert menu includes flan with ice cream. You hear that? Flan AND ice cream, both made in-house. What a great idea - two-course dessert. And of course we went to
La Cabrera, a BA must.
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I also went to a couple of really nice bars, something I rarely do at home. (Actually, that came out wrong: it's not that I don't go to nice bars...it's that I don't go to ANY bars...lest you think I go to dives. And I do go to the
Whaling Bar once in a blue moon.) The Library at the
Faena Hotel is such a nice place for a drink, and the bathroom is not to be missed. It's a palace of marble and beveled glass, with fresh flowers and freaking swan faucets. The
Oak Bar a the Hyatt was pretty spectacular too, although you do have to brave the cigar smoke.
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And just in case you gather the impression we didn't do anything "cultural" at all (four women loose in Argentina = no museums) we did visit the very beautiful
Recoleta Cemetery. And, I believe I can make a very good argument for the case that we experienced more culture talking to the wonderful, friendly locals than we would have on the tourist circuit.