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[title]Asadero is a fire-cooking restaurant set inside an early-20th-century mansion, where the embers extend through the kitchen, dining room and even the garden. With a large bar facing the open kitchen, the restaurant lets diners watch the team at work as meat, fish and vegetables are cooked over the fire.
The menu focuses on seasonal produce, with cuts of meat, wild-caught fish, Patagonian trout and vegetables that also find their way onto the grill. There is also a selection of wines and desserts such as homemade ice cream, which change along with the menu. With the arrival of spring, the mansion’s garden once again takes center stage, with its reflecting pool, fire pit and urban vegetable garden.
At Asadero, fire is much more than a cooking technique: it runs through the kitchen, the space and the entire experience. As you enter, a large bar welcomes you and offers a front-row view of the kitchen. From there, diners can watch the cooks at work as they prepare dishes over the embers.
With the arrival of spring, the restaurant also opens the doors to its garden. The space, part of a fully restored 20th-century mansion, features a reflecting pool, a fire pit, an urban vegetable garden and an imposing palm tree. As warmer days arrive, the garden takes on an even more prominent role.
The wine list complements the cuisine with a wide selection of labels and a system that allows diners to sample different options. To start, we chose the Tandil provolone, aged for 100 days. It is a generous, flavorful starter that is ideal for sharing.
We also tried the lamb parrilla sausage, served with roasted apple and herb purée. The combination brings together the intense, spicy flavor of the meat with the sweet, mellow profile of the apples, striking the perfect balance through the contrast of flavors.
At Asadero, they work with animals weighing more than 550 kilos, raised primarily on pasture and finished on a mixed diet that includes grains. This choice aims to preserve the quality of the meat, its marbling and its juiciness. From there, the embers, time and precise cooking complete the process.
The 450-gram beef skirt steak captures much of the restaurant’s identity. It arrives marked by the fire, precisely cooked and with that smoky flavor that runs throughout the menu. Other options include white fish, Río Negro trout, boneless baby chicken, boneless rabbit, 500-gram ribeye, five-rib beef banderita asado and 450-gram arañita steak, among other cuts.
Vegetables have their own section. The menu features oven-roasted fennel with Brandsen cheese, winter greens with crispy Jerusalem artichoke and lemon-and-honey vinaigrette, roasted cauliflower purée, roasted potatoes with butter and thyme, green salad cooked over the embers and potato lattice.
To accompany them, there are roasted peppers with fresh thyme and roasted sweet potato with burnt ricotta, spiced honey and peanuts. The former are simple and straightforward, with the thyme adding a fresh aroma. The sweet potato takes things in another direction: the sweetness of the spiced honey meets the burnt ricotta and the crunch of the peanuts.
To finish, the homemade ice creams take center stage. They are made every day, starting with classic flavors and quality ingredients. Options include the profiterole with Belgian chocolate ice cream, dulce de leche sauce, praline almonds and orange powder, as well as the Balcarce dessert with chestnuts, meringue and dulce de leche ice cream.
Between the bar, marble tables, open kitchen and garden, which comes to life with the arrival of spring, Asadero creates an experience where attention to detail runs through both the dishes and the space. The result is a fire-cooking restaurant that goes beyond meat: there is also room for vegetables, wine, ice cream and everything that happens around the table.
