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🇦🇷 Argentina /Culture & Society

At the edge of El Impenetrable, a chef brings ancestral recipes to the table

From La Nación · () Spanish

Translated from Spanish and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Outcome reported
  • Chaco chef Alina Ruiz won the Prix Baron B Edition Cuisine for a menu rooted in the traditional food of El Impenetrable.
  • Her restaurant, Anna Restaurante, sits in Colonia 44, six kilometers from Castelli, and serves food shaped by the dry forest, scarce water and local family traditions.
  • Ruiz’s winning menu included goat loin, chanfaina and a sheet made from milk produced by her own cows.

“We prioritized the blood. It was a visceral dish,” chef Alina Ruiz says proudly of the chanfaina that helped her win Argentina’s most prestigious national gastronomy prize.

We prioritized the blood. It was a visceral dish.

· Alina RuizRuiz describes the chanfaina she presented in the competition.

Ruiz received the Prix Baron B Edition Cuisine on Aug. 27 at Buenos Aires’ Art Faena Center. The jury was led by Mauro Colagreco, the only Argentine chef with eight Michelin stars, and included Dolli Irigoyen, Gonzalo Aramburu and Gabriel Oggero. Together, they selected Ruiz’s project as the country’s best gastronomic venture.

Her restaurant, Anna Restaurante, stands at Colonia 44, six kilometers from Castelli in Chaco, at the edge of El Impenetrable. “You eat what there is,” Ruiz says of the menu. “One thing is reaching Resistencia, another is getting here.” The award, she adds, brings visibility to a part of the province that few people know or choose to see.

You eat what there is.

· Alina RuizThe chef explains how the local environment shapes Anna Restaurante’s menu.

The restaurant’s cooking draws on recipes Ruiz learned as a child and that remain part of life in the Chaco’s thorny dry-forest ecosystem. Summer temperatures can exceed 50 degrees, winter temperatures hover around 30, and only about 600 millimeters of rain falls. Water is scarce, while few animal and plant species have adapted to the harsh environment.

One thing is reaching Resistencia, another is getting here.

· Alina RuizRuiz contrasts access to the provincial capital with reaching her restaurant near El Impenetrable.

Her winning plate combined a goat loin, chanfaina and “paper” made from milk from her own cows. Chanfaina may look unattractive and lack glamour, Ruiz acknowledges, but it is prepared during goat slaughtering in the depths of El Impenetrable. The dish has a criollo origin and remains deeply tied to local identity. Preparing it involves the entire family. “It is a dish made so you can keep working,” Ruiz says. Colagreco described the menu as intense, like the project behind it.

It is a dish made so you can keep working.

· Alina RuizShe describes the practical role of chanfaina in local food traditions.
About this summary

Originally published by La Nación in Spanish. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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