The San Antonio Light (San Antonio, Tex.), Vol. 39, No. 266, Ed. 1 Sunday, October 12, 1919 Page: 35 of 52
fifty two pages : ill. ; page 20 x 17 in. Digitized from 35 mm. microfilm.View a full description of this newspaper.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
Eating Is the Biggest Industry in Buenos Aires
It Comes Before Business
in the Argentine Capital.
Which Has Supplanted
Berlin as a City of Gour-
mandizing—When Busi-
ness Interferes With Eat-
ing the Argentine Cuts
Out Business. ~~
The Buenos Aires waiter was trying
to make out bis newly arrived Yankee
customer and the latter floundered in
the deep water of beginner’s Spanish for
the first time.
There was a difference of language
But the real difficulty lay in dif-
ference of viewpoint concerning eating.
For the Yankee ordering a light
lunch New York style wanted one sim-
ple dish an entree with a bit of salad
and then a sweet and coffee. Which as
lunch is absolutely unthinkable in
Buenos Aires—absolutemente!
The Yankee wanted to snatch a bite
to eat and get back to business. But
the Buenos Aires idea is just the other
way round —to do a little business and
then get back to eating.
In days of yore the gourmanduing
capital of the world was unquestionably
Berlin where the population started in
the morning with several breakfasts
first from the fingers then reaching the
“fork breakfast” and mingling business
with meals and lunches all day’until far
into the night when business was hap-
pily outdistanced and eating prevailed.
Buenos Aires now has very good
claims as the capital of a new League of
Gourmets first because its eating habits
are strikingly like those of Berlin and
secondly because as the gateway uf
one of the greatest food-producing re-
gions in the world with only the sur-
face of its rich soil scratched it stands
the best chance of being a permanent
capital.
The Yankee wanted an entree and
salad and a sweet.
What the Buenos Aires waiter consid-
ers a lunch is something like this:
First the “flambre” or cold meat the
indispensable overture to every Buenos
Aires meal. This is strikingly like the
“kaltespeissen” of Berlin where fifty
cold dishes decorated the entrance of
every restaurant fish and lobsters froz-
en in blocks of ice color effects of
caviar and mayonnaise egg and sau-
sage pate and cold meat and thr^e
waiters appeared on one side and four
on the other each bearing several dishes
on his arm and heaped your plate until
you said “Alzo” The Buenos Aires ar-
ray of flambre is somewhat simpler but
includes delicious slices of breast meat
from the juciest turkey in the world
then shavings of ham cured in the
Smithfield style tongue roast beef
game delicious Argentine pate in the
form of castles meat jellies stuffed
eggs salads and relishes. The waiters
bring assortment after assortment dis-
playing flambre to the cold eye of the
seated Argentine and heaping his plate
until he say “Bastante I” Being a Latin
he can say “Bastantc I” silently with
his left little finger or right eye brow.
Had the American ordered simply
flambre and then paid the check it
would .have made an ample lunch but
the waiter would have concluded that
he was a poor man and felt sympathetic
and apologized in bringing the cluck
smilingly protesting "Muy chieo. sen-
ior’’ which is Argentine idiom far verv
small.
To the Argentines however flambre
is only the beginning of a meal. Tl»n
soup fish spagetti a not-ineat
course a vegetable course served ah ne
with chicken later followed by u sweet
and coffee and a cordial.
The soup is no dishwater affair but
a delicious mixture of several well-
cooked vegetables or a thick cream soup.
The fish is not the scrap of tasteless
flounder filet served at a New York
banquet but one of the local fish’s of
the Bio Plata cooked whole which the
waiter brings in cutting filets on the
Spot. The spaghetti is invariably called
"taglievini” and is usually made tr»sh
from Argentine wheat and perhaps col-
ored green with spinach. The meat
may be a delicious casserole dish fal-
lowed by a single vegetable as a slight
interruption of the steady flow of meat
and then comes the chicken which cads
Or description all by itself. Only when
the sweets arc reached does the bill-cf-
fare begin to break down for pie and
ice cream and like desserts are uot con -
mon in Buenos Aires and the “dulce”
is often replaced with cheese or fruit.
When the Argentine does not feel
particularly hungry and would lun di on
a single dish be orders a “puebero”
The Spanish word means a glazed earth-
en pot or the meat boiled in such u pot
but the Aigentine nuchcro is more on
the order of a scpor-New England noiled
<1 in nor. Even when ordered for one
person the waiter brings it on an cd< r-
inous platter with the different in-
gredients carefully arranged. It con-
sists of boiled beef supplemented by
boiled chicken in a “pnehero gallino”
slices of salt pork sections of savory
little Spanish sausages potatoes sweet
potatoes carrots slice of winter squash
cabbage rice and garbanzas or Span-
ish chick-peas. In the restaurants these
are boiled separately and arranged on
the platter but true puchero is one
made at home with all the ingredients
^cooked together.
The Buenos Aires restaurateur not
only understands chicken more inti-
mately then any other host in the
£*/i has an* admirable frankness
concerning the bird. Chicken is sim-
ply chicken with us whether It be
rooster or hen and regardless of age.
But a young chicken on the Buonos
Aries bill nf-fare is always "polo.” or
pullet and the more mature bird is
frankly listed ns “gallins.” or hen. Like
the Jew who long ago settled this ques-
tion of good chicken in his Mosaic law.
the Argentine will buy chicken only on
the hoof—the live bird* arc freshly
killed for the table and cold-storage
poultry is unknown. Gallinn is boiled
tender while Buenos Aires polio can
SUNDAT.
to A.M^
est be described in the words of Edou-
rd. an expert
“It is a young chicken of either sex
hat never gets up until 11 a. m. and
hen after taking its roll and coffee
oes back to bed again.”
Breakfast consists of a roll and cof-
?e. Then there is an hour at the of-
ice and two hours for a hearty meal
tiring which many business places
lose. The Americans a. <1 British com-
jute home to lunch reaching Belgrano
he Brooklyn of Buenos Aires in twen-
y minutes by train. From 2to 5 the
ffices are open again and then every-
ody goes out to tea which is a real
ical consisting of ten. coffee or choc-
late with liberal helpings of sand-
riches and cakes.
At this meal the true son of Argen-
ina really gets down to the business
f eating.
On Sunday people gather and devote
wo hours to this function. It absohite-
y spoils the new arrival’s dinner but
t 8 o’clock the Argentines sit down to
he heaviest meal of the day and then
o to the opera or theater where per-
ormances seldom begin before 9 or 10
’clock. After the show the restaurants
ill again but here rather curiosuly.
ho Argentine appetite balks.
The restaurants of Buonos Aires are
nauy and of a surprisingly good char-
ister with plenty of middle-class places
vhere well-cooked fond is served at rea-
onablo prices. Toko the restaurants
if Paris there seem to be none of the
nonstrous establishments for spoiling
:ood food so common in the United
States and England. But Buenos Aires
s not in the least cosmopolitan. It
ias innumerable establishments where
ts combination <yf French Italian and
Spanish cookihg nre nil pretty much
like.
The cabaret has not. yet reached
luenos Aires and perhaps never will
or it is hard to imagine the Argen-
ine gourmet interrupting the many
ourses of his lunch or dinner to rise
ind dance a foxtrot.
The business day of Buenos Aires
K arranged with eating first nnd busi-
icss secondary. The rising hour is lat”.
12 NOON
Une oi du. no: Aire* a mooern hotel*
THE SAN ANTONIO LIGHT.
|5 P-M.
9 to 10 o’clock in the morning because
the Argentine capital is truly an all-
night town with restaurants filled at
2 n. m. an hour when New York though
widely advertising its midnight frolics
is safely abed.
The day winds up with tea. coffee
chocolate wine or liquors accompanied
by just a bite cf delicatessen. The Ar-
gentine is then willing to call it a day
nnd quit—and it has certainly been
some day in a gastronomic sense from
10 o’clock bi ui • morning until 1 a. m.
OlWhv Th* Pnh’ii I.f>i!crr Co.
8 P.M.
Interior of the Jockey Club Bueno* Aire*
1 A.M.
J New Yorkers Experience Most
Chaotic Moving Day in History
Moving day in New York I It is a s
regularly semi-annual institution oc-je
curring on May 1 and October 1 each r
year. It is a day of moving vans plying ].
through the dense traffic uptown down|t
town and crosstown a day of confusion i h
in apartments and rental houses a day ' 1
of chaotic households of migrations in I j
stallations into new quarters of disrup-
tion and general melee. It is a day ot । 1
dispossessions evictions and the serving!^
of notices demanding higher rent a daj ! f
of upheaval and extraordinary activity. ■ i
It is all of these things even under the >
most favorable condtions. But on the }
first of this October this year there i
were other factors that augmented the i
inconvenience caused by the turmoil i
There were not nearly enough apart- 1
ments available to receive the families I
returning from their homes in the coun- c
I try. scarcely any quarters could be had
that had not been engaged months ahead i
of time and what few dwellings were to {
lot had such exorbitant prices attached j t
that many were forced to return to I |
whence they came or to double up in f
hotel rooms and store their goods in ]
cellars. Besides it rained all day long. K
Moving vans laden with the household t
J
(
c
I
1
OCTOBER 12 1919
effects of hundreds of New Yorkers were
skidding over wet streets late in the
evening of September 30 and early the
following morning furniture was being
dumped into the new homes of as many
hundreds of disgruntled families or into
the corridors of apartments not vacated
because no means of transportation had
been found and in /ome cases onto the
sidewalks. Moving vans cost $lO an
hour—if one was fortunate enough to
get hold of them. Lacking a sufficient
number of these the cars of private in-
dividuals were impressed into service
and not only “flivvers” but many large
and luxurious motors were seen darting
। here and there with their unwonted car-
' goe of tables and chairs apd bedroom ap-
purtenances. Rich and poor alike were
not exempt from the discomforts of mov-
ing and men with ample pocketbooks
wondered where they would spend the
night. For when a new tenant ap-
peared on the threshold and showed his
papers there was nothing to do but get
out.
The situation was complicated in
many instances however by rent strikes
and the refusal of tenants to move after
। their homes had been leased to others.
।ln such cases incoming lessors were
‘ greatly inconvenienced as there was no
j place for them to unload save on the
sidewalks and mostly the rain prevented
that. Many tenants were willing to
give place to newcomers but by reason
of the fact that they had so long delayed
engaging transfer agents it was impossi-
hie to do so except by the means already
mentioned and by making trips with
wheelbarrows baby carriages and chil-
dren’s carts. Nor were such incidents
uncommon.
Courts Helped Out.
The mayor’s committee on rent-prof-
iteering was ready for the emergency.
An attorney had been stationed in every
municipal court to adjust disputes and
to serve both landlord and tenant just-
ly. The justices gave them precedence
and every consideration in the handling
of the many cases which poured into the
courts.
The situation was further ameliorated
by the common observation of an un- j
written law of long standing namely
that no evictions should be ordered while
it is raining. The city marshals were
obliged to order evictions later but
thousands benefited by the leniency of '
the courts. No dispossess notices were
served during the rain.
Matters grew very acute in the Bronx
and in Brownsville a section of Brook-
lyn two localities whither people have
gone in recent years. Rent profiteers
have been very active and many have
been forced to move because they could
not pay the increased rent. Many en-
gaged quarters in the suburbs and in
the more spacious apartments two fami
lies set up housekeeping in one suite of
rooms. It was with the utmost diffi-
culty however that thp families in-
volved managed to get to their new quar-
ters.
Landlords are still filing complaints
and it will be several days before all who
desire to move are installed in their new
homes. There are only Tl>oo vans in New
York or about one for seven families
of apartment-dwellers. No one knows
precisely the number of f: dies to be
dispossessed. And so the nomads of
New York have been packing up their
worldly goods and in observant of the
custom where short-term leases prevail
have been seeking new nw'fs to shelter
them. That there i< suru an unpre-
cedented scarcity "f new afs ac-
countable for a vast amoui t «>f discom- 4g
fort. m ^9
( ity is Crowd d ।
i To get into many of tl' • hugt r hotels
it is necessary to give a nbu.th notice^
and realty dealers report r!l their ^ttu*’-
tures filled. About the only certain
method of getting into an apartment
to build an apartment hoiwe.
People who have homes in the coyntryt
and within commuting distance hafj d«-/
cided to remain in their frail bung|l.<»*.yK ac*
and their shore shacks tb' r» to r|viL4thout
the winter uinds and the ng'nsAOUSMU
freezing weather. N • longer doe- msehri
New Yorker poke fun at the *ommlK>r. ac-
for the latter hu* suddenly attaint Apan Ssx
to a position that makes him rpyiiat rental
all his more unfortunate felhmiicted by
exist in the insecurity of u three'Hoople *U<>
lease. / thau oua
('ororuunities within reach of u a)ue* rely
are enjoying the greatest boom IruptP and
history and there is congesti>»u | d ingemui
the suburbs.
11C
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Diehl, Charles S. & Beach, Harrison L. The San Antonio Light (San Antonio, Tex.), Vol. 39, No. 266, Ed. 1 Sunday, October 12, 1919, newspaper, October 12, 1919; San Antonio, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1615265/m1/35/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .