April 25, 2025 A big Day in BA. Lunch - The Club of Milanesa Dinner - Saigon Noodle Bar
We awakened around 8:00. I ate the doughy pastry I bought yesterday at the Pasteleria across the street for breakfast with a cup of Earl Grey tea.
We split up today. Billy and Elaine left for a book store and parts unknown and Suzette and I decided to ride the Gray Line double decker City Sightseeing bus around the 25 stops of its downtown tour.
We first carried our laundry to a Laundry on Paraguay street and then backtracked to San Martin Square near the apartment to catch the bus.
We traveled to the Recolete Cemetery stop and walked to the cemetery by circumnavigating it in error. We walked along the south side where there was no entrance and at 11:30 tired and hungry stopped at The Club of Milanese at the southeast corner to try a Milanesa. I ordered an Americano that was a pounded, breaded, and fried thin slice of Angus beef topped with bacon and two fried eggs sunny side up. Suzette ordered an egg, bacon and cheese sandwich. Both dishes fell short of our expectations. The beef was tough in my Milanesa but the bacon was cooked and the bacon in Suzette’s egg sandwich was under cooked and both of our French fries were cold. Suzette sent back the French fries to the heated and when they came back they were hot and crisp. We both drank Stella Artois beer to wash down the greasy food.
Neither of us finished our dishes. I gave Suzette some of my Milanesa and I still could not finish mine.
We then proceeded to the Cemetery. It cost 18,250 pesos to enter. Who knew seeing a lot of mausoleums where dead people are buried would be a hot ticket. We walked around some, but basically made our way to the Duarte family tomb where Evita Peron was buried. There were a lot of elegant tombs with beautiful statuary. It reminded me of the fancy cemeteries in Sweden that were similarly adorn with statuary.
A Deco tomb
Then we walked back to the bus stop and caught the tour bus and completed the tour that included the tallest building Argentina.
We exited the bus at the stop near the laundry. It was 4:00 when we exited the bus and arrived at the laundry and the guy was just starting our laundry and told us to return at 6:00.
We walked next door to Frappe wine store where we bought a bottle of a Vermouth and a rose’ of Pinot Noir for a total of 29,000 pesos after a 10% discount.p for paying in cash. Credit cards are considered cash.
We walked back the six blocks to the apartment stopping at an exchange house to exchange $100 at an exchange of 1,140 pesos to the dollar, the worst exchange rate of the trip.
When we returned to the apartment we poured ourselves a Vermouth and studied the dining choices near the laundry. After some study and consideration of our terrible lunch, we decided to eat Vietnamese food because the restaurant was on the way back to the apartment from the laundry and we were craving fresh vegetables.
At 5:30 we walked back to the laundry and arrived a few minutes
We before 6:00 as the laundry owner was folding our laundry so we went across the street to an art gallery that had several interesting pieces. Suzette liked the diptych of about 100 three dimensional capybaras. I liked the color field homages to Mark Rothko, a fun contemporary gallery.
At 6:00 we walked back across the street and picked up our folded and bagged fresh laundry and paid the laundry the 12,000 peso bill.
We stuffed the laundry into Suzette’s backpack and walked the four blocks to Saigon Noodle Bar. There were three chefs in the Kitchen and two waitresses and no customers when we arrived at 6:30 and still none when we left at 7:30.
We were the first to arrived at The Club of Milanesa at 11:30 also, which confirms that not much starts happening food wise until 1:30 for lunch and 8:30 for dinner in Argentina, as in Spain
We ordered an order of 4 spring rolls with grilled shrimp, pork, lettuce, rice vermicelli, carrot and bean sprouts rolled into a rice wrapper that were served with a bowl of fish sauce and a bowl of peanut sauce., not too spicy,
Then my order of Bun Thith Nuong arrived. I had asked for extra cilantro and basil but mentioned vegetables and received and extra bowl filled with cucumber slices, mung bean sprouts, pickled carrot and daikon and cilantro along with my principal bowl filled the usual lettuce, bean sprouts, and cilantro on the bottom, rice vermicelli noodles in the middle, and marinated grilled pork on top that was doused with a light fish sauce.
We shared and I still could not finish, so I asked the waiter to box the remaning half bowl of stuff, which I carried back to the apartment.
Billy and Elaine were back in the apartment when we arrived and we compared notes. They had a good lunch at The Museo de Arte Hispanoamericano Isaac Fernández Blanco, a museum of art located in the Retiro ward.
Elaine said her sea bass was delicious..
We rested and Billy and Elaine went out again for ice cream.
I had accumulated 10,759 steps, which is another post operation record for me and I felt better at the end of the day than at Iguazu Falls and only took one pill, instead of four.
I had asked for cup of Earl Grey and some trail mix and blogged until 11:00.
Bon Appetit
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