January 29-31
We arrived late into town after a short bus ride from Rio (yes – 6 hour bus rides are now considered short). We checked into our AirBNB in Paraiso and then asked for recommendations from the doorman for a place to grab a bite to eat. We then immediately ignored his suggestion after finding out that the burger place one block away is called St. Louis and features midwestern burgers. Yes please. We had been looking for a good burger without success for a few weeks now. Plus the picture has Heinz ketchup on the tables. Real ketchup!!! Plus come on… it’s called St. Louis. It did not disappoint.
The diner was decked out in signs from all over the US with a prominently placed Cardinals hat. The burgers were delicious, and Michael was pumped to get some onion rings as well. The only issues is that we wish the burgers were bigger! They were amazing.
After missing out for Thanksgiving, we ordered apple pie for dessert. The pie was not as good as Mom B’s and the whipped cream was not as good as my mom’s, but it was still real apple pie and delicious.
The next morning we went for a run in the park down the street.
It was perfect: big, beautiful, well taken care of, and safe. Plus, at close to sea level and with cooler weather, we both had great runs. There was some art in the part, but my favorite was this statue:
What I like about it is that you can see the obelisk in the distance, but this memorial is to the people who built it. I like that.
We only had about 48 hours in town, and a lot of that time was spent making plans for the next leg of our trip. But we did get in some good beers and we got in some great meals. Besides St. Louis, we also had dinner at Izakaya Issa which is a Japanese restaurant. But the main event was our dinner at D.O.M. Currently considered the 9th best restaurant in the world, DOM has 2 Michelin stars and serves Brazilian cuisine by chef Alex Atala. Atala’s main theme is to showcase food that is often considered food for the working class, alongside food from the Amazon that isn’t as widely consumed. He then puts a contemporary spin on it. It makes for really interesting, complex, delicious food.
We found out about Atala from Netflix’s show Chef’s Table. So if you have an hour to spend – check it out. Atala is a very bizarre mix of outdoorsman, aged punk rocker and chef. It is definitely entertaining.
A few highlights:
Heart of palm fettuccine with mushrooms (Heart of palm is grown in the Amazon – it comes out of a tree, not a can. Who knew?):
Oxtail with yam purée (you can see I like it because of the thumbs up I’m giving in the background):
This ball of amazingness. I don’t remember what it is but it was doughy and cheesy and amazing:
It was an amazing meal and a great way to celebrate the end of our three months on the continent. Afterwards, we picked up our bags and headed to the airport.
I’ve talked a bit about all the planning we did over these two days. We’ve been traveling for three months and we 1. haven’t run out of money yet and 2. aren’t sick of each other yet. So we’re going to move this party to Africa!! We’ll be sending word from Ethiopia soon!