Culture of Argentina - Cuisine

Cuisine

Besides many of the pasta, sausage, and dessert dishes common to continental Europe, Argentines enjoy a wide variety of Indigenous and Criollo creations, which include empanadas (a stuffed pastry), locro (a mixture of corn, beans, meat, bacon, onion, and gourd), humitas, and yerba maté, all originally indigenous Amerindian staples, the latter considered Argentina's national beverage. Other popular items include chorizo (a spicy sausage), facturas (Viennese-style pastry), and Dulce de Leche, a sort of milk caramel jam.

The Argentine barbecue asado, includes various types of meat, among them chorizo, sweetbread, chitterlings, and morcilla (blood sausage). Thin sandwiches, known as sandwiches de miga, are also popular. Argentines have the highest consumption of red meat in the world.

The Argentine wine industry, long among the largest outside Europe, has benefited from growing investment since 1992; in 2007, 60% of foreign investment worldwide in viticulture was destined to Argentina. The country is the fifth most important wine producer in the world, with the annual per capita consumption of wine among the highest. Malbec grape, a discardable varietal in France (country of origin), has found in the Province of Mendoza an ideal environment to successfully develop and turn itself into the world's best Malbec. Mendoza accounts for 70% of the country's total wine production. "Wine tourism" is important in Mendoza province, with the impressive landscape of the Cordillera de Los Andes, and the highest peak in the Americas, Mount Aconcagua (6,952 m (22,808 ft) high) providing a very desirable destination for international tourism.