Uruguayan Cuisine - Traditional Dishes

Traditional Dishes

• Asado: both the tradition of grilling beef over coals (which translates to barbecue in American English), and the dish, "tira de asado".
• Chivito: a sandwich containing steak, ham, cheese, tomato, lettuce, and mayonnaise.
• Choripán: a very popular Uruguayan fast food. A grilled "chorizo" and a crusty bread such as a baguette, with tomato, lettuce and mayonnaise.
• Empanada : a small pie or turnover, most commonly filled with meat, such as ham and cheese.
• Empanada Gallega: a fish pie, with sauce, onions and bell peppers. Brought by immigrants from Galicia.
• Fainá: a mix of chickpea flour, salt, water and olive oil, originally called "farinata", cooked like a pizza on a flat tray. Brought by immigrants from Liguria (Italy).
• Pancho: the typical Uruguayan hot dog: a bun called "pan de Viena" filled with a "Frankfurter" with mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise or "salsa golf" on top.
• Gnocchi (known as "ñoquis") is traditionally eaten on the 29th day of each month. This was the day before payday, when people were at their poorest. Gnocchi made a cheap and hearty meal. On these occasions, some people leave a coin or a banknote under the plate to attract prosperity.
• Húngara: very similar to the Frankfurter, but very spicy.
• Milanesa: a thin breaded cutlet steak. There is a great variety, such as: Milanesa Napolitana, Milanesa Rellena, and Suprema Maryland.
• Lehmeyun: an Armenian dish, brought by Armenian immigrants.
• Pascualina: a swiss chard pie, puff pastry crust on bottom and top, filled with seasoned swiss chard and eggs, pascualina is a reference to Pascua, 'Easter'.
• Pastel de carne: in English: meat pie. Chopped meat, mashed potato, green peppers, olives, and eggs.
• Russian salad: potatoes, carrots, peas and mayonnaise.

Pizza (locally pronounced pisa or pitsa), for example, has been wholly subsumed and in its Uruguayan form more closely resembles an Italian calzone than it does its Italian ancestor. Typical Uruguayan pizzas include pizza canchera, pizza rellena (stuffed pizza), pizza por metro (pizza by the meter), and pizza a la parrilla (grilled pizza). While Uruguayan pizza, derives from Neapolitan cuisine, the Uruguayan fugaza/fugazza comes from the focaccia xeneise (Genoan), but in any case its preparation is different from its Italian counterpart, and the addition of cheese to make the dish (fugaza con queso or fugazzeta) is an Uruguayan invention.

Fainá is a type of thin bread made with chickpea flour (adopted from northern Italy). During the 20th century, people in pizzerias in Montevideo, have commonly ordered a "combo" of moscato, pizza, and fainá. This is a large glass of a sweet wine called moscato (muscat), plus two triangular stacked pieces (the lower one being pizza and the upper one fainá). Despite both pizza and faina being Italian in origin, they are never served together in that country.

Nevertheless, the pastas (pasta, always in the plural) surpass pizzas in consumption levels. Among them are tallarines (fettuccine), ravioles (ravioli), ñoquis (gnocchi), and canelones (cannelloni). They are usually cooked, served, and consumed in Uruguayan fashion, called al-uso-nostro, a phrase of Italian origin.

Sliced pizza served over fainá, a common combination. For example, it is common for pasta to be eaten together with white bread ("French bread"), which is unusual in Italy. This can be explained by the low cost of bread and the fact that Uruguayan pasta tends to come together with a large amount of tuco sauce (Italian suco "juice"), and accompanied by estofado (stew). Less commonly, pastas are eaten with a sauce of pesto, a green sauce based on basil, or salsa blanca (Béchamel sauce).

Polenta comes from Northern Italy and is very common throughout Uruguay. But unlike in Italy, this cornmeal is eaten as a main dish, with sauce and melted cheese.

Spanish influences are very abundant: desserts like the churros (cylinders of pastry, usually fried, sometimes filled with dulce de leche), flan, ensaimadas (Catalan sweet bread), and alfajores are all descended from Spain. Nearly all kinds of stews known as "guisos" or "estofados", arroces (rice dishes such as paella), and fabada (Asturian bean stew). All of the guisos and pucheros (stews) are of Spanish origin. Uruguayan preparations of fish, such as dried salt cod (bacalao), calamari, and octopus, originate from the Basque and Galician regions.

Germanic influence has impacted Uruguayan food as well, particularly sweet dishes. The pastries known as bizcochos are Germanic in origin: croissants, known as medialunas, are the most popular of these, and can be found in two varieties: butter- and lard-based. Also German in origin are the "Berlinese" known as bolas de fraile ("friar's balls"), and the rolls called piononos. The facturas were re-christened with local names given the difficult phonology of German, and usually Uruguayanized by the addition of a dulce de leche filling. In addition dishes like chucrut (sauerkraut) have also made it into mainstream Uruguayan cuisine.

Due to its strong Italian tradition, in Uruguay all of the famous Italian pasta dishes are present: ravioli, spaghetti, lasagna, tortellini, fettuccine, cannelloni, fusilli, agnolotti, tagliatelle, capellini, vermicelli, penne rigatti, fagioloni, cellentani, rotini, bucatini, farfalle, and the traditional gnocchi. Although the pasta can be served with a lot of sauces, there is one special sauce that was created by Uruguayans. The Caruso Sauce is a pasta sauce made from double cream, meat extract, onions, ham and mushrooms. It is very popular with sorrentinos and agnolotti.