Lolinda

 Now occupying the old Medjool space is Lolinda, the newest addition to the Beretta family.  Rather than their usual Italian and pizza ventures, Lolinda takes a step into Argentinian cuisine.  With only a handful of Argentinian restaurants in the Bay Area, when I think of Argentinian cuisine I think steak and empanadas.  Lolinda had plenty of both.

Normally I tend to go with some type of meat, cheese, or a mixture of both when I choose an empanada, but raves about their empanada de maiz (corn) swayed my usual decision. 

The outside of the empanada was perfectly fried without the slightest bit of greasiness.  Inside the crisp exterior was a hot, oozing corn filling with whole kernels of sweet corn.  It was delicious and I'm glad I ended up ordering this.

A bone marrow dish, of course!  I was a little disappointed with this one.  I haven't had one that topped Alembic's yet.  One canoe of bone marrow with a couple slices of toasted bread and chili de arbol jelly.  The combination of the marrow and the jelly tasted like the sweet and sour sauce at Wendy's, which isn't a bad thing in my book, but it could have been better. 

Every coastal Latin American country has their own take on ceviche.  The ceviche was amazing here!  Probably some of the best ceviche I've had in a long time.  The cerviche mixto (mixed cerviche) comes with squid, shrimp, halibut and fried corn.  Each piece of seafood is juicy and fresh.  The fried corn is more of a corn cracker that reminds me of a rice cracker so it give each bite of ceviche some contrasting textures.  The best part of this ceviche is the sauce.  I could slurp it up with a spoon, which I was happily doing until one of the bussers took away the plate between my slurps.  The marinade is really spicy with hints of fresh tasting lime.  So tasty.

I've eaten tongue from duck, cow, pig, chicken, and various other types of animals, but I've never tasted tongue like this.  The lengua (tongue) is braised in melbec and sits on top chayote (squash) and salsa verde.  The texture of the chayote reminds me of a taro.  The tongue is so tender that if someone told me it was beef cheek I would never doubt it.  

The asada mixto (mixed grilled meat platter) from bottom left;clockwise: padron peppers, chorizo, shortrib, blood sausage, skirt steak.  It also comes with a couple of pieces of grilled better that mostly serves as filler.  The chorizo was probably my least favorite of the bunch.  It had zero flavor and spiciness plus the texture was really soft.  The grilled shortrib was tender and juicy, but having had a lot of korean short ribs in my time, this was nothing special.  The blood sausage was really delicate and the consistency just fell apart even before you put it in your mouth.  Somewhat grainy, blood sausage isn't exactly for everyone's palette.  This one wasn't too irony and I thought lacked some flavor.  The grilled skirt steak was well cooked and probably this and the short ribs were the best meats in their platter.  The wost thing on this platter was the chimichurri sauce.  Not even close to anything that resembles chimichurri, this sauce was extremely oily and tasted of nothing but oil.  That was really disappointing since I love chimichurri sauce.

An Argentinian play on cookies and milk made with dulce de leche alfajores and a vanilla milkshake.  Alfajores are a traditional sweet dessert found in Spain and part of Latin America.  In Argentina, alfajores are commonly made with dulce de leche filling.  These powery cookies crumble in your mouth almost instantly when you bite into them.  The sweet dulce de leche filling is so decadent I could only have a cookie and a half.  Delicious and recommended for those with a sweet tooth.  The vanilla milkshake was a little too watery and icey for me, but it complimented the cookie well. 

I'm still looking for the perfect churros con chocolate similar to the crispy churros in Madrid (see post HERE) and the velvety chocolate sauce for dipping like in Lima (see post HERE).  The churros here were a tad on the greasy side with an oily aftertaste and the chocolate didn't coat the churro in a nice thick layer. 

Address:                 Lolinda
                                2518 Mission St.
                                San Francisco, CA
  

Type:                       Argentinean

Popular chomps:  ceviche de mixto
                                 empanada de maiz (corn empanada)
                                 pulpo (octopus)
                                 hueso asada (bone marrow)  
                                 lengua (tongue)
                                 lubina al horno (branzino)
                                 asado mixto
                                 cookies and milk
                                 churros

Chomp worthy:    ceviche de mixto
                                 empanada de maiz
                                 lengua
                                 cookies and milk