Ola Uruguay Real Estate and Investments

When you distill Uruguayan culture to its most essential elements, you will find that the asado is one of the most fundamental customs of Uruguay life. An asado is a barbeque but it is not simply a meal, it is a ceremony.

First, to become an asador, or barbeque cook, an almost exclusively male role, a young Uruguayan must study under the hand of the family patriarch, and only when deemed fit, he is given a special knife and the blessing to do the cooking on his own.

The firewood is the first consideration—they say that you must spend more time choosing the wood that even the meat. The smoke that certain types of wood give off will flavor the meat, and you want to be sure that you use the best one.

The next step is a visit to the family butcher. The typical asado cut is not like anything you’ll find in Europe or Northern America. It consists of the ribs cut in horizontal strips, about five centimeters wide. You will want a piece with approximately one third each of bone and fat, to give the meat flavor. The cut of meat can be neither too thick nor too thin, and of course, of good quality. But ultimately, you must trust in your longstanding relationship with your butcher, (a gift of a bottle of whiskey at Christmas will help), that he will choose the best cuts for you.

To estimate, the volume of meat needed is a ½ kilo of meat per person, plus extras such as Italian sausage, kidney, sweet breads, blood sausage, and the like. The volume of wood needed is two times the amount of the meat. And of course, you may want to buy bread and one tomato for the symbolic salad.

Finally, you must pour a big glass of whiskey, clear your schedule, sharpen your knife, and relax into a long afternoon or evening of cooking and comradery. This is the most important part.

Nowhere else in the world is the act of cooking meet such a spectacle. In fact, recently Uruguay set the record for the biggest barbeque in the world. Over 50 thousand people stood around and watched meat cook.

In Uruguay the asado is tied to many rituals and traditions—Uruguayans just love to share food, drinks, and stories around a glowing fire, and they do so regularly. As one person told me, it is not just today’s asado that we are enjoying when we make an asado, it is also the good memories of all the asados we have had in the past.