Thousands came to eat meat cooked over fire
En el Hipódromo de Palermo, Buenos Aires volvió a reunirse alrededor del fuego. El festival Carne!, gratuito y respaldado por el gobierno de la ciudad, convocó a miles de personas durante un fin de semana de marzo para celebrar el asado no solo como técnica culinaria, sino como identidad colectiva. Con más de treinta puestos que abarcaban desde la tradición más pura hasta la reinterpretación más audaz, el evento recordó que una cultura se sostiene también en lo que elige cocinar y compartir.
- Miles de personas desbordaron los predios del hipódromo en busca de humo, brasas y el ritual social que en Argentina se llama asado.
- La tensión entre tradición e innovación se resolvió en los platos: matambre estilo pizza, bondiola con salsa Jack Daniels y hamburguesas shawarma convivieron con el asado con cuero de siempre.
- La entrada libre y la amplitud de la oferta —carne, opciones veganas, vino, cerveza artesanal y postres— convirtieron el festival en un espacio accesible para públicos muy distintos.
- Bajo el paraguas de BA Capital Gastronómica, el evento no es solo celebración: es una apuesta del gobierno porteño por posicionar a Buenos Aires como capital gastronómica de América Latina y generar actividad económica en torno a la cultura alimentaria.
- Con ediciones anteriores que superaron los cuarenta mil asistentes, el Carne! se ha consolidado como una fecha fija en el calendario culinario de la ciudad.
Un sábado y un domingo de fines de marzo, el Hipódromo de Palermo se transformó en algo parecido a un templo de la parrilla. El festival Carne! regresó con entrada libre y más de treinta puestos que convirtieron las instalaciones del hipódromo en un recorrido por el vocabulario completo del asado porteño: brasas, kamados, ahumadores, achuras, chorizos con chimichurri de maní, cordero patagónico, costillas de ternera con salsa barbacoa.
Pero el festival no se quedó en la tradición. Los platos reflejaban también cómo esa tradición se está reinventando: brisket con rúcula y queso chamuscado, bondiola glaseada con salsa Jack Daniels y provoleta derretida, hamburguesas shawarma. Para quienes no comen carne, había alternativas vegetales que no parecían un agregado de último momento sino parte genuina de la propuesta.
El Carne! opera bajo el programa BA Capital Gastronómica, una iniciativa del gobierno de la ciudad que busca posicionar a Buenos Aires como capital gastronómica de América Latina, generar empleo y promover políticas alimentarias sostenibles. Que el festival sea gratuito y cuente con respaldo institucional dice algo sobre cómo la ciudad entiende el asado: no como un simple método de cocción, sino como un ritual social y una identidad que vale la pena sostener e invertir.
Ediciones anteriores convocaron a más de cuarenta mil personas, y esta no parecía ser la excepción. La densidad de opciones era lo que hacía funcionar al evento: treinta puestos significaban que no había dos recorridos iguales. Alguien podía empezar con asado con cuero, continuar con un sándwich de pulled pork y terminar con un helado artesanal. El festival también inauguró After Sunset–Puracepa, un nuevo espacio nocturno con DJ, cócteles y vistas al predio, abierto de jueves a sábado desde las siete de la tarde.
On a Saturday and Sunday in late March, the Hipódromo de Palermo opened its gates to thousands of people who came for one thing: to eat meat cooked over fire. The Carne! Festival, free to enter, had returned for another year, and it had brought thirty-some vendors with it—a sprawl of stands and food trucks that turned the racetrack grounds into what amounted to a temple of Argentine grilling culture.
The festival ran from noon until midnight both days, and the menu reflected the full vocabulary of how Buenos Aires cooks meat. There were traditional asados, kamados, and smokers. There was beef and pork and lamb. There were offal dishes—sweetbreads, tripe preparations—and sausages. Chorizo appeared in several forms, some topped with peanut chimichurri, others with spiced onions. For those who had moved away from meat entirely, vendors offered vegan alternatives alongside the charred proteins. Beyond the grilled items themselves, the festival had empanadas, charcuterie boards, disk-cooked dishes, wine, beer from a producer called Rabieta, ice cream, and traditional desserts.
The specific dishes on offer read like a catalog of contemporary Argentine cooking—not just the classics, but the way those classics are being reimagined. One stand served brisket topped with arugula, cucumber, and charred cheese with fries. Another offered beef rib eye with a gremolata sauce, roasted fingerling potatoes, and smoked sweet potatoes. There was matambre prepared pizza-style, bondiola glazed with Jack Daniels sauce and topped with melted provoleta and crispy onions, Patagonian lamb with arugula and mint cream. A vendor called Shami was making shawarma hamburgers. The pulled pork came from a stand called La Triada. The ribs—veal ribs—were finished with barbecue sauce and fries.
This was not the first time the Carne! Festival had come to the Hipódromo de Palermo. Previous editions had drawn more than forty thousand people, establishing the event as a fixture on Buenos Aires' food calendar. The festival operates under the umbrella of BA Capital Gastronómica, a government program designed to position Buenos Aires as the gastronomic capital of Latin America. The stated goal is broader than just celebration: the program aims to strengthen the city's economy through food culture, creating jobs and promoting sustainable food policies in the process.
The festival's timing and scale suggest something about how Buenos Aires sees itself. Grilling—asado—sits at the center of Argentine identity, a practice that is part cooking method, part social ritual, part national mythology. To host a festival dedicated entirely to it, with government backing and thousands of attendees, is to treat that identity as something worth investing in, worth promoting, worth turning into economic activity.
For those who came, the experience was straightforward: walk the grounds, sample from the stands, eat what appealed to you. A visitor might have started with traditional asado con cuero at one stand, moved to a brisket sandwich at another, finished with veal ribs and a beer. The festival also hosted After Sunset–Puracepa, a new venue that opened in conjunction with Saint Patrick's Day celebrations, offering views of the grounds, live DJ music, cocktails, and food service. It would operate Thursday through Saturday evenings from seven o'clock onward.
What made the Carne! Festival work, beyond the quality of the food itself, was the sheer density of choice. Thirty stands meant that no two people needed to eat the same thing. A vegetarian could find plant-based options without feeling like an afterthought. Someone seeking innovation could find it. Someone seeking tradition could find that too. The festival functioned as both a celebration of a specific culinary tradition and a showcase of how that tradition continues to evolve.
Citas Notables
BA Capital Gastronómica aims to position Buenos Aires as the gastronomic capital of Latin America and strengthen the city's economy through food culture, job creation, and sustainable food policies— BA Capital Gastronómica program description
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does Buenos Aires need a government program to promote itself as a food capital? Isn't the reputation already there?
The reputation exists, but it's not automatic. You have to actively build infrastructure around it—events, coordination, support for vendors. BA Capital Gastronómica is essentially saying: we're going to make this a deliberate economic strategy, not just something that happens naturally.
And the Carne! Festival is part of that strategy?
Exactly. It's a way to draw people, generate foot traffic for vendors, create jobs, and reinforce the idea that Buenos Aires is serious about food culture. It's both celebration and economic development.
Thirty stands seems like a lot. How do you even choose what to eat?
You don't, really. You wander. You try things. The point is abundance—so many options that everyone finds something. A vegetarian doesn't feel excluded. Someone wanting innovation finds it. Someone wanting tradition finds that too.
The previous editions drew forty thousand people. That's significant.
It is. It means the festival has become a calendar event, something people plan for. That kind of attendance validates the whole premise—that there's genuine appetite for this, that it's not just government promotion.
What does asado mean to Buenos Aires, really?
It's identity. It's how people gather, how they cook, how they understand themselves. Hosting a massive festival around it is a way of saying: this matters, this is worth protecting and promoting.