Today’s post comes to us from Brandi at Diets in Review. You may remember her from her previous post: Successful Weight Loss with Weight Watchers. Diets in Review helps you understand and debunk all those crazy diets and figure out what fits you best. We love how easy they make it!

Have you walked through the grocery store or local health market and gotten excited when you stumble on something that appears to be healthy and good for you? Then after trying it you’re rewarded with something that actually tastes great? We get the same feeling at DietsInReview.com, and we share those in our Food Finds series. It can be a struggle to find foods you like, that actually provide some nutritional value. These five Food Finds have made our grocery list, and will likely make yours, too.

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It wouldn’t be a proper recounting of my Argentinean travels if I didn’t talk about the abundance of beef just one more time, or more importantly the style of eating Argentineans are most known for: tenedor libre. Translated as an “open or free fork”, this tradition has all-you-can-eat offerings that consist mostly of steak, I mean lots of different kinds of steak. It’s literally a meat buffet, but instead of cruising through plates of already prepared foods basking in heat lamps, dinner is hot off the grill, er, I mean…the asado.

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A few months ago, I received wonderfully exciting news that a farmer’s market would be setting up shop across the street from my apartment every Sunday morning this summer. I was immediately fantasizing about stepping outside my door and browsing the stands, choosing locally grown fruits and vegetables for the week. I already told you about my love of the Madison farmer’s market and I was hoping to rekindle that love in the River North neighborhood.

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Growing up in America’s restaurants, drinking water for free always seemed like a given. I was raised with the attitude that it is my right as a customer to have water, and as much water as I want at that. Everytime I go out to eat, I fully expect a glass of water to be waiting for me at the table or that a busboy will soon be on his way with a cold glass of good old tap water. And never, I mean not once, did it ever occur to me that I was spoiled in this regard. I mean, how could someone deny me water? Right?

Well…I recently came across this post on Chowhound (a food forum) that begs a similar question and really put my skewed American attitude into perspective. A very agitated original poster wrote: “Is it legal for an eating establishment to decline free tap water to its customers?” Knowing what I know now, I would answer this question differently than I would have, say, a year ago.

So what has changed?

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This is one of those pictures that really doesn’t need any words to persuade you how good it is. So beautiful on it’s own, I almost left you here without an explanation. But then… talkative old me decided I just couldn’t do that to you - I mean, you must be wondering just where this salad came from. Right?

I had this masterpiece in Argentina, at La Cabrera no less (the steakhouse I wrote about here). Since it was our second time back to the restaurant and we knew how big the steak portions were, my friend and I decided to split one order of steak and go with a salad instead. This one salad made of hearts of palm, tomatoes and avocados sounded interesting to her.

We ordered it and fell in love.

Recipe after the jump!

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So I know it’s the middle of summer and I’m supposed to be going on and on about the multitudes of basil my plants are producing and how I just cannot make enough pesto to keep up! The truth is, I wish I could be that person. But alas, my wee basil plant is recovering from the last major harvest, leaving me waiting patiently for my next opportunity.

I actually had every intention of making some homemade pesto last week, but had made the mistake of clipping off the basil from the plant too early, leaving me with wilted, brown leaves. Yuck. Of course at this point I was already craving the salty zing of pesto, so I moved on to Plan B: pesto paste.

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Cocktail Museum - Preserving our country’s history, one drink at a time! The museum opens this month in New Orleans.

A skyline of farms - Instead of taking up large expanses of land, the latest farming idea involves vertical expansion. Could farms be the next city skyline contributors?

Bettering the Burger - A group of Argentine (I swear I did not seek this out!) researchers are trying to find the perfect burger: tasty and healthy at the same time. So far, they’ve tested hundreds of thousands of burgers.

Nuts and pregnancy may cause asthma - A new study tells pregnant women to be careful when eating their legumes.

A grease-less stirfry starts with the wok - A new wok has been designed to make the final stir fry less greasy. It’s different shape prevents veggies and meats from absorbing too much of the oil they are cooked in.

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Whenever I travel, I like to find the little nuances of life that differ from what I’m used to here at home (Chicago). I love to compare the foodways of other cultures to my own and imagine myself growing up in another country. I guess you could call it a hobby I’ve taken up in the albeit spontaneous traveling I’ve been doing lately. It makes me incredibly grateful to have such opportunities to expand my horizons.

For example, did you know that in Argentina the stoplights turn yellow before turning green? Me either! Or that almost all the cars driven there are stick shift, and even when you have 8 lanes going one direction on a highway…that’s still not enough to not justify squeezing in between cars and creating 12 lanes of cars driving practically on top of eachother (Yea, the driving was a little bit crazy there. At one point, I compared it to New York and my friend laughed at me for making the understatement of the century).

But more important than anything car-related, there were certainly some interesting foods I came across. Some were what I expected…others were hardly expected at all. From empanadas to crustless bread sandwiches, below is an itinerary of just some of the foods (and drinks) I discovered in Argentina.

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After our whirlwind weekend tour of Buenos Aires (full of tango dancing, street festivals, bus tours and shopping), we decided on Monday that we needed a day to relax. We slept in that morning and gave ourselves a lax agenda that consisted of only one destination: the Japanese Gardens. A cute little place to walk around, the gardens were nice but something tells me they are not the main attraction. At least for me, the highlight of this day trip was visiting the on-site restaurant:Jardin Japonais (Japanese Gardens).

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Life is sweet, especially when you’re in Argentina. It isn’t just the abundance of steak, it’s the fact that every other facet of Argentinean cuisine (that I’ve come across) has something sweet about it. Whether it’s buttery, sugar-topped croissants in the morning, or a snack of churros and dulce de leche, there is nothing too sweet for Argentina.

In my week long stay, I came across a whole slew of food items that I don’t ordinarily assume would be sweet. For example, there was sweetened ketchup, coffee that tasted naturally sweet, and even sweet spreadable cheese! My friend even thought the fries were sweet, but I think we were just going overboard.

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