AREPAS AT LAST!
South America on Whyte
We’ve been arepas fanatics around our north-side casita for a few years now.
With no templos of Venezuelan or Colombian cuisine available locally, you had to satisfy your craving for these small discs of soulful tastiness by hitting a Latino store for bags of Venezuelan P.A.N. or Colombian Donarepa — the white maize meal preparation ingredient — and making your own. Nothing wrong with that.
Now I’d like to report that our penchant for arepas were inculcated by trips to Bogata or Caracas and points in between, to the rich street food culture of South America. Maybe throw in a short narrative on current confusing and confounding political events …
The truth is we hit upon this toothsome revelation via regular jaunts to New York and the East Village and Williamsburg outlets of the Caracas Arepa Bar. The latter location has the most wondrous back garden in the summertime, a sustaining memory through our many months of winter.
How glorious then, via the miracle of immigration to Canada, that Edmontonians can now savour much the same thing in our own little corner of hipness in Old Strathcona. In fact, although this is of no interest to anyone but your correspondent, Avila Arepa — a long, attractive space with an exposed brick wall and striking entryway graphics — bears some resemblance to the aforementioned Manhattan resto. In fact, it’s more designed and more comfortable. The subtitle, Urban Venezuelan Kitchen, is spot on.
OK, so what is an arepa? It is a maize meal/flour disc, (the menu promotes their gluten-free status) about the size, shape and thickness of an English muffin, although the similarity ends there. Generally credited to the Indigenous Timoto-Cuica people of the Venezuelan Andes, they are split partway down and then stuffed with a wide variety of fillings. There are regional variations, as you might expect. When prepared properly, which was the case on our visit to Avila Arepas, they will make you forget about tacos for a while and luxuriate in a new, if ancient, discovery.
Avila Arepas boasts an admirably large menu of fillings and the kitchen seems up to the task of managing that diversity, to the point of making their own cheese (queso de mano), which I highly recommend. Our party of four selected the pabellon (pulled beef, plantain, black beans, feta), caurimare (creamy avocado, chicken, cheddar), bello monte (Portobello, grilled tomato, arugula) and Avila (oven-roasted pork, cheddar, tomato, arugula), each of them around 10 bucks, served with a small cup of coleslaw.
Each was very good indeed — the arepas crunchy on the outside and soft but not mushy inside as it should be — and generously stuffed with quality ingredients. The pulled beef and slow-cooked pork were particularly impressive, with a couple of delicious house-made sauces.
We also decadently surveyed some of the “sidekicks” offerings. Although this turned out to be too much food, it will be difficult to rule out the tequenos ($10 cheese croquettes), cochino frito (delicious, tiny-perfect deep fried pork bites $8), tajadas ($5 fried sweet plantains with feta) or especially the must-try chachapa (fabulous Venezuelan sweet corn “pancake” stuffed with sublime queso de mano, $10).
It is true that much of this food is deep fried and not necessarily on the light side, to understate it. But surely we are allowed a blowout every once in a while. And it must also be reported that there are many options here for vegetarians and vegans, much to their credit.
Like many of the dishes, we were generously filled, to the point of passing on postres, which nonetheless were tempting — from the classic tres leches sponge cake to the so-called quesillo, a Venezuelan flan.
On the drinks side, we opted for a cold Corona con limon ($6.50) and a trio of value-priced rum cocktails ($7.25), namely the guarapita (white rum, passion fruit juice), paperron (dark rum, sugar cane and lime juice) and el
criollito (white rum, pineapple juice). Not one for sugary tipples, I liked the least sweet papperon best, so you’re on your own here.
The service was welcoming and efficient, and unlike some of the comments I’ve read online, the dishes came out as promptly as you would want. And as you can see, the prices are very agreeable, to the point of bargain fare in some cases.
Quibbles? Well, as a wine drinker and recognizing Avila Arepas’s space constraints, it doesn’t seem like offering a single modest Chilean red and white by the glass would be too much to ask. Also, I’m not convinced using cheddar as a topping on many of the arepas is the right cheese to use as a substitute. Surely part of the problem is Canada’s protectionist dairy lobby, designed to keep foreign cheese prices higher than they should be. And then there is the business of being forced to order at a counter, after which table service ensues. How much to tip?
But these are small things. I’m overjoyed that Avila Arepa has arrived, which for this one is the best Edmonton restaurant news of the year. I intend to be a regular. Run, don’t walk to it, and support the real thing.