Eat Out London!Buen Ayre
Buen Ayre | Argentine grill – Hackney/London
For reservations please call us preferably during office hours (9.00 to 15.00) Please note that Due to the small size of the restaurant, the high demand and the small margins, we operate a 2 sitting policy (until and from 9).
- Due to the number of "no-shows" in our tiny restaurant, we are unfortunately forced to take a deposit of £10 per person on bookings of 4 or more people, which will be refunded or taken off the bill according to your preference on the day.
- Please note that email bookings are not confirmed until you received a reply from us doing so.
Emails sent outside office hours or on weekends may not be viewed until it is too late.
- If you want to book well in advance, it is always better to do so during office hours since the restaurant is normally extremely hectic when open and some times taking people's details over the phone is extremely difficult.
Reviews and related sites
Reviews — What our customers say about us | Buen Ayre
food
Luiz Hara, The London Foodie “… a steak house will need to be truly outstanding to impress me, and Buen Ayre has certainly ticked most boxes.”
10 years of London Food / Evening Standard Fay Maschler mentions Buen Ayre as oneof the best things to happen to London in the 90’s See Buen Ayre in the BBC’s Olive magazine.
December 2009 issue “Celebrate Christmas the Argentine way” Para Ti (Buenos Aires, Argentina) – 3/07/2009 ”Una parrilla very british (spanish)” London Evening Standart, 27/02/2009 ”Best BBQ’s in London” The Times (London) – 27/09/2008 “This is the Buenos Aires expat John Rattagan’s temple to quality Argentine steak” Channel 4 – 16/07/2008 Chimicurri sauce recipe Channel 4 – 27/06/2008 10 things you’ve never cooked on a barbecue Time Out’s Eating & Drinking Guide 2008 Time Out’s Hot 100 The London Paper, 14/11/2007 “The best restaurant to eat steak” Feargus O’Sullivan The Independent (London) – Saturday 25 Nov, 2006 Restaurants of the year 2006 Our critics choose their favourite places of 2006 View London – Monday 9 Oct, 2006 ”This steakhouse is the closest London gets to Argentina.”
The Independent (London) – Saturday 3 Jun, 2006 “The end of my quest took me to deepest Hackney in search of the legendary Santa Maria Del Buen Ayre” Metro Life (London) – Friday 15 July, 2005 ”When that meat-eating itch needs scratching, Santa Mariais a pretty good place to do it.”
Thomas Sutcliffe Telegraph Weekend (London) – Saturday 23 April, 2005 “We love the bowls of chimichurri sauce…” Jan Moir Evening Standard (London) – Wednesday 13 April 2005 ”Santa Maria del Buen Ayre adds its particular ethnicity to a burgeoning group of restaurans in Broadway Market” Fay Maschler Time Out (London) – Issue no.1806, March 30/April 6, 2005 “There are few worthwhile Argentinian restaurants in London, and this one’s a purler.”
The London Foodie: London Restaurant Reviews – Buen Ayre
food value staff drinks
Buen Ayre Having lived in Brazil for most of my teenage years, I was lucky enough to have experienced the many “Churrascaria” or “Rodizio” restaurants of the land.
Their signature dish is any variation of their “Parrillada”, a selection of meats, cheese and mushroom served on a hot grill.
In my previous two visits we tried their “Parrillada Deluxe” containing some prime cuts like rib eye sirloin in addition to sausages and other meats, and also their “Parrillada Mixta” which is a mixture of different cuts and sausages with melted provolone cheese and mushroom.
This time, we tried the “Parrillada Al Paso”, a selection of grilled meats, Argentine-style pork sausages, flank steak, black pudding and short ribs.
At £66.83 for two, I would rate Buen Ayre as one of the best value Argentinian restaurants in London, and as good as the ones I tried in Brazil.
Buen Ayre | Restaurants in South Hackney, London
food
Broadway Market’s atmosphere of laid-back revelry should make it the perfect spot for Buen Ayre, chef-proprietor John Patrick Rattagan’s attempt to bring casual Argentinian meat feasting to London.
The beef on our ‘deluxe’ mixed grill (£53 for two, plus £4.50 for a side of above-average chips) certainly looked every charred, sticky inch the parrilla victim.
Yet it didn’t elicit the gushing response that other steak specialists in the capital can.
Cheaper steaks are available, and one of those, the sweetbreads or a couple of chorizo would have suited our overall sense of the place better than that expensive parrilla.
Wines are exclusively Argentinian, and desserts are the usual super-sweet selection, including assorted ice-creams, pancake with dulce de leche, and flan (crème caramel).