Uruguayan cuisine

Uruguayan cooking is beef and Italian at once: meat over coals, pasta, breadcrumbs and a great deal of cheese.

Uruguayans eat more beef per head than anyone in the world, and the asado here is built on firewood rather than charcoal, which is what gives the meat its smoky edge.

Late nineteenth-century Italian immigration left pasta, breadcrumbs and mozzarella so firmly in place that milanesa counts as national food alongside grilled beef.