Don Julio: The world’s (or TikTok’s) best steakhouse?

Illustrations by Grace McKenna

I spent the past weekend cleaning out my prized top floor room of a residential student house in Providencia’s Eduardo Hyatt Street. It was a largely successful post-semester purge; a distinction I quantified by the three large plastic donation centre-bound bags I hauled through 30-degree Santiago. Unburdened of earthly possessions and three Chilean child burns victims helped as the store assistant repeatedly reminded me (one per bag!), I headed back home. I began to tackle the mounting pile of discarded university paperwork appropriately shoved between the conveniently paper shaped crevice between my desk and bed. It was amongst this organised chaos that I found Don Julio’s spring menu perfectly intact, ever so patiently waiting to be reviewed… 

I was instantly taken back to the late spring dusk there on the corner of Buenos Aires’ calle Guatemala. As a recently converted scrapbooker, I had become somewhat of a physical media (a broadly applied term) magpie, manically gluing miscellaneous receipts, food labels and chocolate wrappers into a thoughtfully gifted notebook. I hope to treat and upgrade my scrap collection to a Louise Carmen journal (if you know you know), but scrappers cannot be choosers, and I must stick to my Food and Drink column brief. Menus were thus not spared from my scrapbooking pillage. The intricate fine-lined illustrations and satisfyingly swirling calligraphy were highly deserving of a designated page. It is not only the aesthetic delight of the beautifully crisp, biteable thick menu paper, but also the insanely delicious meat of the best parrilla (steakhouse) in the world, that makes Don Julio’s worthy of my review. 

On first night of our first group trip, drunk on Instagram reel recommendations and unpolluted liberation from Santiago’s smog, we were edged on by Buenos Aires’ complete oppositeness to Chile’s capital. Said factors led us to Don Julio’s green and white pinstripe canopied, red-brick face. That night Mr Don Julio met his reckoning - the twenty-five-year-old establishment met the ever so aged culinary wrath of six twenty-year olds.

Despite reddit users lamenting on a longwinded reservation process, I simply sent a WhatsApp text and 7 hours later we were seated, ready to wine, dine and steak. If your group has the pleasure of being as disorganised as mine, no stress type Bs - ignore internet fearmongering and send that reservation text to the dodgy WhatsApp number with two hours to spare. Don Julio’s marketing mogul’s idea to lull the ‘comically, tremendous lines’ with free bubbles will soothe no-reservation regret. Who knows, you may even chat to a lovely Brazilian couple who take your group’s totally candid pre-dinner digicam photos.

Appeased with our two glasses of free (?) espumante, we huddled over to our people watcher’s paradise table, carved into the roadside. None of us excel in the decision-making department so the complimentary mini empanadas and bottomless sparkling water were ample brain food for such a difficult task. The perfectly fluffy bread rolls proved the perfect accompaniment to my first generous teaspoon of real Argentinian chimichurri; so herby, so oily, so good. On a desperate nostalgic whim, I attempted to recreate that herby magic two weeks later but to no avail - I must email Mr Julio personally; reels recipes simply do not cut it. 

Overwhelmed by the menu’s seemingly limitless choice of cuts, you may wonder why such steak novices were sat in a parrilla, yet when in Rome (Argentina), one must try the renowned meat, grass-fed on the vast Pampa. When in the country with the second highest meat consumption, it is only culturally respectful to indulge in the world’s best meat. When our order of three wondrously thick steaks arrived, the performance began. The waiter flaunted an engraved knife, casting a magically meaty spell to make the supple meat effortlessly fall apart, proceeding to very democratically portion it between the seven of us. The perfectly seared steak, with a rich pink centre that begged to be eaten, made said performance a torturous wait. One can only assume, however, that the steak must be centred like a movie star in candle-lit limelight to be worth of a Michelin star.

Our chosen seasonal spring vegetables sides were equal recipients of our praise of nonverbal satisfaction. I was particularly partial to the slow roasted sweet potato, super satisfying. The warmth of the parrilla had softened the asparagus’ stringy vein system that usually makes me an asparagus adversary. They were instead brandished with thick black grill marks, culinary beauty spots, as if the parrilla had personally blessed each stalk. I marvelled at the quite literal cutting-edge engineering of the table knives, I restrained myself; it wouldn’t fit in my scrapbook anyways. 

Complimentary chocolate covered manjar (dulce de leche) bites, cooled to refrigerated perfection, contrasted the slightly fiery remnants integral to the meat’s deliciousness. This almost tempted us to dessert, but the prices dissuaded us. We went round the corner for 2,000 Argentine pesos Star Wars themed ice-cream promptly afterwards. A note for Don Julio; incorporate more dark chocolate moulded Darth Vaders into your dessert menu. 

The morning after our meat-enlightenment we wanted to evangelise Don Julio’s perfected steak to anyone who would listen. Our uber driver en route to Cementerio de La Recoleta was our victim. He rebutted long-windedly, albeit politely, labelling us sheep, giving us the name of a superior local restaurant, finishing with ‘I bet you just wanted to see Messi’, who supposedly dines in Don Julio. I was loosely reminded of the snarky reddit keyboard warriors calling out the restaurant’s ‘inconsistency’ and ‘overhype’ and mused on whether such criticism would still be made if the restaurant never reached ‘mainstream’ feeds. I didn’t share this with our porteño driver. 

I am grateful we ignored online cynics who equate popularity with linear decline in quality as I sleep well knowing me and Messi may have enjoyed a steak in the same seat.