Casa Esquina is an Argentinean inspired restaurant in Balmain. The menu has a lot of Argentinean flavours and mains are cooked on the parrilla grill. There's also a menu full of bar snacks and cocktails aplenty too!
Casa Esquina is located at the former Efendy site and has been completely revamped. There's a large terrace area and a cosy indoor section but the majority of diners seems to be sitting outside this evening, even with rain threatening to fall. The head chef is Will Quartel who hails from Washington DC. He and Atticus Hospitality Director Michael Fegent travelled for three weeks to Buenos Aires and Mendoza for research before opening up Casa Esquina.
I'm here with Michaela whom I met at Santiago airport in March this year while on my way to Antarctica. While she was born here both her parents are Argentinean and she speaks Spanish and we both helped each other get to our flight through the chaos of Santiago airport (ok she mostly helped me). Then we realised that we both had worked together and have caught up a few times since arriving back. She suggested that our next catch up be at Casa Esquina. Service from our Argentinean waiter is lovely and it turns out he comes from the same small area as Michaela's mother.
Michaela orders the "She Put The Lime In The Coconut" cocktail with Red Mill Coconut Rum, passionfruit, lime, angostura which is very drinkable. I have a mocktail called the "Peaches N Dreams" that has peach, strawberry, orgeat (almond syrup), lime and aquafaba. It's more like a sweet juice and I would have loved a bit of acidity in this.
The best empanadas I've ever eaten were at Don Julio in Buenos Aires and I'm excited to try Casa Esquina's version. We share one of each of the three types. The first is a roasted butternut squash with raclette cheese which is a nice vegetarian empanada. The chicken and chorizo one is stuffed full of soft, seasoned chicken breast and some chorizo for flavour.
However the unanimous favourite is the kangaroo with maraschino cherry. While that may sound like an unusual combination it absolutely works so well that I have to consider trying to recreate this combination of flavours at home. The pastry is also excellent and that is the part that I find the hardest to master with empanadas. The empanadas come with salsa criolla (a finely diced capsicum, tomato and onion raw salsa) and chef Will's DC hot sauce. This hot sauce is based on a Mumbo sauce in Washington DC, similar to a smoky BBQ sauce with various types of chilli with garlic and onion.
When you think of chicharron you think of crispy pork rinds and tasty beer snacks and honestly I was wondering how they could be $32 but our waiter recommended this as did other people. It's not chicharron as you would expect but rather a square of pork belly. It is very tasty and soft and a good size to cut up and share and that chilli arbol sauce is divine. I only wish that the rind would have been crispy because then you would get the signature chicharron texture.
The sweetbread and prawn paella is a great entree to share. The squid ink paella comes in a small cast iron pan with tender sweetbreads and perfectly cooked prawns on top with a wagyu fat chilli crunch.
Entrana or outside skirt steak is Michaela's favourite cut but the wagyu entrana has us a bit confused because there's not a lot of marbling of the fat. Because it was wagyu it was recommended that we have it cooked medium but it's cooked more medium rare. I don't know if I would order this again because I was expecting a luscious cut and while it was nice enough it's not what I expect when I order wagyu. We tried it with regular chimichurri and red chimichurri and both sauces were really good with the steak.
The fish of the day is sand whiting and it is well cooked and still moist. The reason why I ordered this is because I love gribiche sauce and I was curious to see what the anchovy gribiche sauce was like. It's very anchovy forward so if you love fishy flavours this is for you.
I think my favourite dish along with the empanadas, paella and chicharron were these smoked crispy potatoes. The special sauce is made of aji panca (Peruvian red chilli), mayonnaise and onion atop some delicious smoked crispy potatoes. Honestly I could not stop eating these, they were so good.
The fried Brussel sprouts are crispy and served with ajo blanco (almond, garlic and vinegar sauce) and espelette pepper that makes them very moreish.
There are three desserts, four if you count the affogato, and they're all very Argentinean in that they're all quite rich and sweet and involve caramel or dulce de leche. I do think there is room for a lighter less sweet or fruity dessert too. We try the Smoke On The Water with our desserts and it's made with Suntory Toki, Walnut liqueur, Zucca Rabarbaro, chocolate bitters and smoke. You lift the coaster and the aroma of smoke fills the air. The idea is that you nibble on the lightly sugared walnuts and then take a sip of drink.
This flan is quite firm and with a burnt caramel syrup along with a flourish of dulce de leche on the side. Michaela knows her food and she points out that in Argentina they usually add some dulce de leche to the caramel when making flan to temper the burnt caramel flavour.
Alfajors are usually small little butter cookies sandwiched with dulce de leche and their dessert version is a huge one filled with hazelnut dacquoise, dulce ganache, toasted coconut and lots of melted dark chocolate on top. It's rich and sweet and I particularly like the crunchy toasted coconut with the hazelnuts and dule de leche mixed together.
So tell me Dear Reader, do you like Argentinean food? Where is the strangest place that you've run into someone that become a friend?
NQN and Michaela were guests of Casa Esquina but all opinions remain her own.
Casa Esquina
79 Elliott St, Balmain NSW 2041
Phone: (02) 9290 7033
Tuesday and Wednesday 5 pm–12 am
Thursday to Saturday 12 pm–12 am
Sunday 12–10 pm
Monday closed
https://www.casaesquina.au/
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