Night With A Gaucho

Rick Nichols visits Fogo de Chão and follows the night of chef/server/gaucho Ivanir Luis Delavecchia.

Within three minutes, he’s back in the kitchen, smearing a little salt on the exposed meat, hoisting the skewer back on the grill. Its rosy surfaces caramelize and darken again for their encore.

But another skewer is already ready: He’s off, his trousers billowing, his elbows tucked close, his knife and skewer held chest-high in the prescribed two-finger vertical hold.

He cuts a proud figure – an other-American cowboy, a keeper of the flame, untrivialized by the cynical branding of Roy Rogers or Lone Star or Golden Corral.

In a city besieged by cheesy corporate chains (Olive Garden!) and history-erasing interiors, I’m glad he rode into town – and the Fogo gang along with him.

Gauchos stride the range on Chestnut St. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

Fogo de Chão [Official Site]