Tag Archives: Boston Guy

Each year Sergio and I travel to Belo Horizonte (B.H.), Brazil. Despite the fact that you may never have heard of his hometown, it has roughly the same population of Chicago – America’s third largest city.

We take advantage of the great dining when we visit B.H. and this year we visited a restaurant in the Lourdes neighborhood that has been operating since 1988 called Taste-Vin. The quaint French restaurant has a cozy feeling. The decor includes friendly messages like a “Recipe for Happiness”, walls lined with wine bottles and small dining rooms that are sectioned off by a central bar that serves to divide the space but still let patrons look from one dining room to another.

Chef Rodrigo Fonseca who also owns Taste-Vin came out to greet us and share his personal recommendations

The menu at Taste-Vin is surprisingly large with Entrées, Soufflés (perhaps what they are best known for serving), Seafood, Duck and Rabbit, Meat and of course Desserts. Because we got a late start to our dinner (10:30PM on a Monday) we decided to skip ordering an entree and doubled down by ordering one of the twelve soufflés to share and the filet mignon. Before we talk about the food we ordered think about the fragrances that filled these rooms as countless soufflés are being served at nearly every table; like the one shown below.

Taste-Vin Spinach Souffle – $18

The filet mignon, served as two 5 oz medallions, is ideal for sharing so we asked to have each medallion served on separate plates. Below is a photo of my plate as it was served – cooked medium rare as requested. The combination of the wine, filet (with a bouquet of eight herbs served to the side) and soufflé was so aromatic that I was salivating like Pavlov’s dogs after hearing the chime of a bell.

Shown above is one of the two 5 oz grilled filet mignon medallions is $22

The soufflé was so light and full of flavor. I immediately understood why every table had ordered one to share. The Gruyere soufflé we had ordered also had the added benefit of absorbing some of the au poivre vert sauce.

Upon arriving at the table the waitstaff plated the soufflé, adding some additional drama to what normally concludes with plates being served. 

Although I mentioned that we skipped an entrée because of the late start to our dinner, neither of us were in a rush to leave what turned out to be an excellent meal so with very little urging from Sergio we also ordered the Moelleux Au Chocolat which is best described by sharing this 5 second video. 

Should you ever get to Belo Horizonte, you may want to give this restaurant a try. Taste-Vin ranks as the second most popular restaurant out of a possible 8,310 places to try listed on Trip Advisor.

Taste-Vin Restaurant – Belo Horizonte