El Envigadeño
This tiny place doesn’t look, at first glance, like one of the best spots to get a delicious meal. Up a non-descript street in downtown Bogotá, through a small door and into a dark room, it looks more like somewhere to place a bet than to get good Colombian food.
But this is the place for a bandeja paisa just as you’ll get it on the farm. Here the arepas are handmade, fat round balls of carefully grilled white corn flour. The chicharrón is in all its glory, crispy, tasty and fresh. The avocado gets mixed in with tomatoes and onion to make a refreshing salad. And sitting on top of the ground beef is a runny fried egg. Yes, it’s big – but you’ll want to eat every last bit, and wipe up the last of the bean gravy with some arepa.