Medellín, Colombia, Is the Next Big Thing in Global Cuisine …

On the patio of Casa El Ramal, in the El Poblado neighborhood of Medellín, piles of wood were ablaze with big silver pots nestled in the middle. A staffer ushered me into another courtyard, this one smaller, draped in vines and filled with music. Beautiful young people enjoyed spice-rimmed cocktails and bowls of fragrant sancocho, the chicken-soup-for-the-soul of Colombia. 

Chef David Suárez joined me at my table after I’d had two guava gimlets and a bowl of soup. He told me that, in the past, a connection to Medellín’s roots was missing from travelers’ dining experiences. “There were still aspects of Colombian gastronomy visitors didn’t know, that you can’t find in a restaurant, like what we eat at home with our grandmothers.” His “Sancocho Sundays” bridge that gap, and the juxtaposition of new and old, trend and tradition, captures Medellín’s culinary moment. In addition to El Ramal, Suárez is also a co-owner of 23 Hotel, a stylish boutique property a short distance away.

“Medellín is about five years behind Bogotá” in terms of its burgeoning fine-dining scene, Suárez estimated. “But we now have new cuisines appearing, with new ideas and new flavors and fusions. Chefs have the freedom to experiment. Before in Colombia it was rice, beans, pork, and cabbage. We’re changing all that.”

Medellín’s arrival as a food destination belies the city’s associations with Pablo Escobar’s reign of narco terror in the mid 1980s and early 90s. Thousands of people were killed by his cartel during those years — a time when accessing fine-dining ingredients or creating a vibrant food scene was far from most residents’ minds. Times have changed for the better, and in the past decade, the restaurant industry has blossomed.

When chef Laura Londoño opened Oci.Mde, in the El Poblado neighborhood, 11 years ago, it was one of three restaurants on the street. Today, Carrera 33 is lined with fashionable places to eat. Londoño’s kitchen turns out elevated versions of home-style classics, such as shrimp glazed in a jam made with tomatoes and rocoto chiles. While I sampled the beef tongue sandwich, Londoño told me about the struggle to find good ingredients when she first started in the industry. “In Medellín, we didn’t have a culture of fine dining or organic food at that time. And local people weren’t used to sharing — they wanted their own plate,” she said, pointing to her family-style menu. She laughed and nodded to a speaker above us playing David Bowie: “And people complained about the rock-and-roll…. The evolution since that time has been huge, and people started changing their mindsets.” She was right: the joy of spooning through the meringue layer of a frozen guanabana dessert while listening to the Cure is an experience I didn’t know I needed, but thoroughly relished.

The person who has perhaps been most effective at promoting Medellín’s cuisine is 41-year-old Juan Manuel Barrientos, the charismatic celebrity chef whose restaurant Elcielo has outposts in Bogotá, Miami, and Washington, D.C. The 10-plus-course tasting menu dodges pretentiousness by embracing a playful high-low approach. I loved the square of crisped tapioca, a kind of South American tater tot, which was topped with foie gras. A mini arepa was paired with blue-crab semifreddo and French caviar. 

But the showstopper course happened when the waiter asked me to hold out my hands and close my eyes, then poured warm chocolate into my palms and instructed me to lick it off. He told me to pay attention to how the moment awakened my senses: smell, touch, and taste. Later, the liquid nitrogen used during the coffee course released clouds that were an homage to the misty hills of the coffee-growing region around Medellín. 

It’s hard to take yourself too seriously when covered in chocolate or obscured by a cloud over your table. Barrientos’s cheeky play on fine dining proves an irresistible experience for most: the place is booked up months in advance.

Another spot that’s pushing the boundaries is Sambombi Bistró Local, helmed by chef Jhon Zárate. Again, it was a billow of smoke that welcomed me in: another sancocho in the making. I ordered a basic fried-rice plate, which was made memorable by a mischievously hidden yolk of creamy shrimp tartare in its center, elevating a staple to something extraordinary. It’s easy to walk past places like Sambombi and El Ramal, amid the alluring shops and chic hotels dripping in tropical plants. But in Medellín, where there’s smoke, there’s flavor. 

A version of this story first appeared in the September 2024 issue of Travel + Leisure under the headline “Flavor Forward.”