Examiner food critic Patricia Unterman is in Peru on another one of her culinary tours, and well, she really buys into the whole “Peruvian cuisine” thing down there:
The country possesses extraordinary biodiversity, and its cuisine showcases this bounty of ingredients in exciting dishes inspired by Spanish, native Indian, African, Chinese and Japanese kitchens. For a food traveler, Peru is paradise.
Unterman then lists the gastronomical delights of the country: $2 skewered beef hearts, tiger’s milk-marinated ceviche, tamalitos, pisco (a grape brandy) and more. She ends the mouth-watering article with a long meal at high-end restaurant run by Gaston Acurio, “the Wolfgang Puck of Lima” (sidenote: why is it that everyone famous South American is always described in that manner? Rodrigo Santoro was “the Tom Cruise of Brazil,” Shakira was “the Alanis Morissette of Latin America.” We wonder about these things.). Anyway, the meal at Acurio’s restaurant, complete with baby goat and suckling pig, was nothing short of ambrosial, leading Unterman to theorize on Peru’s future as a culinary powerhouse:
Acurio, who sees himself as an emissary of Peruvian products and cooking, has opened restaurants in Santiago, Bogota and Caracas, so far. He’s eyeing San Francisco for a branch of La Mar. He and every Peruvian I’ve met knows Peruvian food will conquer the world.Personally, I was ravished.
Note to self: never play Peruvian cuisine in Risk. Until Acurio opens an American branch, San Francisco has a host of fine Peruvian restaurants, including a newcomer.
Food of Peru will conquer the world [Examiner]
