Peru’s the menu
Bold chefs are putting delicious spins on this Latin American cuisine
IF your knowledge of Peruvian food begins and ends with rotisserie chicken, it’s time to book a table.
Peruvian cuisine, which fuses Japanese, Chinese, Italian and Spanish cooking styles, is amassing a serious foodie following. That’s thanks in part to Peru’s own delicious reputation: The World Travel Awards have dubbed Peru the globe’s leading culinary destination for six years in a row, and the country’s capital, Lima, is home to a handful of worldclass chefs, including Virgilio Martínez, Héctor Solís and Gastón Acurio.
But New Yorkers don’t need to venture far to try mouthwatering ceviche. Between the new wave of trendy Peruvian restaurants and this year’s celebration of Peru Restaurant Week, running through Oct. 19, there are plenty of opportunities for palate expansion.
“In New York, Peruvian rotisserie chicken has always been semi-famous,” Franco Noriega, owner of health-conscious West Village Peruvian spot Baby Brasa, tells The Post. “But there is so much more.”
Popular Peruvian dishes include ceviche (think sashimi doused in acidic lime juice), lomo saltado (a Chinese-influenced stir-fry, with juicy sirloin steak, peppers and onions, often served over french fries) and aji de gallina (shredded rotisserie chicken and yellow aji peppers in a cheese fondue, served over rice and topped with a hard-boiled egg).
Noriega, who’s serving up traditional Peruvian fare for Peru Restaurant Week, laments that the cuisine hasn’t always been respected. “There is this mentality that Latin American food is sort of cheap. But Peruvian food, even in a casual environment, is extremely highend.” He points to the classic Latin American dish of chicken and rice: In a Peruvian restaurant, Noriega says, rather than simple yellow rice with cooked chicken, you can expect a cilantro-infused rice topped with seasoned rotisserie chicken and pickled onions to balance the flavor.
Of course, New York chefs take it a little further than a few sprigs of cilantro.
Noriega’s made a point of sourcing freerange organic chicken. Midtown’s year-old Sen Sakana, a Japanese-Peruvian fusion restaurant, channels Nobu — a restaurant that’s long cited a Peruvian influence — and courts big-spending gourmets with its $125 chef ’s tasting menu and a cocktail program starring pisco, a brandy from the winemaking regions of Peru and Chile. (Epicures on a budget can try the $49 prix fixe during Peru Restaurant Week.) Even the West Village’s fast-casual sandwich shop Llamita, which rejects deli meat for the likes of calamari, duck sausage and rib-eye, comes with an upscale pedigree: Its Peruvian-American chef, Erik Ramirez, is an alumnus of Eleven Madison Park.
That level of effort is ingrained in Peruvian food culture, says Jaclyn Carey, Sen Sakana’s executive chef.
“In Peru, you have to cook really well or people sort of look down on you,” she says. “Our toughest critics are always Peruvian or of Peruvian descent. It means that you have to meet the highest standards.”
Besides making sure their food satisfies those already in the know, Carey and her colleagues in the business say that their biggest challenge is helping diners learn about this Latin fare — namely, that it isn’t just cheap eats or one-note meals.
“There is still a lot of work to do here,” says Jose Luis Chavez, 33, the chef-owner of Mission Ceviche, which opened its second location last year. “When we opened in the Canal Street Market it was really tough. People would go to the market and see ramen, tacos and sushi and go to the food they already knew.”
Chavez, who hosts sold-out cevichemaking classes at the Gansevoort Market, considers education a key part of his job. For restaurant week, he is offering 15 percent off classic ceviche and aji de gallina, which he hopes will expose even more people to the
delicioso plates. “Peruvian food is still sort of new in New York,” Noriega says. “So the Peruvian game is only just getting started.”
Peru Restaurant Week runs through Oct. 19; PeruRestaurantWeek.com