For my 21st birthday, my parents and brother took me to Artisanal, a French bistro which serves delicious French food and specializes in cheeses. When we arrived at the restaurant, the man who greeted us lead us to our table. We were walking to the back of the dining room (it’s a large one!), and I got worried they were going to sit us at a small two-person table. But no! They showed us this private room with a table sat for four surrounded by all of these fancy cheeses. Surprisingly enough, this was all just luck (they didn’t know it was my birthday). And so our evening commenced in the cheese cave.
Hello large urn full of cheese!
I eyed all of the cheeses, and naturally started salivating. Our waiter brought us the drink menu, and since I turned 21, I ordered my first cocktail. The cocktail was called “forbidden fruit” and had bourbon, calvados, apple purée, and Caribbean ginger beer. The drink was sweet and fruity but superb!
To start with, my brother treated us to a flight of three cheeses which came with French bread. (We ordered the one titled “sinful experience.”) Do you see a pattern in my choices? The three cheeses were: délice de bourgogne (a rich creamy cow cheese from France), robiola due latti (a silky mixture of cow and sheep cheese), and pont l’Évêque (my favorite of the three: a cow cheese from France).
It’s currently restaurant week in NYC, so all of us took the special restaurant week menu. To start, I ordered a butternut squash soup which came with blue cheese and almonds. I detest blue cheese, but I really liked it in the soup, and I was shocked to see how mild it was. The almonds added a nice crunch factor to the smooth soup. A drizzle of vinegar was the perfect finisher.
For my main course, I ordered pork belly which came with mustard spaetzle and some vegetables. The pork belly was also quite sinful, as there was a rim of awesome fat surrounding the tender pork. To finish my scrumptious meal, I had a chocolate terrine which had a hazelnut praline in the center. It was a wonderful end to a very memorable celebration.
A pumpkin muffin (from Le Pain Quotidien) paired with a strong cappuccino. Now that’s what I call a good breakfast!
Yesterday, I visited my grandmother in Westchester, and we went to my favorite restaurant there – Encore. It’s a little classic French bistro which serves up some really good food and has welcoming decor. There is a poster of a laughing cow (la vache qui rit) on one of the walls which I particularly like.
On the weekends, Encore has a really great three course lunch menu which they vary from week to week. This time, I ordered artichoke soup to start. This soup was very delicious, and I loved the mild lemon background in the broth paired with the artichoke flavor. For my main course, I got coq au vin which is a French chicken stew cooked in red wine. My chicken was literally drenched in a wine sauce (hence the cool dark purple color of the chicken), but it was very tasty and comforting. For dessert, I ate a nutella-filled crepe. You just can’t go wrong with crepes!
I just got back to NYC yesterday night, and I am currently reminiscing about my time in Lima – the time I spent with my grandmother, my uncles, my cousins, my parents, etc. I really spent A LOT of time with my family these past few weeks, and surprisingly enough, we all got along (for the most part).
I am still picturing all of the wonderful fruits from the Amazon and Andes. To take advantage of the superb fruit, on our last day in Peru, my mom and I went to this cafe called La Gran Fruta. This cafe specializes in exotic fruit juices ranging from mango-strawberry to pineapple peach. I ordered a passionfruit and granadilla juice, while my mother ordered a passionfruit chirimoya juice. These juices were tart, refreshing, and very fresh.
We also each ate a ham and cheese sandwich on whole wheat bread. Even though I am going to miss Lima, I am excited to be back home. Peru, until next year.
My parents and I are leaving Lima tomorrow to go back home to NYC. We decided today would be a good day to get some typical Peruvian food to say a last goodbye. We went with my uncle, cousins, and grandmother to a really good Peruvian restaurant called Panchita. I ordered half a boneless chicken which came with fries and sautéed vegetables. The chicken was unbelievably moist and flavorful, and I enjoyed the chimichurri sauce on top.
And the bread that we started off with was warm and delicious!
My parents took me to Astrid & Gastón for an early birthday celebration, and we took the 17 course tasting menu. No, I did not make a typo and you saw correctly – 17 courses. Astrid & Gastón is the best restaurant in Lima, and apparently one of the 50 best restaurants in the world. I am not surprised since the food I ate there was some of the best I’ve ever eaten in my life, and the service was very good. I was a little surprised how casual the restaurant was – it was very laid-back and there was no dress code. Annoyingly enough, there was a baby which started shrieking, but luckily we switched rooms.
From start to finish the meal was delightful. Our server brought us our first course (called Nature) on a nest (obviously not a real one, though it sure looked real). We each ate 5 things on the nest: achira (which is a tropical plant that grows in Peru) with herbs and garlic, crunchy seaweed, a twig of cashew, some sort of soft white apple drop with a begonia flower, and an “egg” whose shell was made of granadilla-flavored sugar and the inside was passionfruit. This dish was very cleverly done and delicious.
The second dish was also remarkable and definitely one of the highlights of my meal – cold tomato soup with toasted quinoa and small tomato pearls. The base of this soup was tomato water, so it was clear. The chef added vinegar to the tomato water which really brought out the flavor of the tomato. The toasted quinoa was so crunchy and was a perfect texture balance to the smooth tomato water. The soup was served in a small egg-shaped bowl which was a perfect continuation to the nature and bird theme.
The other 15 courses were:
1) potato with peppers and dusted with mushrooms
2) lima beans with brazilian nuts and calamari (this was also amazing because the lima beans seemed to be pureed and reformed into the shape of a lima bean). The texture was very luscious.
3) Sea scallops with corn, coral oil and coriander
4) A ceviche with clams, sea snails, and sea urchin served with sweet potato and corn like a typical ceviche (I enjoyed the dish, but it was my least favorite just because I don’t like snails).
5) Some fish (I forget the name) with artichokes and a sauce of leche de tigre (which is a lime sauce used to “cook” ceviche).
6) Blue fish with mussels, yellow pepper, roasted onion, and sea lettuce
7) Shrimp with potatoes, cheese curd, and broad beans in a tomato sauce
8) Dashi with toasted octopus, black sesame, daikon, and avocado. The preparation of this dish was so cool – the server brought a contraption with two chambers. The bottom chamber had broth in the bottom and the top chamber had raw vegetables. The server lit a little flame and in a matter of seconds, the broth started boiling and went to the top chamber where the vegetables were. The hot broth got good flavor from the vegetables. After a couple of minutes, our waiter served the flavored broth in a bowl with the accompaniments (the octopus, black sesame, etc.).
9) Peking cuy (aka peking guinea pig). I swore I would never eat guinea pig before, but I caved in at Astrid & Gastón. And shockingly enough, this was one of my favorite dishes. The cuy was served like a burrito with a soft purple corn tortilla, sweet and sour sauce, and pickled vegetables on top.
10) Carbonara – this dish was a play on the classic pasta carbonara. Instead of pasta, the chef made the carbonara with arracacha which is a root vegetable grown in the Andes. I don’t usually like carbonara, but this was very good.
11) Roasted pig with potatoes, peanuts and chocolate. This was a great transition dish between the entrées and desserts because the peanuts and chocolate made the pig mildly sweet.
12) Frozen chirimoya (a Peruvian fruit) with caramel, crispy caramel cake, and orange. This was another highlight of the meal because I actually detest chirimoya, but the way it was prepared here was superb. It made me want to eat more chirimoya. I think the chirimoya was frozen in liquid nitrogen.
13) Lucuma (an Andean tropical fruit) popsicle with dark chocolate for dipping and granola topping. I loved how interactive this dish was. I dipped my popsicle in the dark chocolate sauce and coated it with the crispy granola.
14) “Beso de Moza” which had butter scotch, meringue, and camu camu (a fruit from the Amazon which tasted like strawberry) wrapped in a dark chocolate shell.
15) 5 little desserts: lucuma tuile, pumpkin cake, mango-basil jelly (my favorite of the 5), and two chocolate truffles one of which had pisco.
Surprise 18th dish for me because I was celebrating my birthday. A cake which I thought was blackberry-flavored bread pudding with coconut sorbet and orange foam. AMAZING!
Yesterday, back in 2012, my family went to this cute Italian restaurant in Barranco, which is the artsy neighborhood of Lima, kind of like Soho in NYC. This restaurant has a large brick oven which the cooks use to make pizza. Though I did not eat any pizza, I will have to try it the next time I go there.
I loved all of the decor on the walls of this restaurant; there were lots of old bronze pots, pans, and other cookware as well as photos and other cool objects. It definitely felt like an old, charming trattoria.
We started off with a sampler of three different types of bruschetta – tomato and mozzarella, tomato and basil, and prosciutto and mozzarella. I then ordered steak which came on a bed of arugula dressed with balsamic vinegar and pieces of parmesan cheese. It was a very tasty dish.
Happy 2013 everyone! I decided to start the New Year off with some yellow food, because yellow is supposed to be lucky. I ordered causa (a Peruvian potato dish) filled with crab, avocado, and egg. I’m starting 2013 off on the right food, that’s for sure.
Segundo Muelle is one of my favorites restaurants in Lima because the seafood is outrageously good. Today for lunch, I ordered grilled sea bass with sauteed vegetables.
This morning, I went to a Peruvian market where they sell a large variety of beautiful fresh fruits and veggies as well as nuts, meats, cheeses, spices, and much more. I loved everything about this market (except for the meat section which smelled bad). I bought yellow and red plums and some apricots. I can’t wait to eat them this afternoon!
Here are some pics of the market.
One of my friends really likes kumquats and figs, so this picture is specially for her.
Some Peruvian corn which is all white, has large kernels, and is more bitter than the corn in the U.S. And look at those MASSIVE artichokes!
The bags of nuts and dried fruit put Costco portions to shame.
Food Follower 