FOOD SPECIAL ......................Think Peru, Think Papa

Think Peru, Think Papa





The writer digs into Peruvian heritage food that even has a national day in its honour

Blue potato: Bake it.

Papa amarilla: Turn into purée.

Red potato: Slice and fry as wafers.

Papa negra: Boil it.

Papa blanca: Boil and sauté it.

In Park Hyatt Goa's Village Square, potatoes and papas were getting addled. And then, alpacas and guinea pigs joined the conversation. Kinda. Alpacas that are skinned and cold-dried whole in the frigid winter months. Guinea pigs salted and peppered and fried; the skin thrown into stew and soup pots. Not a handful of guinea pigs. Some 65 million guin ea pigs turn up on Peruvian din ner plates every year. In the au tumn breeze, chef Bruno Andres Santa Cruz Gaudia was detailing Peruvian cuisine and I was listen ing with disbelief. No questions though. The much-tattooed chef Bruno Santa Cruz (that is what he is popularly known as) knows best. The chef is Peruvian, lived and trained in Lima, currently works in Hyatt Regency, Istanbul and had flown into Park Hyatt Goa to launch Peruvian cuisine in the hotel's beach-side Palms restau rant -the first Indian five-star hotel to have Peruvian dishes permanently on its menu.

Papa all Over

Across the world, Peruvian cuisine is having its glorious moment. A Peruvian would thump a big `Yes' to papa for meal but what is the fuss on papas in Peru? Chef Bruno sniffed the question and ladled an explanation: In the Quechua language -spoken in many of the Latin American countries -`papa' is tubers. Potatoes, that is. Papa negra is black potato; papa amarilla yellow potato and papa blanca is potato with light brown skin and firm white flesh. In Peru, never start counting papa. The country domesticated potatoes roughly 10,000 years ago and now grows at least 3,000 different varieties of potato.Countless colours. Blue. Purple.Yellow. Pink. Brown. White.Black. Innumerable shapes. Long. Short. Stout.Elongated. Tiny. Fat.Skinny. Any shape, any colour you can think of there's a Peruvian potato! I was walking towards the palmlined pathway to the Palms restaurant wondering what would be on the din ner plate for my first ever Peruvian dinner. An alpaca? A guinea pig? Potatoes tinged turquoise?
Corn as purple as lavender? Chillies bright red and christened Rocoto? A dessert called Suspiro de limeña (sigh of a Peruvian woman)? My mind was scurrying through the Peruvian must-eats.“It is ceviche for dinner,“ chef Bruno quietly informed and hur riedly got busy squeezing lime and lemon. On the granite counter lay a tankard of orange juice, a sprig of coriander, shrimp as circles and red snapper as squares. Seafood and all things citrusy that is what my eyes could spot. No wok. No stove.

That's what ceviche is. Peru's iconic dish is made by marinating fresh, firm fish in citrus juice, and zesting that up with a kiss of ají or spicy sauce. It is not heat-cooked and is probably the quickest dish to rustle. Whisk the citrus juice with a few condiments and throw in the ultra-fresh fish. And lo! ceviche is ready to be devoured.

From Lima to Goa

Goa is a seafood hotspot but what made ceviche travel 16,871 km from Lima into Goa? India's first ceviche journey started with a far-off thought of Thomas Abraham, general manager, Park Hyatt Goa. Always in a mood for a new idea, Abraham travelled to Istanbul where chef Bruno is quietly stirring a Peruvian cuisine revolution in the Hyatt Regency. Abraham knew it was a challenge to bring such an unknown cuisine to Goa and put it permanently on the menu. But Abraham is relentless with risk.And he hits the bull's eye. Always.

This might be ceviche's first foot into India but the dish is as ancient as the Incans (mid 15th to mid 16th century). It surely was not rustled by a whimsical chef in a kitchen with no fire. History mentions that ceviche originated nearly 2,000 years ago with the Moche men (who lived in northern Peru between 100 AD and 800 AD) marinating fish in the juice of banana passion fruit. Further back in time, the Incans marinated fish in chicha, an Andean fermented beverage.

A more recent predecessor of the current ceviche is a dish brought by the Moorish women from Granada who came to Peru with the Spanish conquistadors, or soldiers. Traditionally, sea bass was the main ingredient of Peruvian ceviche served with corn on the cob and slices of cooked sweet potato on the side. In Trujillo, a coastal city in northwestern Peru, there is shark in ceviche; in Lima, it is a fish called sole. There are several variations of the dish and ceviche proudly calls Peru its birthplace.

Chef Bruno was chopping peppers and dicing snappers, I was wondering whether the word ceviche borrows from the Latin cibus which translates into `food for men and animals'. I am no man. I am no animal. But wait, there could be a better etymology. Like the one propounded by the Royal Spanish Academy that the dish name comes from the Arabic word sakbj (meat cooked in vinegar). Or, ceviche could simply be a variation of siwichi, Quechua name for the dish.

As I dug my spoon into that first slurp of ceviche, I knew far away from the Andes, I was partaking in a Peruvian national heritage. Yes, ceviche is officially a Peruvian national heritage with a national holiday in its honour. June 28 is el Día Nacional del Cebiche (National Ceviche Day). I did not travel 16,871 km from Goa to Lima for the authentic ceviche. In Park Hyatt Goa, I tiptoed from my room to the Palms restaurant for a Peruvian heritage.

:: Preeti Verma Lal

ETM15NOV15