Re:visiting Peru | Mika's Lomo Saltado

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The goods.

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Ladies and gentlemen, I'm getting back to eating Peruvian food thanks to the lovely Miss Mika Sobieski. Mika is my new roommate and an amazing cook who spends her summers preparing breakfast, lunch, and dinner for 150 teens at a Spanish immersion camp in Minnesota. Random, right? But through her contact with Argentinians, Peruvians, Columbians, and whatever else, she's brought mate, quinoa, all sorts of wine, and Peruvian food back into my life.

You all will love her because she made the best Peruvian dish in existence for us last night: lomo saltado. This could very well be the most popular dish in Peru, and with damn good reason. Marinated steak, home-made french fries, delicious rice, and red onions sautéed with tomatoes and cilantro (and a ton of spices) is a great combination. You won't be able to stop eating it if you make it right!

Mika made her version of lomo saltado for us, which included green bell pepper and jalapeños. You'll be seeing another variation of this classic, delicious dish in a few weeks! This makes enough for two, but it can be expanded for more.

The ingredients:

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We're not big on censorship.

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• Beef sirloin or tenderloin for two (we used a 12 oz. strip steak)
  
• Enough red wine to cover the meat
  
• 2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
  
• 2 tbsp. soy sauce
  
• 1 clove of garlic
  
• 1 jalapeño pepper, diced
  
• salt and pepper to taste
  
• 1/2 red onion
  
• 1/2 tomato
  
• 1/2 green pepper
  
• 1 tbsp. fresh chopped cilantro
  
• juice of one lime
  
• 2 tbsp. cumin
  
• rice
  
• french fries
  
  1. Slice the steak into cubes, then marinate it with the soy sauce, red wine vinegar, a good red wine (we used a Rioja), garlic, black pepper, and salt for at least 20 minutes.
  2. Start making the rice. We made one cup of parboiled rice, because we love it. I used the beef fat to saute diced garlic, added a touch of olive oil, and continued with the rice preparation.
  3. Prepare the french fries. They're supposed to be made from scratch, but we were in a time crunch. We cheated and bought frozen Texas home fries, so at this point we put them in the oven to bake.
  4. Slice the red onion and green pepper into petals and dice half a tomato in large chunks; set aside.
  5. Once the 20 minutes are up, place the meat and marinade in a pot on medium heat.
  6. Sauté for five minutes, then add the lime juice, red onion, bell pepper, cumin, and fresh cilantro.
  7.Sauté for five more minutes, then add the diced tomato. Cover the pot and simmer for 5 minutes, or until the onions and green peppers are soft.
  8. Place rice on a plate, serve the meat and juices over the rice, add french fries, and devour.
  

Re:visiting Peru | Causa Rellena

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The finished product is on the left.

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Causa is one of my favorite Peruvian comfort foods. My grandmother made it for us as children, and once in a while I made it with her. The tangy and lime-y flavor of the potatoes, the creamy tuna, the spice of the red onion and the peppers, and the buttery avocado just make a great combination. Despite the apparent randomness of ingredients, this dish looks beautiful and tastes delicious.

I prefer to come home to causa already made and ready to eat, of course, but since my grandmother is thousands of miles away, I make do with making it myself. The neat thing about this dish is that you can substitute any seafood for the tuna. I've had it with fresh shrimp and with octopus in Lima, Peru. This version is homey, with canned tuna and extra mayonnaise, and makes enough for six.

I used small bowls this time, but you can use a 9" springform pan.

• 2 lb yellow potatoes
  
• 3 tbsp olive oil
  
• aji verde, rocoto or any hot pepper sauce
  
• juice of 1 lime
  
• salt
  
• pepper
  
• 1 can of tuna
  
• 1 cup of mayonnaise
  
• 1 sliced avocado
  
• 1 sliced hard boiled egg
  
• 1/4 cup of diced red onion
  
• chopped parsley
  
  1.Boil potatoes in salted water, peel them while they're still warm, and pass them through a potato ricer. Don't have one? Mash 'em with a fork!
  2. Set the potatoes in a bowl and mix in the olive oil, hot pepper, lime juice, salt, and black pepper.
  3. Divide the potatoes into 3 equal portions.
  4. Line your oiled glass bowl or springform pan with one portion.
  5. Mix the tuna with 1/2 of the mayonnaise, and place it on top of the first layer of potatoes.
  6. Add the second layer of potatoes.
  7. Add the rest of the mayonnaise, then layer the avocado, the boiled egg, and the red onion over it.
  8. Add the last layer of mashed potatoes, cover the dish, and let it set for a half hour. Decorate with a little parsley, or with sliced avocado and boiled eggs, as I did.
  
  

The Amazon's Antidepressant | Ayahuasca

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Gringos who go to the Amazon are usually there to perform some ethno-botanical experiments with ayahuasca, a sacred concoction brewed from the ayahuasca vine, chacruna leaves, and a variety of forest goodies.

I thought only hippies and New-Age "witches" took ayahuasca seriously outside of the jungle. I was very surprised, then, when my hosts decided I should travel to a shamanic village deep in the jungle and try the sacred ayahuasca. I declined politely, because all I'd heard of ayahuasca was that it was like peyote - which is to say that it made you so sick you started hallucinating. The offer lingered in my mind, though ... had I overstayed my welcome that badly, or did ayahuasca truly have something to offer me?

Fast forward five years and I've learned that (in addition to being a vehicle for rapid entrance into the spirit realms) practitioners of Western medicine have discovered ayahuasca can also be used as an anti-depressant - and they're taking it seriously enough to begin clinical research. Kira Salak reported in her March 2006 article for National Geographic:

"At the vanguard of this research is Charles Grob, M.D., a professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at UCLA's School of Medicine. In 1993 Dr. Grob launched the Hoasca Project, the first in-depth study of the physical and psychological effects of ayahuasca on humans. His team went to Brazil, where the plant mixture can be taken legally, to study members of a native church, the União do Vegetal (UDV), who use ayahuasca as a sacrament, and compared them to a control group that had never ingested the substance. The studies found that all the ayahuasca-using UDV members had experienced remission without recurrence of their addictions, depression, or anxiety disorders. In addition, blood samples revealed a startling discovery: Ayahuasca seems to give users a greater sensitivity to serotonin—one of the mood-regulating chemicals produced by the body—by increasing the number of serotonin receptors on nerve cells.

Unlike most common antidepressants, which Grob says can create such high levels of serotonin that cells may actually compensate by losing many of their serotonin receptors, the Hoasca Project showed that ayahuasca strongly enhances the body's ability to absorb the serotonin that's naturally there.

"Ayahuasca is perhaps a far more sophisticated and effective way to treat depression than SSRIs [antidepressant drugs]," Grob concludes, adding that the use of SSRIs is "a rather crude way" of doing it. And ayahuasca, he insists, has great potential as a long-term solution."

Yes, that's a huge chunk of text, but it's important because it shows that ayahuasca could work as an antidepressant without all the nasty (often, enduring!) side effects from mainstream antidepressants.

The primary ingredient of ayahuasca is the Banisteriopsis caapi vine, which is mixed with the shrubs containing dimethyltryptamine. Dimethyltryptamine is a naturally occurring psychedelic drug said to be analogous to the neurotransmitter serotonin. Neat, right? The problem is, each brew seems to vary in potency depending on the brewer.

Oh, and heads up: "In addition to its hallucinogenic properties, caapi is used for its healing properties as a purgative, effectively cleansing the body of parasites and helping the digestive tract" (Thanks, Wikipedia!).

Ever die of dysentery playing Oregon Trail? It's like that, only in South America.

Dr. Grob explains some the long-term effects of ayahuasca below:

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It's clear that taking ayahuasca is not something that should be done on a lark - still, I want to experience it after reading Kira Salak's personal website and her article, but that's more to do with the the fact that I've taken "mainstream" antidepressants and haven't been impressed by them. After more research is done, I'd be willing to give it a try ...

... I'll have to find a decent "guide" to walk me through the experience, however - I don't want to end up in bat country!

Re:visiting Peru | Kanguro Saltado

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Say wut?
Via Portage_tide_new

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That's a weird title for a post, but it's a weird thing I'm about to share: the Peruvian government has recently approved the importation of kangaroo meat raised for human consumption from Australia.

The thought of Peruvians eating kangaroos doesn't actually faze me. Peruvians roast little guinea pigs very often and very well. One could say they specialize in "exotic" meats.

I do find it odd that Australians kill off their own national symbol. Shouldn't there be laws against that? We don't BBQ bald eagles here because, well, they're the majestic symbol of the United States of America, and because we would get in Big Trouble.

I guess there aren't laws like that down under:

"Despite being Australia's national symbol, millions of kangaroos are slaughtered in the wild each year to control their numbers and much of that meat is used for pet food.

The idea of farming them for human consumption is controversial, but many health-conscious Australians already eat kangaroo meat."

(Read the AFP article here.)

Australians, in what I hear is typical Aussie fashion, couldn't care less about what anyone thinks of them. But why?

I guess kangaroos seem to be Australia's version of annoying deer. They destroy gardens and prized crops and leap in front of cars instead of away from them. Deer don't participate in hilarious, one-sided boxing matches, though, or carry cute joeys in nifty pouches, or save farmers' lives. Clearly, the kangaroo pros outweigh the cons, and kangaroos prove to be way cooler than pesky deer.

I propose we institute a kangaroo/deer exchange: bring the kangaroos to the States and let Australia have our deer. We can incorporate kangaroos into American life humanely: a kangaroo in every classroom, kangaroo walking backpacks, kangaroo living baby carriages, attack kangaroos, kangaroo drinking buddies, and so on.

Who's with me?

The Amazon Rainforest | Paiche

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I first wrote about my trip to Iquitos a few weeks ago, and mentioned having a bit of an "Amazon Adventure Checklist" for the trip. One of my first demands, of course, was that that I get to the Amazon river itself as soon as possible!

I foolishly considered tossing myself into the river as soon the guide boat glided free of the shore - moments before being told to watch out for piranhas and paiche.

Piranhas I know all about (they're hilarious!), but paiche were new to me.

Paiche are the largest freshwater fish in the Amazon river, being large enough to give an adult human a pretty good fight if they were to piss one off. They're considered great sport fishing by the natives and breathe through a creepy lung-like-but-not-a-lung organ instead of gills.

My favorite part of the paiche crash-course, however, was learning that these lung-fish are considered "living fossils".

The next day, I was treated to a variety of local dishes, and was pretty enthusiastic to learn that the first course would be paiche! Our cook skillfully cleaned a local fisherman's catch, then fried thick fillets of paiche in palm oil and sprinkled them with salt. The paiche was served with long strands of pale green vegetables that looked a bit like fettucini, as well as fried plantains and fresh tomatoes.

While it might seem obvious, fresh Amazon paiche makes a great meal! The fish is moist and sweet, with a texture like swordfish. The light green vegetables are called chonta, and are harvested from the hearts of palm trees and have a fresh, almost cucumber-like flavor. The cook actually called the chonta "jungle pasta".

There was small-talk around the meal, of course, and I was educated more thoroughly about paiche by our guide. He mentioned the living fossil bit and mentioned that paiche were incredibly easy to catch because they had to surface every few minutes to breathe, and that their tendency to come up for air made the paiche so easy to catch that they had been put on a protected species list ...

... wait, WHAT!?

Luckily, there weren't any Amazon Rangers lurking about to arrest me, but from then on out I learned to ask lots of questions before being fed the sort of "delicacies" that might get me fined or jailed on these sorts of trips.

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Mmm ... forbidden paiche

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SO, did I stop eating the paiche?

Heck no! Paiche is delicious on its own, and I bet it would make for divine fish 'n' chips, ceviche, and McFish Filets, as well! Unfortunately for the rest of the paiche, the fish is too damn delicious and too easy to catch to stick around in the wild much longer - so maybe you should start some sort of letter-writing campaign to open up some hatcheries or something.

So, whatever. Do what you must to make it happen, but I strongly suggest adding "fresh grilled paiche" to your culinary bucket list ...

... just watch out for piranhas.

Re:visiting Peru | Cerdo Relleno con Manzana

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I made one heck of a dinner tonight, thanks to that old cookbook my mom sent up. "Cerdo Relleno con Pure de Manzana" is a simple dish, perfect for those nights that you don't want getting too complicated.

If you do it right, the pork is tender, the apple sauce is savory, and it's so tasty, you won't even want a side dish (that's all filler, anyway).

To reproduce this dish you'll need-

• 2 lb pork tenderloin
  
• sea salt
  
• freshly ground black pepper
  
• powdered cumin
  
• 1 tbsp of raisins and 1 tbsp of cranberries
  
• 4 tbsp olive oil
  
• 4 tbsp butter
  
• 2 medium-sized onions (small dice)
  
• 2 large apples (peeled, cored, sliced)
  
• 1.5 cups chicken stock (as required)
  
  1. trim excess fat and silver membrane off pork tenderloin; wash and pat dry
  2. butterfly the pork and season both sides liberally with sea salt, freshly ground black pepper, and powdered cumin
  3. place either the prunes or the raisins and cranberries in pork
  4. dice the onion; peel, core and slice the apples thinly, set aside
  5. sear pork until golden in olive oil over medium heat, set aside
  6. discard the olive oil, add butter to the same pan and saute onions and apples for 5 minutes over medium heat
  7. return pork to the pan and add 1/2 cup of chicken broth
  8. cover pan, adding chicken broth as needed so that the mixture doesn't become dry
  9. cook for 25 minutes (or to your preferred temperature), flipping the pork over halfway through
  10. slice pork in 1/2" thick slices, serve with rustic apple sauce on side
  
  

I took a few liberties with the recipe, substituting cranberries and raisins for the recommended prunes. I also plumped up the raisins and the cranberries by heating them in chicken stock, before placing them in the pork. I added cumin to the list of seasonings, as well - and you can see from the picture that the apple "sauce" isn't, since I prefer apples in their rustic form. I also added some fresh goat cheese (with lemon pepper) as a counterpoint to the sauce's sweetness.

The end result was better than I could have asked for, and definitely a recommended "bucket list" recipe!

Re:visiting Peru | Seco de Pollo

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My mother knows there aren't many Peruvian restaurants in Ohio, so she sent me an old Peruvian cookbook. Now, I'd rather have a Peruvian cook than a Peruvian cookbook, but I guess visas are hard to come by (unless you're willing to marry the guy).

Regardless, my mom's little gift inspired my recent desire to push Peruvian cuisine through my "Re: visiting Peru" articles.

With that in mind, I took the cookbook on a test-run right away, making the Seco de Pollo shown above.

Seco de Pollo is a delicious, cilantro-infused chicken dish served with peas, carrots, rice and potatoes. "Seco" literally means "dry" in Spanish, but (if you do it right) this dish is anything but, with moist chicken and flavorful starches.

If you want to reproduce this dish, you'll need -

• 6 pieces of chicken
  
• salt, black pepper, ground cumin (to taste)
  
• olive oil
  
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
  
• 1 cup of diced onion
  
• aji verde (to taste)
  
• 1/4 cup of blended cilantro
  
• 3/4 cup of peas
  
• 1 cup of sliced carrots
  
• lime juice (about 1 lime's worth)
  
  1. season the chicken with salt, black pepper, and ground cumin
  2. fry chicken in large sauce pan until golden brown; set aside
  3. fry the onion, garlic, and aji verde on lower heat in same pan until onion is translucent
  4. add cilantro, peas, and carrots
  5. add chicken and cook on medium-low heat for 25 minutes, or until the chicken is done
  6. squeeze the juice of the lime into the pot once finished
  7. serve with rice and potatoes
  
  

Cilantro can be difficult to find fresh. Try to buy cilantro when it's cheap, pluck the leaves off the bunches, and blend it with a bit of water. You can also freeze pureed cilantro in an ice cube tray, keeping it fresh.

Aji verde might be a even more difficult to come by. "Aji" is a pepper indigenous to South America, which has a very distinctive taste. You can substitute jalapeño peppers if you can't find any version of aji in the Latin section of your grocery store ... but if you want to keep the recipe fully authentic, you can always order aji verde online from Amigo Foods or Latin Market.

I hope you try this version of the recipe ... and let me know what you think in the comments!

Re:visiting Peru

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It's great to see Peru finally moving up in the foodie world - historically, destination sites for gastronomic tours have been chosen from regions in France and Italy, or other commonly-visited European regions. Google "gastronomic tours" these days, however, and Peru actually pops up on the first search page!

Peru's not the first result (yet) but it's on the list now.

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Peruvian cuisine is, IMHO, awesome - an organic outcome of Peru's rich history and a melting pot of the best that the cultures and races that have made Peru their home have to offer. It is an inter-weaving of ingredients and traditional dishes prepared by the descendants of the Incas, the heirs to the Spanish conquistadors, the sons and daughters of the African slaves, and more recent immigrants from Italy and France. The waves of Chinese and Japanese laborers brought to the Americas in the railroad days have contributed as well, making the land into a culinary equivalent of a military superpower.

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Lomo Saltado: a gorgeous example of comida criolla

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Perhaps it should come as no surprise that Google's top gastronomic search results include Peru, since legendary chefs like Georges Auguste Escoffier have ranked Peruvian cuisine among the top three cuisines of the world since the 1920's.

Still, maybe Peru won't become the next "hot" gourmet destination, but I intend to add as much to its popularity as I can, so stay tuned!

¡Buen provecho!

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Full disclaimer: I am the American-born daughter of Peruvian immigrants, so I may be a bit biased and more inclined to point out the finer aspects of llama gasbag soup than your average reviewer.