LIMA DAY 11: Last Full Day; More Octopus

Sunday, May 17

Eating Dinner on Sunday is not easy in Lima.

I started the day with a trip to the food festival at Surquillo Mercado #1. I had a Causa stuffed with Crabmeat and Shrimp, and an order of Hueveras.

Hueveras are some sort of Fish Roe that's fried up. They're better than they sound, and my friend Cesar loves them.

Later, while walking around, I bought a small bag of Sweet Potato Chips.

Later that night, my (lack of) Dinner adventure began. First stop: Madam Tusan, where they do Dim Sum all day on the weekends. The hostess seats me and tells me to enjoy my meal. I was planning to -- there were all kinds of happy diners, waiters running around, people eating and laughing.

Twenty minutes later, no waiter has approached me. I get up and leave, with the hostess following me out of the restaurant offering to serve me herself. That's unheard of here, much less in one of Gaston's restaurants.

Luckily, there was another Gaston restaurant across the street... Tanta. I walk in, sit down, am greeted right away and handed a menu. Looking good.

I order the Tacu Tacu a lo Pobre, a Peruvian standard.

"I'm sorry, senor, we are all out of Tacu Tacu a lo Pobre." I ask for the menu again, and order a Burger with Fries. The Burgers are really good at Tanta.

Ten minutes later, the waiter returns and tells me that he's really sorry, but they don't have any Hamburgers either. I leave. At least I got a free bottle of water there.

I walk to the $20 all you can eat Sushi place. I'm the only customer, usually a bad sign, but I figure that I've got their attention.

I order three different Rolls to start.

You get to watch the Sushi Chef, so things are looking good. First Roll: done. Second Roll: ready. As he starts on the third one, the Chef's phone rings and he has a (minimally) 6 minute fight with his girlfriend, or whoever. I say 'minimally' because for all I know, he's still fighting with her. I walked out of there, too, after having another free bottle of water.

I go home and make a reservation at Alfresco's. They're always open, and they have lots of food.

Just in case, I stop on the way and get some Gelato for Dessert. They were open, they had Gelato, and I had money.

It turns out that Coconut Gelato is delicious. I don't know why this surprised me.

Alfresco was open, they had my reservation, and a cute hostess. I started with a Pastel de Choclo witch was considerately paired with some Grilled Octopus.

For my Main Dish, I ordered the Seafood Mixed Grill.

There were Scallops, more Octopus, Fried Shrimp, mixed Fried Fish Chunks and Calamari, and confusingly, two brochettes with Steak on them. At this point, I was asking no questions, and just ate.

Next time I am in Lima on a Sunday, I will have a big Lunch, and just get a Sandwich for DInner. Or eat at Alfresco. Or eat at home.

Speaking of home, I had some Chips before bed.

Here's my steps for the day.

LIMA DAY 10: Lobster and Lima 27

Saturday, May 16

Two Meals today, apparently. They were good ones.

After listening to Rock in English all night, I didn't get out of bed until after 10:30, so first up was Lunch.

Whenever I eat with David, he picks the restaurant. He's an expert on the non-shiny, great neighborhood places. Me, I'm an expert on the places with the nicest websites and the best reputations. If you have to just choose one of us, follow David around -- you'll eat better.

David always agonizes over where we will eat. After some internal back-and-forth, he announced that today's Lunch location was Los Esteros de Tumbes in Magdelena. So that's where I met him.

Another thing about David... I'm not sure that he's really Peruvian: He is always on time.

Anyway, we get there, the place looks great, and they have Blackboard Specials.

 
We look at the menu and decide to each have a Tamale Verde while we decide.

Our Final Answer: We are going to share a Mixed Cebiche and the Grilled Lobster with Seafood. They turn out to be wise choices.

The Cebiche was wonderful. They pretty much all are. And the Lobster was what we would call Florida Lobster, but in a cute Serving Quirk, it comes out with one head and two Tails. Aside from the Lobster, there was Calamari, Shrimp, and Octopus... all grilled.

And, either good or bad -- depending on your point of view -- it was Grilled with a heavy dose of Butter. We were pretty happy, and wound up splitting the food 55/45, with David having a little more than me. He also ate a good portion of the Vegetables that came with it; I just had two small Potatoes and a piece of Broccoli.

That was it for the afternoon. Around 6:00, I had a bag of Plantain Chips.

Cesar picked me up for Dinner a little later. I made us reservations at Lima 27, one of my favorite Dinner places here.

I know that I have a lot of 'favorites', but if I was forced to choose four of them, they might just be (in no particular order): AmorAmar, Panchita, Astrid y Gaston and Lima 27. I hit all four this trip. There are plenty of other great places, but if you limited me to those four, I wouldn't utter a word of complaint.

The place is pretty, the hostesses are beautiful, the food is very good, and they are NEXT DOOR to Astrid y Gaston, so they always have to be on top of their game. Always.

We started with Bread, Butter and the obligatory Free Appetizers.

By the way, the Free Appetizers aren't really Free. At the fancier places, you are paying anywhere from five to 12 Soles just for the privilege of sitting down at a table. That's how they do it here. It used to bother me; now I'm over it.

Cesar and I both had the Pastel de Choclo Appetizer. This is pretty much a classic Peruvian staple.Of course, it is fancier than the ones your Grandmother used to make, but it cost a lot more, too. It's really good. But then again, so was Grandma's.

For our Main Courses, I had a Lomo with a Pepper Sauce, and Cesar had the Tuna.

My Steak came with a Rosotto topped with some Mushroom-based thingy that was awesome, and Cesar really enjoyed his Fish.

We passed on Dessert and headed out.

One of Ceasar's amigas was having a birthday party, so we stopped by to wish her well. We almost got out of there before Mom forced all the food on us (it looked and smelled wonderful, but we were both really full), but she sneak attacked me and had me at least try three of the Potatoes from the Appetizer tray.

Ok, she only forced one on me; the other two were voluntary.

We left, and I wound up winning some money at the casinos before heading off to bed. Here's my steps.

LIMA DAY 9: Empanadas & AmorAmar

Friday, May 15

Breakfast: Cafe con Leche, Mixed Ham & Cheese Empanada, and a Pastel de Acelga at La Espiga de Oro.

La Espiga de Oro is a random Bakery that one of my local friends did a check-in on a couple of years back. I don't know if they are extra-great and I'm lucky, or if all of the joints of this type are great. Regardless, great.

During the course of the afternoon, I had a Pork Sandwich at some place that threw itself in front of me as I was walking down the street, and a Aji de Gallina Empanada and Cafe con Leche at Per-Lizza, possibly my only visit to this Temple of Empanadas this trip.

Sandra lucked out with two good Restaurants this visit. Tonight's plan was to go to AmorAmar in Barranco, and then walk over to Sargento Pimienta for their salute to CBGBs, which translates to, "Let's get a cover band to play some New Wave and Punk music."

They started us with two Free Appetizers: Fried Platanos topped with Aji de Gallina, and Mini-Causas with some Fish on them.

The Aji de Gallina treats were OUTSTANDING. I was close to just ordering a plateful and having it for dinner.

The Bread was warm, and the Cheese to spread on it was tasty, Sandra said. Me, I wouldn't know.

Since they gave us two Free Appetizers, I showed them and ordered two more Paid versions: Grilled Octopus and Tuna Saltado.

The Tuna Saltado is a Main Dish, but we split it as one of our Appetizers. I had it last trip to Lima, and it was fantastic. Just as good today. And the Octopus, well, it was Grilled Octopus!

For our Main Courses, I had the Arroz con Pato -- Rice with Duck, and Sandra had Arroz con Mariscos -- Rice with Seafood.

I may not have mentioned this before, but I Love Duck. Mine was delicious. Sandra said she liked hers, but didn't eat a lot of it. It could have something to do with her being little and me forcing have of the Tuna Dish on her to start.

We passed on Dessert, but they would have nothing of it, so they brought us Free Mini-Cupcakes.

That was it, food-wise. We stayed out until 2:30 watching the cover band, and had a great time. Here's my steps.

LIMA DAY 8: Yeah, Well, I Ate A Lot

Thursday, May 15

I ate ten times, depending on what you consider 'eating'. Just don't tell Viv, and we will all get along just fine.

For Breakfast, Sandra and I went to Nathano's Cafe on Enrique Palacias -- the street with all the local joints. We each had Juice, Coffee, Eggs and Toast. An Omelete for me, and Fried for Sandra.

All your food groups, right there.

Earlier in the week, I walked past a new Cevicheria in Surquillo called Don Cevichero. The guy in front really, really wanted me to buy food from them, but I was on a mission to go elsewhere. I promised that I would be back, and there I was.

They had a little crowd in there, so I felt like it could be OK. I ordered the three-way combination (a lot of other people had it, too).

From left to right, you had Rice with Seafood, Cebiche (mixed Seafood), and Fried Fish Chunks and Calamari. The Fried Chunks were excellent, and everything else was pretty good. They also gave me a Bowl of Chilcano (Fish Stock Soup).

On the way home, I was wandering through Surquillo Mercado #1, I stumbled on a food stand called El Cevichano.

Their sign says, "You pick the Seafood and we will make it!" I took them up on it, and asked them to make me a Clams Cebiche. After convincing them that I only wanted Clams, nada mas, they agreed. But first, the free Chilcano.

They have different Clams in Peru than we have back home. they are firmer, and make an excellent Cebiche. I'm surprised that I don't see this more often. I think that I will go back to do this again before I leave.

At home, I had a half Tamale Sandwich that was laying around the house.

I started my evening by walking all the way down to Larcomar. I rewarded myself by getting two scoops of Gelato: Mint Chocolate and Banana Chocolate.

My driver, Luis, picked me up after I made some donations at the casinos. It gives me a chance to go exploring.

I have a lot of Peruvian Facebook friends. I don't *personally* know all of them, but we have stumbled across each other and have become virtual friends. One of these people is Angiela. She's the drummer in an all-girl rock band, Las Tetris Peru. They're really good (check out "Imaginacion -- the third song on this page), and Angiela goes out A LOT, to lots of cool places.

One of them that she recently checked in at was Piano Bar Munich. They are renowned for their Salcipapas (French Fries with Hot Dogs on top). Luis and I went on an adventure.

We found the address, then you go downstairs, and through this kind of secret door, and you're in a really old-school bar. With really old school tables, and REALLY old-school waiters. And there was an old guy playing the piano.

We order the special Salchipapa (Salchipapa Munich) and Sodas.

These Salchipapas had Hot Dogs and four different Sausages on top of the Fries. They were great (probably really bad for you), and we polished them off.

Our next stop was the Golden Palace Casino, where I not only won a few dollars, but I had a small Chicken Salad Sandwich, a piqueo of Hams and Cheese and Olives, and then it was Mexican Night, and I had some sort of Taco-like thing.

I was almost done. Last stop was a Caldo de Gallina place, called -- of all things -- Caldo de Gallina. I had the jumbo Chicken Noodle Soup.

And then, that was it. Here's my steps: