Eating Peru

By Guest Blogger, Tom Wriggins

This past April I was able to travel to Peru with my wife and daughter for a school based trip to Peru. It was a whirlwind week with a lot of travel movement ‘student class’ hotels and felt like we were filming the next ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ movie with the addition of Buses and Boats! Our trip took us from Miami (MIA) to Lima, then after one short day/night in Lima to Cusco by air.

We spent two days in and around Cusco to acclimate us to the altitude (12,000 feet above sea level). We toured the Sacred Valley and Ollantaytambo (a massive Inca fortress) and spent a morning with a rural Inca school, delivering school supplies and backpacks to the children there. I will have to say this was a major highlight of the trip as it is truly humbling to see the joy a simple pencil, or backpack can bring to these kids.

Then travel by train, the Inca Rail, from Ollantaytambo and then bus to the base of Machu Picchu. We climbed Machu Picchu (truly a Bucket List item!) and spent most of the day exploring this amazing site.

Then we traveled again by plane back to Lima and then out to Puerto Maldonado in the Amazon River Jungle. Here is where we boarded boats (big canoes really) for an hour ride up the river to our VERY RUSTIC accommodations in the jungle.

I live in Southwest Florida but the heat and humidity in the Amazon is really something to behold! Not to mention that all we had were ceiling fans that turned off @ 11pm when the power was shut off to the camp to save energy.

We then did that trip in reverse to get back to Lima for the conclusion of the trip. Hike to boats, boats to buses, buses to planes, planes to buses and back to planes again!

Now lets talk about the food. Three out of the Top 50 Restaurants in the world for 2019 call Lima, Peru home. This is really saying something for a country historically known for potatoes and ceviche. Unfortunately, when you travel on a school trip you don’t get to make reservations at these top restaurants, but what we discovered was that for the adventuresome eaters (not all kids fit this bill) great and interesting meals can be found.

I did get to have what I would rate as some of the best ceviche in my life, and I have eaten a lot of it over the years. There is a small place down a back street in Peru called Punto Azul (https://puntoazulrestaurante.com/). You cannot go wrong eating here. It was so good I forgot to snap a photo till I was done, so you have to see one of the teachers devouring his plate. I would have eaten here every day.

During our stay in Cusco we ate several unremarkable meals with the larger group. I know it is hard to feed 30 people at once so I cut them some slack there, but many things were over cooked and just kinda plain.

We had a ‘lunch on your own’ day and discovered a beautiful little restaurant on the town square in Cusco called Calle Del Medio (http://www.calledelmediorestaurante.com/), great pisco sours and we tried the Alpaca. It was delicious! With the flavors of beef and venison mixed together it was tender and well-seasoned. The presentation was perfect and our small (9) group enjoyed this meal very much.

Our last night in Lima was amazing, we had left our school trip compatriots behind and ventured out on our own. Using the internets I found a highly rated place outside Miraflores in Lima. It was dark when we headed out by hotel car service and we wound around many back streets. Needless to say there were some doubts expressed when the driver said “estamos aquí” and all we saw was a dark alley and a big metal door taking up half the block.

Well when that door was pulled back for us, a whole secret world opened up in that alley. Amoramar (https://www.amoramar.com/) or translated “Love, to Love” was amazing from the service to the unique drinks to the food, it was definitely a great find and a great ending to our Peruvian adventure.

Overall the trip was a great adventure and I would have loved to explore the culinary scene a bit more and have less group meals. Maybe there will be a next time, but with so many other places to explore it is hard to return to places you have been.

Tom Wriggins has spent over 30 years wearing multiple hats in the healthcare industry, but his passion is food. He has chef’d, farmed, catered, butchered and most frequently dined well. Tom and his wife Alana love to travel and enjoy the blessings they have been given. They live in Naples Florida and Nobleboro Maine.