Three trips to Lima, Peru, and not once did I eat at Astrid & Gaston, the trend setting restaurant founded there by star chef Ga
ston Acurio.
Now, finally, I have eaten at Astrid & Gaston. Not in Lima, but in Santiago, Chile, where the first A&G outside Peru was opened in September, 2000.
The timing was perfect. Astrid & Gaston has just been named the best restaurant in Chile by the Guia Culinary 2008, based on a survey of restaurant goers.
The restaurant was honored for its varied and elegant menu, which focuses on authentic Peruvian flavors. Its dessert menu won first place in that category. 
It follows that my four-hour tasting lunch was brilliant. Course after course of exquisite seafood. Peruvian standards such as tiradito, ceviche and causa rethought with Acurio’s vision. Wines matched to each course from a selection of 360 labels, large enough to require two sommeliers.
What stood out? Everything, starting with a pisco sour made with aguaymanto, a berry-sized orange Peruvian fruit that is available only three months of the year in Chile, where it is known as physallis. The flavor was as sunny and tropical as the color of the fruit.
No time to finish the drink, good as it was, because I was handed a glass of Vina Valdivieso extra brut sparkling wine to accompany the first course, tiradito, which is the Peruvian equivalent of sashimi.
The cancha (roasted corn) on top of the fish was the
same cancha that restaurants in Peru set out for snacking. The fish was lenguado (sole) in a bright yellow chile sauce that swirled around circles of green herb oil. The tiny red bits scattered over the sauce were rocoto chile.
Peruvian ingredients are easy to get in Santiago, which has at least 50 Peruvian restaurants, including several I could walk to from my hotel. Peruvian corn, potatoes, herbs such as huacatay and flame-colored rocoto chiles are available fresh, so there’s no need to alter dishes to make up for missing ingredients.
Acurio trains his chefs in Peru and manufactures eight sauce bases there t
o distribute to the restaurants. There are other Astrid & Gastons in Madrid, Caracas, Bogota, Quito and Panama, and one will open soon in Mexico City.
The chef in Santiago is Oscar Gomez from Ayacucho, Peru. For ceviche, Gomez stacked marinated octopus, shrimp, calamari and corvina, working in tastes of traditional ceviche garnishes such as red onion, giant corn kernels, rocoto strands and a slice of pale sweet potato.
The wine was Vina Casablanca Nimbus Sauvignon Blanc 2007 from a cool valley that is noted f
or whites.
What a shame that more Chilean wines aren’t available in the United States, because they are wonderful, like the Anakena Viognier 2006 from the Rapel Valley that came with the next dish, causa de atun.
Traditional causa stacks layers of bright yellow mashed potatoes with seafood or chicken and avocado. This version played with that concept, employing an appetizer portion of lime-flavored yellow potatoes as the base for tastes of smoked trout marinated with dill and raw tuna from Easter Island.
Never have I tasted pasta so perfectly cooked as that for the next course, a crab shell filled with bucatini a la huancaina. Bouncy yet tender, the pasta was seasoned with a shellfish reduction and huacatay. and coated with spicy yellow ocopa sauc
e.
Ocopa is a creamy mixture that includes milk, cheese and aji amarillo (yellow chile). A grilled crab leg came on the side, and more crab was mixed with the pasta.
The wine was Alto Vuelo Pinot Noir 2007 from William Cole Vineyards in the Casablanca Valley.
Another red, Terra Noble’s Gran Reserva Merlot 2005, came with sudado de pescado, a winter fish stew appropriate for May’s cool fall weather. The fish was corvina (sea bass) cooked with tomatoes, corn, garlic, cilantro and yellow chile in a vibrant orange sauce.
Departing from seafood for a moment, I ate arroz con pato--crisp duck leg with northern style sav
ory green rice. Then back to seafood with quinoa chupe.
In Peru, chupe is like chowder. In Chile it is dry, not soupy. This version included picoroco, a crustacean that attaches to rocks like a barnacle, as well as shrimp, clams, scallops and oysters.
The wine for both these dishes was Chile’s signature Carmenere, an Amplus One 2004 from Santa Ema. If my suitcase hadn’t been overstuffed, I would have hunted down a bo
ttle to bring home.
And at last, dessert—a stemmed glass containing a soft mound of white chocolate blended with cream cheese, surrounded by orange chile sorbet and a compote of pineapple cubes and aguaymanto marinated in pisco.
Instead of a Chilean wine, Taylor’s 10-year-old tawny Port accompanied the sweets, including a final plate that contained a delectable taste of chocolate soufflé, a slice of cooked banana topped with
a rocoto strip, a packet of filo dough filled with banana paste, and two ice creams, one flavored with banana, the other with nothing more than rich cream.
Is it any wonder that afterward I walked the equivalent of three subway stops to my hotel?
Good news for Californians: I learned from Alejandro Hartmann, who directs Astrid & Gaston in Santiago, that Acurio will soon open a restaurant in San Francisco modeled on the seafood restaurant La Mar in Lima.
Personally, I wish La Mar were coming to Los Angeles. After one taste of Acurio’s food, I want more, much more.
The Photos:
From the top, diners at Astrid $ Gaston; aguaymanto pisco sour; tiradito; ceviche; causa; bucatini; chupe; the dessert cup; an exterior view of the restaurant.
Astrid & Gaston, Antonio Bellet 201, Providencia, Santiago, Chile. Tel: (56-2) 650-9125. The tasting lunch is about $60 and must be ordered by everyone at the table. Wines are additional.
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