Peruvian Food 3 - avocado, beef, causitas

Causitas is a popular Peruvian finger food made with mashed potatoes and lime juice with a touch of yellow chili pepper sauce.  It was delicious and was yet another variation of the many foods made with potatoes in the country.   I had this as an appetizer with local avocado and guacomole - an outstanding combination of flavours.   The alpaca confit appetizer, however, was a far cry from the alpaca loin I had as a main at the Aranwa - it tasted a little like beef jerky.

As expected, the beef tenderloin was excellent, as with all the beef we'd tried in Peru.  It was served with chimichurri, a delicious parsley sauce that is very popular in all the South American countries.  It's not uniquely Peruvian but I was glad I had an opportunity to try it.  Apparently it's used like a pesto sauce down there.

We had a variety of desserts over our two nights at the Inkaterra hotel in Machu Picchu - the best was the ricotta cheese cake, better than the chocolate cake or the creme caramel.  Creme caramel seemed to be a very popular dessert in Peru - it's everywhere, even at the supermarket dessert counter in Lima (you can buy it by weight) - but too starchy for my liking.  Both cheese and chocolate are Peruvian - both excellent!   

Avocado with causitas, guacamole and yellow chilli pepper sauce

Alpaca confit 

Beef tenderloin on mashed potatoes with chimichurri and Marsala sauce

Creme caramel - no surprises

La "Bete noire" - exotic name for chocolate cake made with Peruvian chocolate

Ricotta cheesecake - the winner!

Summer salads

The colourful tomato salad with fresh basil in Akujiki's post whetted my appetite for more.  I had a BBQ last night and created my own summer salad - it was a great hit!  I had started off thinking that I'd make the tomato salad, but when all I could find was half-dead packaged basil from Colombia on the supermarket shelves, I thought maybe I would have to try something else.  I came across a recipe for a salad using hearts of palm, avocado and tomatoes with lettuce and ended up using a combination of both recipes since I already have all the ingredients at home.  An accidental find as I was going to the check out at the local grocer's made a world of difference to the recipe - a live organic basil plant!   The fragrance from fresh basil practically made the salad.  As with Akujiki's salad, the hard part was finding tasty tomatoes - and I did that by following my nose near the tomatoes section.


The hearts of palm, avocado and tomatoes were all cut into chunks, lettuce torn into bite-sized pieces.  The dressing: 1/3 cup olive oil,  2 tbsp red wine vinegar, fresh ground pepper, 1/4 tsp of sugar, dash of salt. Toss the hearts of palm, avocado and tomatoes in the dressing and spoon onto the bed of lettuce laid out on a platter.  Spread out the basil leaves.  And you've got a refreshing summer salad with a great contrast in textures and flavours.  Bon Appetit!