A high and dry, wild and wet, majestic history medley – RTW 2018

[RooFlyer]

<snip>
Anyone got any must-dos in LIM?

Did you mean food, necessarily? Feast your senses on : Gold Museum of Peru.

Also the San Francisco basilica is worth a gander.

 

[Milboo]

A meal at Central would be a worthy must do. Loved it!

 

[JohnM]

Thanks for tips, peeps.

Request wasn’t just for restaurants.

I had scoped Maidu and Central for a meal but figured getting in for dinner, which woul be my preference, is unlikely. I have tonight and tomorrow night and A mid-day flight LIM-GRU on Thursday, so I may have a crack on spec.

Weather is fine today after misty drizzle yesterday but very low thick cloud, so while pleasant enough for strolling around, it has a certain gloomy feel. I’ll scope the gold museum, thanks RF.

 

[JohnM]

Cerviche (natch) and quinoa risotto with prawns last night at a well-credentialled place close to my accommodation last night. Preceded by a pisco sour (natch), accompanied by a half-bottle of quite acceptable Peruvian Sauv Blanc from a surprisingly small wine list, and followed by a cerveza chaser.

If I’d known how large the cerviche was, I would have skipped another course. But I was quite hungry after travelling over from LPB early and not having any lunch.

 

[JohnM]

Wandered around Miraflores today and will scope out cntral lima and the gold museum tomorrow.

Solid cloud all day, but no drizzle. Apparently it’s quite standard for winter here.





El Beso (The Kiss).





The Larcomar shopping mall on the cliffs is an interesting rendition of something I normally avoid like the plague.

 

[JohnM]

The parasailing looked less scary close up. I may have been tempted if it was sunny.

 

[JohnM]

Well, here we go again. I decided not to chase up trying to get in to Central or Maido, the Lima - actualy Miraflores - restaurants in the top echelon of the world’s best for a few scraps.

Instead, I punted on IK - perhaps an up and comer. Well, what do I say? I’ve eaten a few scraps in a few joints around the world but this was phwoar - just PHWOAR!

I rocked up very early chancing getting in without a reservation. Success.

Start with a Pisco Sour (natch).

I decide (well, I always intended to) go for the 10-course IK Experience with matched bevs.

Let us rock & roll...

This place is the schmick. Dual lights above each table shine an Inca theme until the table is occupied. Then it flicks over to a straight spot.







The Pisco Sour.



The menu. My focus is on the bottom right of page two.



Amuse bouche like I have never experienced. Ding, ding! Signal that something special is going to happen!

 

[JohnM]

Armed with forceps.



Amouse bouches on the plate. Flavour right off the scale.



I ask for a print of the IK Experience menu. Let’s follow along.



Andean Tubers.







And on the plate with the first bevy - a whisky concoction that was excellent.

 

[Boca68]

IK is certainly a great place. Glad you enjoyed it.

As for the weather, that's Lima from April to September..... Very dull, day in, day out. And the misty drizzle passes as a torrential downpour for them.

 

[JohnM]

Next, awaiting Cured Peruvian Meats.



The wine.



Yep, a Sauternes style. At about this point I asked for a copy of the wine list. It was quite short. By the end I conclude that at this place, the food sings like the angels sing; the wine is merely a bit of backbeat. Very interesting.








Next Charcoal of the Andes.





With this a Spanish Verdejo.

 

[JohnM]

Oops, got the wine out of sequence. No wine with the bread. The Verdejo came with the Tight Wrapped Crawfish.





Then Tubers and Beef with the palest Rose I’ve ever had.







Next K’allampas Project with Sake.

 

[JohnM]

Next Scaly Paiche. White fish from the Amazon, with chestnut slices emulating scales. Wine: a Peruvian Chardonnnay.







Moving along. Ollucos and Beef Cheek with a Mendoza Malbec. This was presented as the makings for a wrap. Waiter very kindly gave me a top-up of the wine.







Palate-cleanser to die for. A chocolate sphere filled with the most amazing refreshing zesty liquid flavour-bomb.

 

[JohnM]

Dessert time. Sweet Corn.







Then Seasonal Garden.





Then three little sweets to finish with, accompanied with symbolic traditional Peruvian cultural/religious artefacts.

 

[JohnM]

After all that, when asked if I wanted coffee - nah, I’d like your best cerveza!

Waiter brings the best IPA I’ve ever had (although I’m not a great beer drinker). The IBU (International Bittering Units) were off the scale. Icy cold and a fitting end to an off-the-scale meal!





A couple of shots of the kitchen staff at work.





If you’ve ever wondered why Peruvian restaurants are up in the very top echelon internationally, wonder no more - it’s real! Just sensational!

Wandering back to my accommodation, I pass a gym. As a gym-goer myself, this is impressive for its size, equipment and the number of people working out at about 2100h.

 

[kermatu]

Food looks amazing. I'd need some help though to work out what was the actual food vs the fancy art/crockery!

 

[Milboo]

Food looks amazing - and very similar in style to Central anyway!

I would have loved to have provided other tips but our time in Lima was very much focus on that! We did the main square and catacombs and then headed to Parque Kennedy, before having churro (as my birthday cake!), a short walk on the cliff top and then dinner. Ours was just a brief stop between Galapagos and Sacred Valley.

 

[JohnM]

Food looks amazing. I'd need some help though to work out what was the actual food vs the fancy art/crockery!

Indeed. I did read one review where the reviewer had eaten the beans under one of the amuse bouche. Fortunately, the waiter did point out what bits to eat.

 

[JohnM]

I battled the incredibly gridlocked traffic in Lima today to go to the gold + weapons museum this morning and to central Lima this afternoon.

Talk about a mission to go just a few kms! What a PITA. I was left wondering whether it was really worth the hassle. A couple of days in Lima is enough. I’m over it. A city of 10M people is not fun when trying to move about. I’ll be glad to escape into the wilds of the Pantanal after tomorrow.

Anyway, the gold and weapons museum once one eventually gets there, is quite interesting. I, like several reviewers, think that the weapons museum is probably more interesting than the gold museum in the basement of the same building. But I am a shooter in an earlier life.

Downtown, the central plaza of Lima is indeed very attractive and the San Francisco monastery and catacombs are interesting enough. I didn’t get a chance to go into the cathedral - but I’m pretty much over churches these days. No pics allowed in those places, in any event.

 

[RooFlyer]

I wasn't going to say in advance, but gridlock was my experience in Lima also, and that was a few years ago!

I stayed at a hotel in Miraflores for a few days, but was doing some work in the city. It was really foggy along the coast and I never realised we were on top of cliffs until the last morning, when it cleared.

 

[JohnM]

Fog wasn’t that bad. I could see the cliffs, but the gloomy days started to do my head in. Despite its culinary delights Lima is not a place I’d ever want to spend time in again.

Tomorrow I have to spend some time in LIM with no lounge access. LA seems to be in some sort of dispute with the operators of the lounge, such that access is suspended.

Not that the LIM lounge was ever much chop, but still better than just being in the terminal. LA give a 20USD voucher to use at one of two restaurants or a bar as compensation for no lounge access. Yikes!