The Peruvian Andes are an awesome sight.
These majestic, snow-dusted mountains stretch the length of Peru
and have witnessed the rise and fall of many civilizations.
By 3000 BC, highlanders were cultivating a wide range of crops in this difficult landscape—
hardy, life-sustaining foods such as gourds, corn, and quinoa.
Then as now, tubers were a mainstay of the Andean diet.
More than 4,000 varieties are native to these highlands—
nutritious crops that sustained the legendary Inca empire,
whose territory spanned most of South America.
Millions of visitors travel to the Peruvian Andes every year
to visit Cusco and the surrounding Sacred Valley of the Inca –
cradle of the Incan civilization and later a stronghold of the Spanish viceroyalty.
Strolling the cobblestone streets of Cusco is like entering the ancient world of Babylon,
with speakers of Quechua, Spanish, Italian, French, Dutch, German, and English
blending seamlessly on the streets.
Potatoes provide the foundation of the Andean diet,
a picture that sounds bleak until you learn that Peruvian potato varieties number in the thousands.
A stroll through the Cusco market provides a glimpse of the tantalizing potato options:
at some stalls, the selections extend almost as far as the eye can see.
Coque Ossio owns five restaurants in Cusco.
Not surprisingly, he knows the best vendors in the market.
Shopping the stalls with him is a fast-paced introduction to the Andean kitchen,
a nutritionist’s dream cuisine based on quinoa and other whole grains;
dried favas, chick peas and other legumes;
amaranth; fresh and dried corn;
chuño, or freeze-dried potatoes;
knobby Andean tubers such as oca;
mountain herbs such as huacatay, a marigold relative known as black mint;
cheeses of obvious Spanish influence;
and aji peppers in vivid Crayola-box colors.
[Coque Ossio speaking] [....] We use for ceviche this one, and you can get, you know, in all colors.
White, green, red....
[Narrator] In the Andes, dietary protein comes largely from legumes, freshwater fish,
cheese and from the tasty guinea pig, or cuy.
A special-occasion meat in Peru,
guinea pig gets the royal treatment in the outdoor ovens at Pacha Papa,
Chef Ossio’s establishment in Cusco.
[Chef Ossio speaking] This is a traditional guinea pig.
It's a very expensive animal to to buy, so normally it's eaten in holiday or some important dates.
It's not like a common food for the general public.
No. Traditionally, it's cooked — roasted — and it's seasoned with huacatay, which is a typical herb
which you can see there. And some spices, cumin, and Ají Panca, which is our one of our dried chilies.
And basically that's it.
The inside is stuffed with garlic and the huacatay and then roasted.
People like to, when they come, they heard about eating guinea pig, so they want to see this, you know,
they want to see the whole animal with a head and feet and everything.
[Narrator] Many Andean cooking vessels are made of clay,
a porous material that conducts heat slowly and imparts an indescribable taste.
Even clay roof tiles are enlisted as a cooking medium,
perhaps for a whole filleted Andean lake fish, stuffed with tomatoes, garlic, olives, and aji limo, a Peruvian pepper.
Clay pots seal in the juices and concentrate the aromas when meats and herbs are cooked in a wood oven....
—a technique that Chef Ossio demonstrated for the visiting team
from the Culinary Institute of America and Unilever Food Solutions.
[Chef Ossio] This is an adobo. So, basically it's the pork meat, you know?
Which will be leg or, no?
But and that's the Ají panca paste.
So, then we have a oregano, we have a cumin.
We have a bay leaves, we have a panca chili paste....
We have onions....
Pepper, garlic purée paste....
And we put the chicha, which is like the corn beer — fermented corn beer,
which is a typical drink in the Andes.
Also, in the coast, but basically....
Has an acidic flavor, which will be like cooking with almost like white wine.
This we will marinate overnight at least five hours, four hours, you know? Okay.
So then we take the meat out, no? We take the meat out and we sear the meat.
And then we put everything together again in the clay pot, and put it to cook in the stove.
So, this is how that will look, you know, after cooking two hours.
So we have very tender pieces of pork
with a the juices of the....
....the onion thickens up the preparation. And normally, it's eaten like, it's almost like a soup,
and it's eaten with bread. as I told you, it's sometimes even a breakfast food.
You know? People — there are some streets in Cusco — you might go one of these days,
that they have only.... A lot of places.....
So, people after drinking — a heavy night — they go, you know, five o'clock you go in the morning, and have this with bread for breakfast.
[Narrator] Huátia, a pre-colonial beef stew made in a clay pot,
gets its signature Peruvian flavor from chicha de hora—corn beer—
and from the masses of fresh herbs that line the pot, top and bottom.
[Chef Ossio] This is a Huátia, which is a beef which has been marinating with again the corn beer — the chicha de hora,
spices, cumin, garlic, pepper, onions....
And basically a oregano too. And we are going to take the meat out first....
We're going to sear it in.... Gonna sear it in a pan or or in the grill here.
Very quickly, we sear that.
[Ambient noise]
Okay, and we are going to set herbs in the....
....you know, in the bottom.
A little of all the herbs.
That's cilantro. That one was rosemary. Is oregano.
A little [...] and huacatay.
Okay, so then, we have the herbs on the bottom
We'll take the onions.
We will divide into the two.....
[Ambient noise]
So, onions here..... And here.....
Okay, put some of this liquid in both.
Okay, we'll put a potato in there.
And we will — we'll get the meat — the seared meat — and then more herbs.
Okay, so that's ready. You cover it up.
And we set in the oven for maybe 30 minutes in this case.
[Traditional Peruvian Music Playing]
[Narrator] At the sophisticated restaurant overseen by Chef Ossio
in Cusco’s museum of pre-Columbian art,
rustic dishes like Huátia, and roast cuy give way to fresh ideas.
Ossio’s New Andean, or novoandino style,
is helping to put Peru at the forefront of international gastronomy.
[pan flute music]