A Temple for Meat!

It has been a while since I put up a post on this blog. It has been a combination of factors. Sheer laziness, the ease of putting stuff on Insta or FB and a feeling sometimes that blogging has run its course in this Snapchat generation!

But once in a while, you have a meal which redefines an aspect of food and makes you think that this deserves way more description than a post on Instagram or FB. This was a trip to Lima which mixed business with some absolutely serious eating. Our hosts had snagged us reservations at three really hard to get spots for dinner, but this post is about a lunch we had on the last day which turned out to be the best meal of the trip! And that was really saying something on this trip.

We had already eaten at Central, Maido and Astrid y Gaston on this trip and were to have the last lunch before leaving at Osso, a meat restaurant owned and run by Renzo Garibaldi, a celebrated chef high up on the Best Latin American restaurant list. Jack Perkins, of Maple and Motor (one of the ten best burgers in America) fame, one of our party, had scored the reservation through a mutual friend of Renzo’s and we landed up there for a Sunday meal which is special in Peru. What was to follow would blow the mind (and stomach!)

We had a tasting menu so as to sample the variety of meat on offer. Even the desserts had meat in them!

It started off with a charcuterie platter. All the meats are cured in house and we also got to visit the meat storage. Pics to follow.

The cuts included a prosciutto, pork pate, cured beef and a couple of others. Also some chicken liver pate served with Melba toast and some berry jam. Quite exquisite.

Then came a visit to the meat storage where they dry age and wet age the meat. Some cuts had been dry aged for 4-5 years. Quite extraordinary. The angels share in these (to paraphrase the whisky industry) is likely to be quite high making for an expensive and very intense tasting cut of meat.

Roast bone marrow with sea salt and salmon eggs. Marrow cooked to perfection in its fatty goodness! Just fabulous and this was just beginning.

Pork Ceviche

Possibly the most startling dish in this extraordinary meal. A ceviche made with pork! We already had plenty of ceviche in Lima already. It is probably the best known Peruvian food after all. We were all used to eating raw fish or raw beef, but raw pork was a stretch esp coming from India. It was bold and absolutely brilliant. The meat had cured perfectly in the lime juice and was succulent and juicy.

Steak Tartare Peruvian style

Raw beef to follow as a tartare. With Melba toast. Flavorsome and expected from a restaurant which started as a butchery and continues to be an excellent one

Two sliders. One beef and one pork belly

Two sliders followed. One with a medium rare beef patty and one with a activated charcoal patty with pork belly inside. Because we liked this Renzo insisted on us trying his regular burger at the restaurant. Which was made with bacon jam and was excellent too! The fries were great too

In case you thought that was a lot of food, then we came to the main courses!

Just some wagyu on a skillet to start off with. Keeping it simple 😉

Then the three steaks to share among us

Ribeye

Strip with Chimmichurri sauce

Dry aged pork with just salt and pepper

All 3 cuts together. Ribeye, strip and the phenomenal dry aged pork

accompanied by mashed potatoes and an extraordinary bone marrow risotto

Mashed potatoes with bacon bits

Bone marrow risotto with a fried egg

The Pork was just out of the world. And dry aged was something I hadn’t eaten before. The ribeye and strip were excellent as was to be expected from a restaurant and chef with the heart of a butcher. The sides were wow as well. I mean, bone marrow risotto!

By this time, we were struggling to eat any more but the desserts were so good, we managed to finish those too. And they had meat too!

Osso Mess! Renzo’s take on the Eton mess with bacon inside

The piggy covers a maple and bacon icecream on a cake

One meatless dessert!

Bacon certainly goes very well with the Mess as well as with maple in an icecream. It cuts the sweetness and the saltiness adds a dimension to the dessert.

That was the end of a quite extraordinary meal. Special thanks to Jack Perkins and the next agenda is a visit to Maple and Motor.

And a very special thank you to Renzo Garibaldi, chef and butcher extraordinaire! He is a bold chef and running a butchery seems to have given him enough knowledge for trying new things with meat like raw pork ceviche, dry aged pork and bacon in his desserts.

It is worth a visit to Lima to eat at Osso alone. Although the other restaurants were great as well. And might deserve a blog post too!

Renzo and Jack (in center) with the Endourology All Stars!

A Temple for Meat Eaters!