An American in Lima

It’s been more than a year since I had pizza at El Italiano, a classic pizzeria/trattoria in Lima’s rough-and-tumble La Victoria neighborhood.
In that time I had forgotten that El Italiano makes better pizza than almost any other place in Lima, a city that should have lots of excellent pizza joints but for some reason doesn’t.
What  [...]

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I need my Jewish chicken-noodle soup in the wintertime. I grew up on the U.S. East Coast, where delis and diners and Jewish moms cook up barrels of this fragrant, healing soup all year long. Then I moved to Miami where at gourmet delis like Epicure, you can buy big jars of delicious matzoh-ball soup [...]

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The photo above was taken in Surquillo Market No. 1, in Miraflores. The vendor is arranging her eggplants and tomatoes as the day winds down.
Peruvians prefer to prepare their meals from fresh fruits and vegetables, rather than buy canned, frozen or processed foods.
Doing so it more economical and tasty, Peruvians agree. As an added bonus, [...]

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Delicious purple Peruvian potatoes

Potatoes are a big deal in Peru. The Peruvan Andes were the birthplace of the potato, and today Peruvian farmers cultivate more than 3,000 native varieties of them — potatoes with names like Ica Huila and Purple Viking and Wilja.
The United Nations has declared 2008 “the International Year of the Potato,” and this event is [...]

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