Tamsin & Cooke: Off on a culinary tour to the bohemian district of Baranco , Lima

The Gastronomy explosion in Peru probably took off about 5 years ago creating a fusion of different food types that work. There's Japanese Peruvian, Chinese Peruvian, Italian Peruvian, African and Creole Peruvian fusions and not to forget Peruvian Ceviche.
My host was Josselin, a chef in her own right with The Lima Gourmet Company.

First Stop was La Trastien on the coast for Pisco Sours made from the juice of the grapes, lime juice, simple syrup and egg white, and angostura bitters That's 84% proof alcohol and what a treat.

We set off on a whistle stop tour highlighting the many facets of Peruvian food and while I've heard many conflicting references to the number of varieties of food grown here, I like to think that Josselin's numbers as a culinary specialist must be correct, so I'm sticking to her totals.

Not only is Peru famous for her potatoes, over the years they have grown over 4000 varieties of which they consume 2000, they also grow have grown dating back to early Inca years over 3000 types of quinoa, now there are 5 different color varieties, 55 types of corn with 60% of their fruit and veggies come from the Amazon. Peru is also proud to be a non GMO country with 84 mini climate zones within a total of 104 different zones.

Group photo after imbibing on Pisco Sours made us miss the sunset.- But the liquid sundowner was pretty darn good.

Next stop was to create our own Peruvian ceviche of which the base was plantains that had been boiled for 20 minutes. It sounds strange but believe me it is was delicious

. Gaston Acurio is largely acknowledged as the person to leap-frog Peruvian cuisine onto the world scene. There's a film called Finding Gaston and am told it is currently on Netflix, His own restaurant Astrid & Gaston is ranked # 33 in Peru and #50 in the World.

But more importantly Lima's Central Restaurant holds the 4th place in the world and hot on it's tails the 13th best restaurant, Maido is also found in Lima,

Josselin holds a black corn non alcoholic drink. and ex-plainly the flavors of what we are about to eat including Beef heart - Don't think I've ever had it before - but certainly they way they cooked it it was delicious.

Our group in front of the Inka ruins that owe their evacuation to the restaurateur besides them that uses the profits to help sponsor the architects work