Picchu Perfect
Authentic Peruvian Eatery shines
(Restaurant Review from Village Post Magazine, March 2009)
by Kelly Jones
"CHEQUE PLEASE"
EL FOGON
543 St. Clair Ave. W.
416-850-8041
Dinner for two excluding tax, tip and alcohol $50
½Review:
There's no hiding the fact that owner Silvia Riojas-Kamiya is proud of her passion for Peru. From decor to atmosphere to menu, El Fogón (meaning "firebox" or "furnace") oozes authenticity.
Cacti pose for passersby in the window, Andean pan flute music serenades families and amiguitos on a night out, and an open bar at the front serves the thirsty.
Peruvian beers are illegal to import, but El Fogón makes a terrifyingly terrific Pisco sour rimmed with cinnamon, lemon, egg white, syrup and Pisco brandy ($6.95) and also pours homemade exotic juices (papaya, say, chichi or passion fruit) and sangria.
Bright paintings of Peruvian women compete for visual attention with illustrations of the Nazca lines, and photographs of llamas and Machu Picchu. The decorative hodgepodge is tamed by the room's calming tan and brown walls, white table linens and classy dark wood chairs and comfy banquettes.
Bread arrives alongside a ramekin of fiery and fantastic habanero salsa - ideal fodder for perusing the menu.
Among the lists of appetizers, soups, salads, meat, seafood and vegetarian offerings, the hungry will find the likes of papas a la huancaina, Peruvian shrimp chowder and milanesa.
Ceviche mixto appetizer goes over big, despite the toughness of the occasional squid ring. A picture-perfect citrus-cooked pile of shrimp, whitefish and squid, with purple onion and cilantro, reclines over crisp lettuce with a cross-section of corn on the cob and one wedge each of sweet potato and Yukon potato. Finely chopped bright red chili pieces heed warning to the (requested) medium spice of the dish. Worth every penny of its slightly hefty price tag ($14.95).
Thick with puréed potato and green with coriander, the authentic smell and tastes, of aguadito de pollo ($5) flood us with memories of our months living in Peru. We eat in silence, enjoying every mouthful of the soup, also made with chicken, onion, rice, garlic and spices.
Our fun, and first-class server recommends tacu tacu con bistek ($15.95).
Simple salt and pepper dominate the seasoning of two very thin, but flat and gristle-free slabs of beef beside a mix of garlicky rice and canary beans fried into a patty (a traditional Afro-Peruvian dish). Fabulous and filling.
Unevenly cooked squid rings also pepper generous arroz con mariscos ($15.95). But the remaining seafood and fish - shrimps, mussels, scallop (singular and small), whitefish - are immaculately prepared and fresh as fresh can be, so it's hard to be grumpy.
The rice, too, playing pedestal to the protein, is well timed and steeped in flavour, with turmeric, coriander, garlic, and peas. A single squirt from a big, fat lemon slice adds zip.
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