Delicious food you must try in Peru

Peru is home to incredible food. You’re bound to be extra happy foodwise there. It was one of the places with the best food we’ve been, and we’ve eaten a lot this past year.
On this post, you’ll find the list of the best food we’ve found – local, delicious, and easy to find. There’ll be something even for the pickiest person. I have 2 of those, and everyone was very happy there.

Chicharón

Oh my, how not to start here? Chicharón is usually made out of pork – deep fried, crunchy pork belly. BUT, hear me out, there’s chicharón for everyone, even if you don’t eat pork – we’ve found beef, llama, and my favorite, trout. Just not for vegetarians.

Trucha or trout

They sell it everywhere. If there’s fish, it’s trout. The trout chicharón (or chicharón de trucha) is my favorite, I couldn’t resist it if it was on the menu, but every single trout I had there (and during our trip to the Sacred Valley, I’ve had it lunch and dinner every day) was delicious. Yum!

This looks like salmon, but the menu said trout. It was just delicious.

Chicha Morada

It’s a drink made out of the purple corn. It can be alcoholic or not, ask before you choose. We all tried it and it wasn’t the best drink ever – too sweet, maybe? – but it wasn’t bad either. Try it!

Chicha – a fermented purple corn sweet drink

Papas Huancaina

Boiled potatoes with a funny sauce, it wasn’t really enjoyed by most of my family but we don’t eat boiled potatoes, so that’s probably why. Still, it’s everywhere and you should try it!

Papas huancaina – it doesn’t even look good, in my opinion.

Avocado

Peruvian avocados are so freaking delicious I don’t even have words. They have it with every meal and you should too. Perfect little things!

Pisco Sour

It’s an alcoholic drink. Pisco is a wine kind of thing there. We tried it because the restaurant gave us – they were having a problem and our food was taking too long to cook. Well, it’s sweet but very strong. We couldn’t finish it, but we rarely drink, so you should try it. It’s read Peesco Soor.

Cuy

Guinea pig. In Cusco and the Sacred Valley, you can find it everywhere. A bit more rare in Lima, but still around touristy areas. The poor guinea pig comes whole, with head, limbs, and all that. It does look like they deep fried it. In some places, they even put a tomato hat and a carrot in the mouth for decoration. We didn’t try. Angelo wanted to, but he’d have to sit somewhere by himself, so he gave it up.

Because we didn’t actually try it, you can see on the photo: the cuy

Corn

Corn is everywhere, but don’t think about the sweet corn easily found everywhere in the world. Peruvian corn is something different. It’s bigger, it’s meatier, it’s delicious! I loved it, but 3 out of 6 in the family didn’t.

Take a look at the corn – oh I miss it!

Chocolate

Peruvian chocolate is delicious. I’m gonna be honest and say that we didn’t try a lot of brands, but the ones we did, we loved! Chocomuseo’s chocolate is the best.

This is Coral making her own chocolates at Chocomuseo

Soup

Every. Single. Soup. I tried was amazing. Best soup country ever. Just go on and order a soup. Yum!!!

Delicious soup at Inkazuela in Cusco. Just yum!

Lúcuma

It’s a fruit. If eaten raw, it’s bitter, but when you cook it, it tastes like heaven. You’ll find lúcuma chocolate, lúcuma ice cream, lúcuma tart, lúcuma drinks, everything lúcuma. Try them all. So delicious! It was also called Inca Gold because it’s just so good!

Lomo Saltado

It’s beef stir fried with veggies – Angelo loved it and he ordered almost everywhere. The kids loved it too. The seasoning is really delicious.

Lomo saltado but note the fries: in the Sacred Valley, they were all real potatoes cut and fried, not the frozen stuff! (And the pisco sour at the top)

Vegetarians

I’m sorry, we didn’t see many vegetarian restaurants nor options there. In our whole month, we found 2 vegetarian restaurants, and they were both on the same street in Cusco. It’s probably not the best place, especially if you’re vegan. But I wasn’t really looking for it, so you may be able to find better places or options.

Ceviche

Raw fish marinated and served with onions and some kind of leaf. We didn’t try it, though, because there was always something better on the menu.

Picarón

Kind of a donut, but usually made out of a pumpkin and sweet potato. SO GOOD!

Picarón with Inca Kola – couldn’t get any more local than that

Inca Kola

The local soda. It’s bright yellow. People drink it everywhere! It’s not bad, really. Don’t let the color fool you.

Which one of them you’d like to try? Let us know in the comments!

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