Going Peruvian at Samba
The Philippines is like putting a Latin country in Asia,” says chef Mitsuharu Tsumura, who is of Peruvian-Japanese descent. He is in the country for The Shangri-La International Festival of Gastronomy 2016, which runs until Oct. 31 at Samba, a soon-to-open Peruvian restaurant at Shangri-La at The Fort. His restaurant in Lima, Maido, took the number 13 spot in this year’s World’s 50 Best Restaurants.
“Look at all the countries in Asia — people are more formal. Filipinos are more easygoing, more like Latin, in a way,” he says, adding that he himself doesn’t feel Japanese in the way he behaves. “My father is from Japan but I feel 100 percent Peruvian.” His dishes, exciting both in presentation and taste (with his Cebiche de Abalón, every bite offers a different experience — spice, tang, creamy avocado, and meaty abalone contend for your tastebuds’ attention), are representative of Nikkei cuisine, but with his own signature flair. His trademark dish, the Wagyu short rib, cooked for 50 hours with a sake-shoyu, beef stock, purple potatoes and a bit of rocoto, is a must-try. His pork belly with ramen reduction and potato cream is the closest to a Filipino dish on the menu and it’s not at all Japanese-looking.
Cebiche de Abalón – Chullpi corn, abalone, avocado, nitro aji amarillo (frozen yellow chilli peppers) and leche de tigre.
“The way I slice the food is not so Japanese, it’s my own way of seeing how to present it. When I started my restaurant, I was more Japanese than Peruvian. Then every year, I became more Peruvian. It’s because Peru has so many beautiful things to offer that there was no reason for me to import so many ingredients.” He adds, “Peruvian cuisine is one of the tastiest food on earth. It’s a well-seasoned cuisine, very spicy in a way. Peru is a country that is very bio-diverse. Few countries in the world have so many different climates, so many different altitudes, that make it possible to have almost more than 3,000 varieties of potatoes, 300 varieties of chillis, varieties of fruits. Anything grows in Peru — we have the Amazon, we have the Andes, we have the coast, we have the ocean. The Japanese, the Chinese, the African and the Italian influence has made Peru a sponge.”
Peruvian cuisine has its own version of pesto, minestrone, paella, sashimi, and Chinese fried rice. They also have their own version of adobo, also called adobo, and it’s cooked in vinegar, salt, peppers, paprika, chillis, and fermented corn drink for one day. Despite the similarities in heritage, the flavors in chef Mitsuharu’s menu are refreshing, foreign, and give you a good kind of jolt from the usual gastronomic grind.
Green rice tamale, short rib wagyu beef, seafood sandwich are on the limited-time only menu.
Given the epic spread of food that greeted us at the preview of what Manila can expect from the festival, and with the holidays fast approaching, I had to ask what a Peruvian Christmas is like — with a chef in the house. “The holidays is the time I like to cook the most. I do the whole roasted pork; we put it in box called la cachina. I cook it for seven hours. I do potato salad, roasted turkey, waldorf salad apple purée, Arab-style rice, and potato gratin. Besides the appetizers. I’ve done it for 15 years. My mom helps me, my sister helps me. It’s a very nice time,” he says, adding that he would love to taste our version of roasted pork, lechon. “That’s where you have the ears and the whole face? I would like to try that!”
Chef Mitsuharu Tsumura will be preparing lunch and dinner menus at Samba, located at level 8 in Shangri-La at The Fort until Oct. 31. Lunch and dinner menus are priced from P2,250 nett and P4,500 nett respectively. Beverage menu pairing is an additional P2,220 nett for lunch and P2,500 for dinner. To reserve, call 820-0888 or email samba@shangri-la.com. Samba opens to the public on Nov. 9.
