Recommend July 2011 - (Page 31)

Opposite page: Magical Cusco Tours offers itineraries with cooking classes in Peru. “Peru has so much to offer, so many amazing destinations. But in my opinion, the food is something special we needed to promote as a destination in and of itself.” Wendy Alperstein, Operator & Owner, Magical Cusco Tours sic Peruvian dishes; creating specially designed tasting menus at quintessential Peruvian restaurants; and enlisting our chefs to lead visits to local markets to select ingredients for each day’s cooking classes.” And says Alperstein, “We now make it a point to include a culinary experience as part of all our suggested programs, even if it is just one class or one amazing dinner.” Magical Cusco Tours’ signature program is the 6-night Taste of Peru tour that starts in Lima learning the basics of Peruvian cooking at Le Cordon Bleu; mastering the famous ceviche dish with Cucho la Rosa, the first chef to introduce Nova Andina cuisine; and sitting down to a 7-course menu de degustacion, prepared by chef Gaston Acurio at his famous Astrid & Gaston restaurant. In Cusco, travelers enjoy a predinner tour of the Pre-Columbian Art Museum and then dinner at its MAP Cafe. Next it’s a full-day excursion to the Sacred Valley where at Hacienda Huayoccaru, owner Jose Ignacio Lambarri, shares his family art collection and a “Fiesta of Potatoes,” featuring a huge variety of dishes made with potatoes. The itinerary includes a full day in Machu Picchu, city tours, and on return to Lima, an outing to the Pueblo Hotel to participate in the preparation of the pachamanca, literally an earth oven in which traditional feasts of meats, vegetables and herbs wrapped in banana leaves are placed on ember-heated stones and covered to cook for hours. (A similar tradition in Chile, usually focused on seafood, is called a curanto.) Using three-star hotels, the tour is priced from $2,379.90; in four-star hotels, from $2,679.90; costs are net, based on shared accommodations. Under an expanding Taste of Peru program, the operator also offers shorter culinary experiences in Lima. For example, the 2-day Experience Peruvian Culture includes a walking city tour, experience Chifa (a restaurant serving Peruvian-style Chinese food), Peruvian tea time, market visit and fruit festival, and introduction to Peruvian cuisine with a hands-on class and lunch. Offering new culinary experiences is Marnella Tours, whose Peruvian-born founder Martha Tavera feels that, “Lima, with all its treasures and things to see and do, gets the short end in itinerary planning. But in recent years, with Peruvian cuisine now internationally acclaimed, Lima has almost become the gastronomic capital of the Americas, offering even greater appeal to stay a while, dine around, and even learn to make a signature pisco sour cocktail and cook a specialty or two.” Marnella’s 8-day Gourmet Journey to Peru visits Lima, Cusco, the Sacred Valley and Machu Picchu. The itinerary also includes many mouth-watering gastronomic features: dinner at Huaca Pucllana Res- taurant, set within a 1,500-year-old adobe pyramid built by the original settlers of Lima and serving creative Peruvian-criollo specialties; a market visit, followed by a demonstration of preparing one popular Peruvian dish at El Señorio de Sulco with chef Flavio Solorzano in charge; a tour of the San Pedro produce market in Cusco and a class on preparing Andean foods at the Blue Ribbon Cuisine School; and dinner at MAP Cafe. The land cost, with three nights in Lima at the Sonesta El Olivar and four nights in Cusco at the Novotel and including all culinary features, special restaurant meals, sightseeing and overland transportation, is $ 2,750 pp dbl; hotel upgrades are available. ecuador Ecuador shares many culinary traditions with Peru, for indeed, both were part of the Inca Empire, whose New World culinary treasures introduced the conquering Spaniards to the potato (more than 100 varieties), chilies, chocolate, vanilla, fruits such as cherimoya and granadilla, and the meat delicacy of cuy (guinea pig). Ecuador contributed the banana, and today, the country has dozens of its own specialties, some of which clients learn to prepare at the 23-room La Mirage Garden Hotel & Spa in the Andean highlands. During a 5-night program combining cooking and adventure, foodies don aprons each morning for the hands-on preparation of Ecuadorian haute-cuisine dishes, under the guidance of chef and hotel owner Jorge Espinosa. On the cooking menu might be gazpacho with coriander sorbet, timbal of quinoa topped with ginger, or Asian-style fricassee of duck. Afternoons are reserved for such activities as a visit to the Condor Park and the Otavalo Market, learning about the process of baking native bread, or leathergoods shopping in Cotocachi. On day five, travelers return to Quito, visiting en-route an Ecuadorian winery, and check-in at the Hotel Mansion del Angel for the night, with a farewell dinner at a local restaurant. Based on four persons, the cost is $1,960 pp dbl, including roundtrip transfers from Quito, accommodations, all meals, excursions and cooking classes. argentina We think of Argentina as a country all about beef, prepared asado style by roasting over a smoldering wood fire. But of course there is more to love and taste, as Ladatco Tours shows in its 13-day Culinary Argentina tour, highlighting gourmet cooking tours, workshops and other culinary experiences. ÍÍ july 2011 31

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recommend July 2011

Editor's Notes
Design Hotels
Gap Adventures
Spiritual India
Experiencing the Not-So Familiar Vietnam
Sailing the Seas
New World Adventures in Food
Little Whale Cay, The Bahamas
Into the National Parks
Journeys Beyond the Ordinary
Heritage Tours to Europe
Grand Solmar at Land's End Resort & Spa

Recommend July 2011