Day 5

We started today with breakfast with our roommate Grettle who is Peruvian. We spoke to her lots about Peru lifestyle and interestingly how their fuel has also increased massively with her saying it’s doubled over the last month! She is training to be a software engineer due to it being the highest salary which is shockingly only $30,000! But I guess when food costs £5 it balances out?!

We then wondered through the park near our hostel and watched a group dance battling which was quite fun before heading to our meet point for the food tour!

We met our guide Samira and she talked to us about the history and culture of Peru pointing out churches and important buildings as we walked through the historic centre. The first food stop was fried corn with beans and sauce, this was actually pretty good I’d give it a 7/10. We also got to try juice that is made from boiled purple corn water- this doesn’t sound appealing at all but it was delicious!

Next up was cow stomach and heart! I’ve never eaten an organ before but decided I needed to be brave and we both found them delicious! Although the concept of eating a heart was a bit freaky! We then had a fried doughnut made of pumpkin and potato drizzled in honey which was surprisingly nice despite the fact I don’t like pumpkin!

She then took us to this underground market which was ENORMOUS. Not a single tourist in sight, this became apparent with the bewildered looks we got as we entered and hearing Gringo more than once. The first thing we saw as we walked in were skinned Guinea pigs for sale! There was also every part of the cow and pig. Hung up at various stalls were tongues, tails, stomach lining, testicles, and hooves. It was pretty shocking and gory and I have to say made our stomachs turn slightly. It’s very interesting as lots of little Peruvian kids were in the market complelty unfazed. I think it’s very much a know where your food comes from and local approach which I approve of. We then tried what I had been dreading - Ceviche! For those that don’t know I don’t really eat fish so raw fish is always a bit daunting. This was increased by the fact this ceviche had “baby shark” in. To be fair, I didn’t hate it which is saying something, Keira said it was incredible so two very different perspectives there hahaha.

We then tried various tropical fruits that we had never seen or heard of before I can’t say they were all a big success, with some having very strange textures. She then offered us the “spiciest pepper in all of Peru”. Feeling that we had to eat it for the experience we ate them nervously. I don’t know WHY we felt we had to eat them because they absolutely BURNED I have never experienced pain quite like it with Keira looking like she might pass out with our guide moving between laughing and concerned.

To finish off the food we headed to China town existing after a huge migration of Chinese in the 1850s and I had a dumpling full of red bean paste which was very good and Keira had pork dumplings. Feeling absolutely stuffed we headed to our final stop- pisco sour making! A really nice guy showed us how to make the best pisco sour and kindly made me one without egg. We also tasted a pisco with pomegranate which was delicious but lethal at 43%!

We were shattered after this, an incredibly authentic, overstimulating and amazing day!Read more