Chorrillana

Chilean food isn't great. Aside from the excellent sea food (which you'd expect with one of the largest coastlines in the world) Chilean food mainly consists of meat unimaginatively paired with some kind of carbohydrate, usually bread, corn or potato. Even the Chileans tacitly acknowledge that Peruvian cuisine is better by the plethora of Peruvian restaurants that line the streets of Santiago.

The mixture of meat and stodge does come into its own when it comes to drinking and hangover food. The king in this genre is undoubtedly the Valparaiso specialty of chorrillana. Chorrillana is essentially a plate of chips (or fries if we have any North American readers) with a huge pile of fried steak, chorizo sausage, onions and egg dumped on top. This is not finesse food. It is however bloody amazing.

It's usually shared between at least two,  and as far as I can see it is always accompanied by a beer (one area that Chile does have Peru beaten hands down). Our first chorrillana we ate fittingly in Valparaiso. Having not seen one before we weren't sure what to expect.  Should we have ordered two? When it arrived all fears of leaving hungry were put firmly to bed. We had another one in Santiago on our second to last night in South America.

The picture below doesn't make it look very appealing. It was taken in poor light on a compact, but even with the best light in the world it's still just going to look like a pile of grease. The taste however more than makes up for its looks.

Tom

Ceviche

Ceviche is claimed to be the specialty of various countries, Mexico, Peru and Chile included, but we avoided getting into arguments and got on with eating it instead. We were already big fans and were looking forward to ordering it without it being the most expensive starter on the menu as it is in England. The way ceviche is served differs between Peru and Chile, but the basics are the same. Fish or shellfish is soaked in lime juice and chilli until it is 'cooked' although as there is no heating involved, pickled might be a better description. The surrounding fluid turns milky during the process, and is called leche du tigre (tiger's milk).

In Chile, we were given ceviche in large portions with the leche du tigre still surrounding it, and with a few segments of lime and chilli to add to taste. In Peru, it tended to be in small portions, carefully presented and with the leche du tigre removed. We often saw leche du tigre on its own as an option for a starter, and Peruvian ceviche usually came with large grains of corn and sweet potato alongside it. The difference in the appearance of the two versions was likely to be partly due to where we ordered it (Chile - fish market stalls, Peru - restaurants) as well as actual variations across the border. Wherever we ate it, it was fresh, zingy, delicious and surprisingly filling and if you like fish and shellfish then it's a must. 

Kate