Eating Peruvian food is nothing new in Barcelona and there is no one who does not know what a ceviche is. But as it happens with all gastronomic fashions, its stars become distorted, and ceviche is now an omnipresent and too often mediocre dish, which often serves to hide some regular fish. That’s why it’s good news that new places are opening where you can try a real one, and set a standard for how it should be.
We are talking about Macambo (Carrer del Bisbe Sivilla, 44, Sant Gervasi, chef Roberto Sihuay’s first own restaurant, which has opened its doors in Laforja street, near Bar Omar or Wilmots, adding to this small “gastronomic neighborhood” within the Sant Gervasi district.
Contemporary Peruvian cuisine
Peruvian cuisine is among the popular neighborhood restaurants, which we love, with traditional cuisine, and some cool elevated proposals but also somewhat elitist. Macambo is not cheap but has a lunch menu that is an excellent option to go in and try their ceviches which, as we say, are canonical. Tasty, with very fresh fish, well seasoned… they taste exactly what they are supposed to taste like.
But Macambo’s idea is to get out of the tired binomial of ceviche and aji amarillo, and hence reversions of the causa limeña with Andean sauce and Iberian jowl or the Pekin duck croquette.
Hence also the refinement of its olive octopus, one of the best we have tasted, with tender octopus and the sauce, based on botijo olive, typical of Peru, very smooth and silky. From there, also, the cubes of suckling pig confit with escabeche, which refine a traditional stew.
Haute cuisine… at 20 euros
Macambo is the result of more than a decade of experience of the chef from Lima on three continents. After passing through kitchens in Lima, Ibiza, London and Barcelona itself – in restaurants such as Ceviche 103, Nikkei 103 or Cantina Canalla – Sihuay returns to the city with a very personal project. “Returning to Barcelona with a restaurant of my own is very special. It is a tribute to the Peru I know and the Peru I have been discovering while cooking around the world,” he says.
His proposal is high, and the ticket per person is, as we said, between 40-60 euros, looking for those who want a fine version of Peruvian food.
Now, the restaurant also has a lunch menu for 20 euros where you can try his most emblematic dishes in migdia formula, so that we can approach this version of a specialist in ceviches that now makes a tribute to the cuisine of his country.
