By the Book: Gastón Acurio’s Mixed Ceviche

  When I held up Peru: The Cookbook to a trio of Peruvians at a recent dinner party, I was met with shrieks with delight. “¡Ay, Gastón Acurio!” Acurio is a superstar in his own country, but his culinary influence reaches much farther. He owns nearly four dozen restaurants around the globe, including La Mar in San Francisco and Miami. With Peru: The Cookbook (to be released May 18), Acurio makes Peruvian cuisine even more accessible to the English-speaking cook. My dinner pals salivated over the 500 recipes in this compendium of classic Peruvian dishes. There were so many they longed for – lomo saltado (beef stir fry), tacu tacu (a patty of rice and mashed beans, often served with breaded steak or a fried egg) and especially fish dishes. We agreed that ceviche showcases the fresh flavors of Peruvian cuisine. Among the 30 ceviche recipes in the cookbook, Acurio’s mixed ceviche – squid, white fish, prawns, octopus and scallops – appealed most to the seafood lover in me.     Although ceviche is usually a dish of raw fish or seafood marinated in acid, Acurio’s recipe cooks the squid and octopus and blanches the prawns. The upside to this method is that it shaves a lot off the marinade time.     While I prepped the seafood, a friend got a workout juicing the lemons. The recipe calls for the juice of 20 small lemons. As it happened, the Asian market where I purchased fresh produce for this recipe only sold lemons the size of a fist. In the end, seven of these humongous lemons produced the equivalent of 2½ cups juice, which I poured over the chopped seafood.     Ceviche is often enhanced with the flavors of onions, corn, chiles and culantro, a relative of cilantro. True to tradition, Acurio’s recipe called for all of these. While I didn’t intend to deviate from his recipe, the Asian market threw another wrench in my plans. The only sweet potato was a Japanese variety, and fresh corn was unavailable so I settled for a can of baby corn, I don’t think Acurio would mind the Japanese inflection I added to the ceviche since Japanese is one of many international cuisines that has Peruvian culture over the years. “These people arrived in Peru with their memories, their ingredients, their techniques, and they started mixing with the locals,” said Acurio in one interview. The dish was delicious. The flavors were fresh and bright. The produce lent crunchy texture to the chewy seafood medley. If you haven’t already jumped on the Peruvian culinary bandwagon that is gaining traction in the U.S., once you get your hands on Acurio’s book, you, like his compatriots, will shriek, “¡Ay, Gastón Acurio!”     Gastón Acurio’s Mixed ceviche 4 servings 5½ oz. squid, cleaned 1 6-oz. white fish fillet 12 shrimp (prawns), blanched 7 oz. cooked octopus, thinly sliced 12 scallops, cleaned Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste 2 cloves garlic, very finely chopped 2 tsp. chipped limo chile Juice of 20 small lemons 1 tsp. chopped culantro or cilantro leaves 2 or 3 ice cubes 1 red onion, sliced into half-moon crescents 1 corncob, cooked and kernels removed Half sweet potato, boiled and cut into 8 slices • Put the squid in the boiling water for 40 seconds. Drain and cut in ¼-inch rings. • Cut the fish into ¾-inch cubes and place in a bowl with the shrimp, squid, octopus and scallops. Season with the salt and pepper. After 1 minute, add the garlic and limo chile. Mix together well. • Pour over the lemon juice and add the culantro or cilantro leaves and ice cubes. Stir and let stand for a few seconds. Add the red onion and remove the ice cubes. Mix together and adjust the seasoning to taste. • Serve in a large shallow bowl with cooked corn kernels and boiled sweet potato slices. Reprinted with permission from Phaidon What is your most memorable experience with Peruvian cuisine? Tell us in the comments below for a chance to win a copy of Peru by Gastón Acurio.