 Welcome to your Peruvian birthday 2022 stream. Let's go, it's Peruvian birthday episode. Thank you crowd, appreciate your positivity, appreciate the energy. Feels good to be on the internet. Welcome to the SCORE channel. Welcome to my Peruvian birthday stream. Last year I just did a little pre-made video for Peruvian birthday and I thought this year would be more fun to do something a little more Peruvian themed and for that we're gonna get into one of the most important topics in all of Peruvian culture. It's Peruvian food. People in this country, let me start by saying it first of all, I think Peruvian food is some of the best food in the world. It is absolutely banging, it claps so hard. But you know, it's not all perfect. There's some stuff here that maybe we should let go of. Maybe we should move on from, you know what I'm just saying, there's some dishes are better than others. Of course, this is only my opinion, which means of course that it's right, you know, but you're entitled to be wrong and have your own opinion too and you can let me know how wrong I am if you want in the chat and just tell me, you know, how incorrect my opinions are. Of course, you'll be wrong, but that's okay, you know, you're allowed to be wrong. I appreciate you anyway. So I got here, I wanna give a shout out real quick to wonderful research assistant Mika who put together this wonderful list of Peruvian foods. If it were not for Mika, I wouldn't have all these things here right now. So big shout out to Mika. Thank you for your assistance on this one. I haven't really looked at this list. I haven't seen it. She gave me a giant folder. She made the tier list. I didn't do anything because I wanna come in here fresh and I just wanna like see what it is, all right? So we're kind of just due to rankings. I mean, obviously S tier food is like the stuff that, you know, you really, really, really wanna eat. Like you would, you know, probably that'd be like your last meal in prison. You know, like if you're gonna die, this is the stuff you wanna eat tomorrow. And then we got like the stuff down here that I think we should just forget about. Like we need to forget about, that's the F tier stuff. We don't want that in our culture no more. We need to get rid of that. And then, you know, we got everything in between. Being that this is Peruvian food, I don't think a lot of stuff is gonna end up at the bottom of this tier list. Not gonna lie, cause it's really good. It's, I mean, there's few other national cuisines that I find that like rival Peru in terms of breadth of options and general level of quality, Peruvian food just hits it out of the park all the time. So far in my life, I think the only ones that I've come across that were like on par are like Japanese and maybe Mexican. Like I like Mexican food a lot. I think Japanese food is really, really good as far as like consistent quality. Peruvian food right up there, you know, right up there with those. I think you could make a case even that like Peruvian food in general is better than like Italian or you know, some of the other ones that get a lot of hype and attention. But we're just focusing on Peruvia today. So we're gonna start off with you know, whatever's first in here and it looks like we got some chifles. And oh, oh, I love chifles. I will tell you right now, first of all, that I will not go to a ceviche dea that does not give me chifles. If I find out that your ceviche dea does not give me chifles when I sit down, I'm not coming back. All right, that's it. That's all she wrote because I'm sorry, I need my chifles. All right, chifles I think are freaking delicious. I think that you need to have, but like now here's the thing. There's more than one kind of chifle. You know, these ones in this picture right here, they're like the little thick boys. I like those like thin, like chifle piuranos, like the ones that they make up North. Those are the real good banging ones. I like to go to Tomb base mart for ceviche. You know, that's the spot. They got the like really good chifles. Oh, those Nortania ones. I'm gonna pretend we're talking about those ones, okay? To me, this is one of the best snacks you can get. It is like, you know, it's technically fruit so it's healthy, okay? It's technically healthy because it's fruit. And then you got the fact that like, you know, it's bananas, which is the best fruit objectively. Bananas are officially an S tier fruit. Chifles as a snack are an amazing snack. I, it's hard because like, I don't think chifles really belong in S tier. Like I don't, you know, they're a nice to have and definitely sometimes I get like a bag of them at home and I just pound a bag of chifles and they're definitely up in the higher ranks. Like at least in B, I'm thinking, hang on, I'm just leaving it here for now. I'm not passing judgment. I think that they're better than a B tier. They're probably A tier. This is an A tier snack. Like if I think about snacks, right? Let's just narrow it down to snacks. If I'm like, all right, I could get a bag of Lay's potato chips or chifles. I'm gonna get chifles. I'm gonna get, I don't know, bag of peanuts or chifles. I'm gonna get chifles. Like, chifles just kind of are better than most other snacks. Given the options, I would probably pick the chifles. I'm gonna leave these up in the A tier. I think, I think chifles are a quality A tier snack. You know, I think sabroso. That's what they are. They're sabroso. I'm gonna stick with the chifles up here in the A tier and then, you know, we're gonna get into, we'll have to make some adjustments here because we're talking about different snacks, plates, desserts are on this list too. I see some desserts down here. So it's gonna get interesting as we go through here. You know, I'm gonna try to compare apples to apples, oranges to oranges. What we got here? That looks like, that's a doble, I think? Yeah, that looks like a doble. I almost never get this. Like, there's so many delicious menu options that I'd skip over just because you kind of get your favorites, you know? And when you like your S tier A tier foods, you just kind of stick with those. I don't, I mean, this is good. Don't get me wrong. If you've served me some adobo, I'm gonna be like, thank you very much. This is delicious. I don't know that I would put it up in my top two levels though. I feel like this is kind of a B range item. I don't know if you guys, if there's any adobo lovers in the house, holler at me and tell me I'm wrong, but like, I don't feel like this is a plate. The other thing to think about is like, would you go to a restaurant, like a nice restaurant and order an adobo? I don't think so. That's like a good, hearty lunch. Like, I'm at the menu. It's not, maybe my top options are not there at the menu, but like adobo's there. I'll get that adobo. That's a solid like B tier food. I think it's tasty, it's good, you know, but I don't know if I would necessarily put it like, way, way, way up there, you know? So one of the things I like about Peru is how you go to menu and you've got like 10 different options at most of the menus. You know, even the small ones is like three or four different choices. And that's how you, it's almost like you have this tier list in your brain already. You know what you want. You know, kind of like what your A tier foods are, which ones you're gonna go with. And that to me, I think is important, you know? To kind of think about it. So for me, this is not the first thing I would get at the menu, but it is something I would eat and enjoy at the menu, which I think puts it up in that B tier as a solid option. We may, again, have to make adjustments. Oh boy. Next item on this list. We're gonna jump into the anticuchos. Oh! Sheesh, I love me some anticuchos. This is a tough one now because here's the thing. First of all, I love the concept of the anticucho. It is the heart of an animal. You know, it's got that sort of like Aztec vibe, right? Like, rape, chin to the heart, pull it out while it's still beaten, hold it up to the sun god and then just like that is delicious. And I like the idea that we managed to turn part of an animal that we normally don't eat into something delicious. That right there gives it a boost because, you know, you're using all the parts of the animal. My Native American ancestors would certainly agree with that. So I appreciate that part of the anticucho. The anticucho also has a delicious sauce. There's nothing quite like the sauce on the anticuchos. It comes on a skewer, which is very convenient because you can hold it in your hand and just kinda eat it as you go. I like that. I like food that facilitates eating, all right? Cause I like to eat. And I don't want, you know, food that is messy and difficult. I like food that you can grab and go. And that's another thing. You can get anticuchos on the street corner, man. I remember one time I went to Juarez and I went there on a school trip and it was like a poorly organized school trip. I was, I don't know, we didn't eat for like 10 hours. I was starving and there was no food around. And I went to the corner and there was this lady making anticuchos. Now they were very tiny. I'm not gonna guess what kind of meat they were. Maybe they were a different kind of heart. Who knows? But they were still freaking delicious, okay? They were like two soles for a palito. All right? Try and buy something for two soles right now. Good luck inflation. But anticuchos possible. That's delicious. And that is something that, man, it's just like, mm, anticuchos are so good. These have to be at least eight here, at least. These are quality, a quality item. I mean, you know, also just really good for you. Tons of protein, like no fat. Like there's healthy factors to consider. There's convenience factors here. There's taste factors. They come with potatoes. Like who doesn't want a free piece of potato? I feel like everything about the anticucho is, you know, it's knocking out with every punch. It's just like bam, bam, bam. Anticuchos are kicking it. I think that they belong up top. I don't know that I would put these in that S tier. That is sacred territory, okay? We're not gonna, we might have to move some things up there later, but I am gonna be very difficult with my S tiers, okay? I don't just give out the biggest grades, all right? Anybody who knew me as a teacher knows, you know, you gotta work hard if you wanna get a 10 out of 10. You wanna get that hundo, you gotta be tough. I think anticuchos though, firmly in the A tier, and I would put them even up here in the front, like a head of the chief lays. It's just a delicious piece of food. I, God, I want some anticuchos right now. For the record, I didn't eat, I didn't eat Peruvian food today. I just made some hamburgers because I wanted to, like, have a neutral feeling today for this. I didn't wanna come in here after eating, like, Poyalabrasa, and have that affect my judgment. So, I'm trying to give you the most, you know, neutral perspective, so I did a nice American lunch to kind of keep myself from being biased, okay? It's tricky, all right? If I ate, you know, one of the things on this list today, it might throw off my entire judgment. So I'm trying to be, you know, objective. And, all right, now we get to a, oh, that looks like a roast chaufa. Yeah, chaufa's a tricky one, man. What can I say about chaufa? So many things. First of all, chaufa, I think, out of all the dishes in Peru, might have the biggest range of price. You can get, like, chaufa for, like, five soles at a cheap chifa, right? And then you can go to, like, some deluxe, fancy restaurant and get, like, a 60 soles chaufa. You know, there's a lot of spread on the chaufa. There are some absolutely really good ones, and then there's also some where you're like, I think I saw my food move. I don't know if that was rice or a worm. And I will say, I used to have this chifa around the corner from my house in Lince. This place was cheap. Occasionally, occasionally you had a small insect or worm in your food, but that's just free protein. In other countries, that is a bonus. You pay for that. So I didn't think that was a big deal. Everybody I took to that chifa got sick, except me. I had to stop taking people there because it became a problem. It was like five or six people that I took to that chifa and they all got food poisoning. I didn't because I'm impervious. I have a high resistance stat. You can't bring me down with food. There's no food that will stop me, okay? I've eaten everything. So, I mean, I can't, you know, I don't want to use that as my metric, okay? I think like a midpoint chifa, you know, like your 15 soles, chawfa is kind of like that sweet spot because I would never pay like 60 soles for chawfa. All right, it doesn't make sense to me unless it's like a giant one. And I think it's a good, it's great like drunk food, really good late night drunk food. Like, you know, because the chifa's always open late. Always open late. The Chinese people never rest. They're waiting for you. They're there when you need them. And that's another great thing about chawfa. They can just whip that up quick, get some good food, you know, get a little egg in there, get some chicken in there or other things. You can make it with whatever you want. That's the other cool thing about chawfa. I think though, like, to me, chawfa's a great side dish. I don't think it's like a great main course. I want it on the side. I want like, you know, my teapot kai with chawfa. Like I want that chawfa bowl next to the other food that I really want to eat. And for that reason, I don't think that I could call this like an A or an S tier, but it's definitely better than a C. I mean, chawfa's solid, you know? I think I would put it up in here with the adobo, maybe right behind the adobo. Like this is good stuff. I get it from time to time. I like my chawfa. I'm not like a huge enormous chawfa fan, but like, it's good. You know, it's solid food. But it's definitely not the kind of thing I go looking for. It's like chawfa comes to me, you know? On those late nights when you're hungry, you got nothing in the fridge, you get some chawfa. I think that's where it goes. All right, I think I'm looking at some fried seafood. Hang on, I got bigger versions of these pictures on another window here. Let me see what I'm looking at here. I want to make sure I'm talking about the right things. Okay, that's a halaya. Oh, damn, all right. Okay, we may have an S tier contender for the halaya. Ooh, halaya is awesome. I like saying the name. I like the food that's in it. I mean, it's basically chicharron con mariscos, but it's like better, you know? Because they put them fish filets at the bottom, you get the yuccas, you got all that onion, and you get the ahi, and you just put the ahi all over that thing. That is quality food. Oh, man. I don't know. Halaya's really, really good. I, again, going back to like chifles. If you give me chifles and a halaya, I order that all the time. I'll go to Tumbe Smart to get my chifles and halaya. I'm not sponsored by any of the restaurants I give a shout out to today, but just so you know, Tumbe Smart, they clap. Okay, they're banging. Halaya's so good, and you get so much. I mean, it's a stupid amount of food when you order a halaya. Like you order a halaya and it's just like a mountain of dead things from the ocean, and it's just really tasty. And it's all battery and crispy with a little bit of pepper and salt in that batter, and it's like, oh, give it to me. I mean, this is quality stuff right here. I think, and the other thing I love about Peru is how cheap seafood is. Y'all don't understand, if you live in another country, you don't know. Like we got cheap seafood. Even nowadays, as it's gotten more expensive, I've been here 13 years. I've seen things, I've seen it change, okay? Used to get this stuff way cheaper, but still stupid cheap. You can't get anything like this in the States for less than $25, $30. Here you get that for like 10 bucks. You can get a good halaya for like 10 bucks if you know where to go. And that's solid. It's hard for me to like, you know, say no to halaya. This is A-tier food. Absolutely. Now the question is, would I put this in front of like, anticuchos? And I don't know. That's tricky. Cause like anticuchos, man, there's something special. This is just at the end of the day, fried seafood. I mean, it's not exactly like halaya is like a magical, special dish. It is just chicharro de mariscos with more stuff in it, you know, which is cool. I love that, appreciate that. But like, I don't know, does it defeat the legendary anticucho? I mean, the other thing about halaya that brings it down a little bit for me is like, you can't get halaya whenever you want. Cause like seafood place is closed by the afternoon. You want that fresh fish in the morning. Whereas anticuchos, that saves your night. That can save your day. It can start your day. It's all three meals. Halaya's like, you better come get me at 12 or one o'clock. Like, you know, but man, you put some halaya next to some chifles and give me a beer. And like, I'm gonna be the happiest man alive. That's a solid dish. I think eight years is appropriate for the halaya. I can't think of how you could put it lower than that. It's so good. If I go to a ceviche restaurant, I'm either getting ceviche or halaya. That's where we're at. It's basically one of those two choices. I might once a year deviate and get something else, but like 98% of my trips to the seafood restaurant, it's either halaya or ceviche. So to me, it belongs up there in that upper level. And that takes us to, I know exactly what this is. We got Seiko. Oh man, Seiko. Seiko's the first dish that I had in Peru. And so it has a very soft spot in my heart. Okay, it's like, let me explain this, right? So the first day I get here, I got in at night. I didn't eat anything that night because I got in at like midnight. I went to bed, very tired, woke up the next day, walked around a little bit. And you know, lunchtime came around, American lunchtime, 12 o'clock. And I walked around looking for food. And the guy that I was staying with, he was renting rooms in Jesus Maria. He was like, yeah, you can go around the corner. There's a menu, you know, go over there, go get that. Okay, cool. And I go around the corner and I'll tell you, I did not find like any menu. There was no food. All I wore is the food. Everything was closed. And I realized, oh, I'm a gringo. I think it should be open at 12. Nobody else here does. So I walked around for like another hour, went back, saw the menu. It was open at one o'clock. And I said, okay, time to eat. I go in there now, here's the thing. I've told this story before you may have heard it, but here's the deal. I didn't speak almost any Spanish. Okay, when I first got here 13 years ago to the day, my Spanish was absolute crap. Okay, I couldn't say anything. And that was difficult, you know? But I had a bright idea because I'm a smart dude. I looked around and I was like, all right, I'm gonna wait and watch what other people order. I'm gonna see what they order. And if I see something that looks good, I'll ask that person what that thing is called. And then I'll tell the person that's what I want. I thought it was a big brain strap, you know, 200 IQ at least. And so I go to the menu. I see this old guy and he's like, he's got Seiko. You know, that's what he's got. He's got the Seiko on his plate. I go, señor, como se llama eso. He looks at me confused, Seiko. It's like, awesome. I got the name of the food. And I'm gonna get this. Daniel says, jale de carretilla. But jale de totibo, it doesn't matter. Anywhere you go, give me jalea. I'll get it. I don't care if it comes off of a cart out of the back of somebody's truck or in a proper restaurant. Give me, give me. And yeah, those restaurants on the side of the highway is up North, man, they're so good. So I go, I sit down at the restaurant. I look at the waitress, she comes up to me. She's like, I don't know what she said. Probably something like, you know, if you make a guieres, no say, I don't know what she said at the time. So I was like, all right, Seiko. I said it with confidence. And she looks at me and then she goes, sopa woncajina. And I didn't understand what she meant because I just said Seiko, I wanted Seiko. I was like, no, Seiko. And she looks at me again. She's like, sopa woncajina. And I'm like, okay, what am I doing wrong here? Cause like, here I am fine. I thought I was so smart. I said the word that the guy told me is everybody trolling the gringo is this a joke here? What is going on? And she's like, she's like, and I'm like, I want Seiko, you know, full sentence. Let's try that. No luck, no, no luck. She looks at me again. And then she looks at the whiteboard on the wall. She's like, see Seiko, okay, it's fine. And also woncajina, sopa woncajina. And I was like, ah, you get more food. And that's why this country is great because you know, it wasn't just, oh, you ordered one thing. No, you get an extra thing in addition to your thing. That is amazing. So I got the woncajina with the Seiko. And it was fantastic. And I fell in love on day one. And to me, this is a plate that is deserving of the highest ranks. I will get this anytime it is offered to me. You give me a Seiko, con frejoles, you know, with the rice on there, potato, like, oh, it's so good. And it just makes you feel satisfied. It's delicious, the meat is tender, the flavor is excellent. You dump a bunch of aji on it and everything's even better. I can't think, and maybe I'm just being nostalgic, but like, Seiko, I get that a bunch. Anytime that my local menu offers me a Seiko, I order that. So you bring it here now. So my first dish in Peru, definitely got to get that again. Got to have more Seiko in my life. So yeah, that right there. It is, man. It is, it's very Riko, you know? So it's getting toasty in here now that I'm streaming. I think the PC is getting hot. Let's take off the layer. Let's get a little loosened up. Let's go. All right. Looks like I got some more seafood here. What am I looking at? It looks like an Arosco Mariscos, I think? Yeah, yeah, yeah, Arosco Mariscos. All right, okay. This is also delicious. Man, yeah, those SAB tiers is gonna be packed today. I think it's really, really good. The only thing I don't like about Arosco Mariscos is like, sometimes you get some crunchy shell bits in there. You get like a weird random thing that you're not familiar with. You're kind of like, what is this exactly, sir? Please, thank you. But you know, that flavor on the rice is really good. The seafood in there is really good. It's a solid dish. It comes out nice and hot, too. I like how Arosco Mariscos traps the temperature and it stays nice and hot. And you know, you can be eating a giant plate of that and still at the end, it's like burning you. It's so good. I don't know what magic property it has, but it holds the heat forever and ever and ever and that is really good. Again, I think it does just, the only thing that knocks it down a little bit for me is just kind of like, I get a little tired of it by the end of the meal. I feel like maybe it's all the rice and I'm not, you know, I'm American. We're raised more on corn and wheat. Not as much on rice, perhaps that's why. I do like Arosco Mariscos a lot. I would say, I mean, this is better than the other B tier options here. I don't know that this is a tier though. It's like, especially too, like once you run out of your favorite seafood, right? Like you get Arosco Mariscos. For me, I like the langostinos. You know, I want the langostinos, I want the calamar. Like that's the stuff that's in there that I want. But you know, then there's like the other stuff and maybe you're not a big fan of the other stuff and you're kind of like, oh man, I ran out of langostinos. I already had like the three or four that were in there and now it's like, I got to settle for the like lower tier Mariscos, you know? I think this is like the champion of B tier for me right now, like delicious, you know? But it's not like, I would order any of these other things before I get Arosco Mariscos multiple times. Again, like I said, if I go to a ceviche restaurant, I'm getting Jalaya or ceviche. Arosco Mariscos might be like my third choice, but again, it's like, I only order that maybe once a year. You know, not as frequently. So I think that's where it got to be. I think that's where it belongs. Now, we have our first dessert. All right, Arosco Leches, sticking with rice. All right, I got to make point about Peruvian desserts, okay? And I want to say again, I think Peruvian food is magical. It is blessed. Pacha Mama made some amazing stuff, but you guys need to work on your dessert game, okay? Some of your desserts are a little bit weak, all right? I mean, if I had the choice between American desserts, like a good, delicious New York cheesecake, oh, or a freaking apple pie that my mom made, I mean, those are desserts right there. I think that, you know, where Peruv's dessert game is strong is in the cake department. Y'all make cakes like you wouldn't believe. I can't, I'll never forget, I got my first birthday cake in Peru. And it was because my students, like, hacked the system, found my birthday, because I never talk about my birthday. I talk about my Peruvian birthday, but I don't really care about my actual birthday because I didn't do anything, all right? What did I do that day? I don't even remember it. It's like I wasn't there, right? My mom did all the work, and so did the doctor, and my dad should celebrate like nine months before, okay, because that's when he did his part. But like, I didn't do anything. For all I know, I was grown in a laboratory. I wasn't even born. How would I know? So like, to me, I never talk about my birthday, but these students figured out somehow what my birthday was, and they brought me my first cake for my birthday. And I was blown away, and it was a very touching gesture. Sophie, if you're out there, remember you did that, you were there, too. Now, they like, you know, they bring me this cake, and I was just blown away by how good the cake was. Like, your cake came in this country very, very solid. But when we get into like the Peruvian-specific desserts, it's not as strong, okay? Arrozco leches good, it's tasty, you know? But it's, I mean, it's like sweet rice, man. It's like, I mean, you know, it's kind of lacking in balance, I feel. I feel like you need something else to go with the sugar. There's a lot of sugar in Peruvian dessert, but not so much like balance. You know, that's what's nice about the apple pie. You got the sour green apple, right? You got the little bit of sugar and cinnamon. You got the like, nice neutral crust to help you balance it all out, right? Cheesecake, savory, delicious, creamy cheese, all over that cake, you know? But with that graham cracker crust. Oh, it's, it's, I have to hold up Peruvian desserts against the world's best desserts. And I gotta say, I don't think that Arrozco leche really breaks it up into here. I never get this. Like, the only time I eat this, all right? And that's why I think it's in a C tier. Like, if I never order it, I think that's where C tier is. I think that's gotta be like my line there in the sand. It's not that I don't like it. D and F is like, I don't like it, okay? C is like, I'll eat it, but I'm never gonna order it. You gotta give it to me. And so, you know, once in a while, you go to the menu and they give you like the little bit of dessert and sometimes they give you a little Arrozco leche. That's cool. I appreciate that. Two or three bites, awesome. Thank you, but that's all I want. That's all I need. I'm good for the rest of the year. I think that's why this is a C tier dessert, C tier food in general. You know, nothing wrong with C tier. Nothing bad about it. Just not something that I am gonna get. And then it looks like we got another dessert right after this because it set me up for dessert talk. Is that like flan or something? Like, what did, I'm looking at my list here. I gotta figure out what the heck I'm looking at because I don't, again, I don't eat a lot of desserts. Maybe I shouldn't have eaten that. Oh wait, cremable dea. Yeah, I think I kind of, I never get this actually either, but it's kind of got that flan-ish kind of like vibe to it. Again, just kind of like soft, liquidy dessert. Kind of like missing texture. Feels very light, very fluffy, but like also liquidy. I feel like it needs more substance. It needs more like, you know? That's what I like about the cheesecake. You get a thick slice of cheesecake. You feel that. It goes right into your arteries, you know? And you feel them like closing. But this is kind of like, I feel like I just had empty calories. I didn't get much out of it. I think I may have to say, I don't have strong opinions on this dessert, but I genuinely don't get it. Like I never get this. And I would say I even, I'll keep it up here at the sea for now, but I'm gonna leave it behind the Arozco Leche because I don't see, you know, the real value in this one, all right? I don't, but there's other desserts I like better. Not all Peruvian desserts are gonna be like mid-loatier, all right? There will be something that I'm sure I enjoy better. Now, we get to perhaps one of the most iconic dishes in all of Peruvian cuisine. The legendary Lomo Saltado. I actually made my mom make Lomo Saltado one time, which was pretty funny. A long, long, long, long, long time ago, before score, before many of my other ventures, I had this idea to make a video series. And I was so stupid, I didn't even think to put it on YouTube, even though my buddy did say that might be a good idea. And if we had done that back in like 2010, 2011, we probably would be giant YouTube stars right now. I'm super appreciative of the fact that we have 700 subscribers right now. By the way, thank you to all the new subs and like all the people watching. You guys are awesome. I really appreciate that. I'm super happy with how this channel has grown, but like, I could be sitting on millions right now, you know, just saying. You know, if I had been smarter in the past. But what happened was, you know, we went around and we made videos. And our idea was to like make a series of videos that you could use in institutes and like teach people English through the videos. And one of the videos we did was on Peruvian food. And we went to stores in the United States and we bought all the ingredients for Lomo Sartado. And then I made my mom do the acting and like she made the food and we filmed the whole thing and we turned this kitchen into a studio. I don't have those files anymore, sadly, because both my buddy and I lost them due to years of neglect and system failure. But like, man, Lomo Sartado, it was like if we had to choose one dish to represent Peru, I feel like it might be this dish. It is undeniably amazing. Have you ever really had a bad Lomo Sartado? Like the cheapest, crappiest Lomo Sartado you can find is still really good. And then you get the deluxe ones. You get like those giant trozos of Lomo Fino. The ones are like golf balls of soft meat. You put it, oh, it's so good. And then you get fries with that. You get fries with that. Not a lot of Peruvian dishes come with fries, okay? Like your standard fast food stuff, sure. Like your Puyo La Brasa and stuff, okay? But like Lomo Sartado is like, not only are you gonna get Lomo and all the Sartado and the rice. Here's some delicious fries to go with that. Here's this like juice that's all over the place. This is easily, this may be the best item on the list. There's no debate. This may very well be the best item Peru has to offer. If you come to this country and you don't get a Lomo Sartado, you're an idiot. I'll just say it like that. You've screwed up horribly. You have made a major fatal mistake, okay? That is, oh man, I'm getting hungry already. I'm thinking about it. I want that. It's so good. It claps. I usually, I like to get the one at Panchita. Panchita gives you a nice gigantic Lomo Sartado. It's like real good, you know? But yeah, I mean, you can make it really spicy too. I make my own version, but I add another secret ingredient. I have my own unique recipes. I like to use baby corn, okay? Baby corn clutch Sartado ingredient. They sell it at long. You can get little things of baby corn. It tastes different, but it's really good. Put some of those in your Sartado next time and you can thank me later, all right? Baby corn Lomo Sartado, believe me. But yeah, that's like that and Seiko right there. Those are like, if we're making like a Mount Rushmore of Peruvian food, like Lomo Sartado's gotta be up there. That's gotta be an S tier. I can't think of any argument to the contrary. I can't, what negatives are there? There aren't any. It's absolutely nothing. So yeah, that's where it goes. All right, now we got Carapulcra. I like the name Carapulcra. It's a good name, quality name. It's a good dish too. I mean, it's good stuff. You know, there's good food in here. I like that it's kind of like an ironic name, because it's kind of messy to eat it. And I think that's kind of funny. It's good stuff. I think this kind of falls into that same category of like, this is something I will see in a menu, probably not get because other choices are available, but if it's served to me, I will like it, I will enjoy it. Like I will probably ask you for a second plate if you serve me a plate of Carapulcra. All right, I like that stuff. It's really good. Now, where it falls in relation to some of these other items, I think it's like right up here. I would get this before Adobo, definitely. It's almost making me reconsider Chalfa's positioning here. I feel like Chalfa may need to move up a little bit. I'm not sure. I would get it at Roscoe Mariscos before I get a Carapulcra, that's for sure. So I think that's a good spot for it. Like a strong B tier option, not the kind of thing I'm gonna spend a bunch of money on, but if it's at the menu and I don't see my other favorites, I would get some Carapulcra and enjoy that a lot. All right, now, a controversial item in Peruvian cuisine. Personally, I wanna start by saying, I don't care what animals you eat. All right, all animals are animals, just because some are cute, doesn't mean they deserve extra protection, okay? In Chinsha, they used to eat cat all the time. I think that's totally fine. And I say that as someone who had a cat. I've had several cats. I have no problem with people eating cats, you know? Pablo, you asking for some justice for Chalfa? We'll continue to evaluate the situation for Chalfa. I feel like it might be a little low now, but I mean, I have feelings on it. You know, it's hard for me to place Chalfa. Cui, though, Cui. I mean, here's the thing, right? I remember when I first came here, I got Cui with my dad. That was the first time I got it. My dad came down three weeks after I got here. I didn't really know anything about Peru yet. I had just gotten here, and my mom was like, you need to go see him because he might be getting kidnapped and murdered, as if my dad visiting for a week was gonna change that, you know? Like, my mom just needed somebody else to see me in Peru to make sure that it was okay to get someone else's approval. So my dad came down, and while he was here, I was like, yo, we should go get Cui, you know? I haven't had it yet. It'll be funny. You can take pictures with it, and it'll be good for laughs when you go home. You'll have something to tell the people back home that you did something cultural and different. And so we went and got Cui. It's not the only time I've had Cui. But here's the thing, all right? I think there's some problems with this plate, all right? First of all, it is overpriced, all right? It is way overpriced. I can go and get a guinea pig at PetSmart in the United States for way less than what they charge for a Cui here on the plate, okay? Just say it. I don't think it makes any sense. It's always like 20 soles more, 30 soles more than everything else in the restaurant. And I know it's because they wanna get the gringos, okay? I know that they're like, oh, hey, look, here's a gringo. Do you wanna try the Cui? It's experience, it's cultural. And then they're like, you know, they're gonna be like, oh, here you go. You gotta try it once while you're here. And that's why it's so expensive. They're like, they know that we want to try it before we leave the country. And so every restaurant offers a freaking Cui, but it's like 30 soles more than other food that is way better. And so it's overpriced most of the time. Now you can go into the mountains and get like a legitimate good quality Cui served at a reasonable price, but most places that you go are gonna make it overpriced. And then the other thing is like, if we're being honest, I don't think it's that great, all right? I wanna say it. I love the way it is displayed. I love the like Cui spread out with the, you know, with the like, the head on it, still in the little teeth. Like I think that's hilarious. I love it. Put my fork in the head and like make it talk. You know, that's funny. Like, oh, I'm a little Cui. Like that's funny to me. I enjoy that part of it. That keeps it out of F tier for sure. But here's the other thing. It's so skinny, man. It's got like no meat on the bone. So you're picking at the meat, you're like me, me, me. Like I feel like I burn more calories than I get. I have to work so hard to get the meat off the Cui. And then the, when they fry it, like that skin is super strong, you know? You've got like sliced into that. I just feel like it's too much work. All right, it's too much work. It's good meat, but it's so much work to get. I would much rather have like a piece of lamb or like veal, something easy to eat that is also soft and delicious. And then like the overpriced factor brings it down for sure. And then I don't know. It's just, yeah, it doesn't really do it for me. It's the kind of thing that you do once, say you did it, leave it alone. And that's it. If it weren't for the tourist factor, I don't even think you would see this dish anymore in Lima. In the mountains, sure. But in Lima, you would never eat this. If it weren't for the tourist factor, I don't think it would ever be sold. Now, I will say quick asterisk. I have had Cui, like the ribs from Charua. And that was amazing. Now, that was awesome because it literally peeled right off the bone. Like they give you the rack of ribs and it's like 20 little tiny Cui ribs, you know, like in a little square like this big and you just peel that meat off. That was awesome. All right, that was really good. But that's not what I'm looking at here. And that's not the usual method of preparation. That's like deluxe primo fancy people preparation. To me, I think because it's so overpriced and because it's such a tourist trap and because it's, man, like I want to put it in detail almost. Like I would not get it ever again, just for those reasons. It's the kind of thing that like, I don't even really enjoy ordering it. It doesn't, it's not like these things where like if you give it to me, I'll be fine with it. Like down be like, man, I'm really gonna have Cui like really seriously. I mean, I have, I've had it a few times because it was served to me under different circumstances. And I've eaten it. I'm gonna move it up to the sea. Honestly, and I just thought of another reason to give it just a little bump because Cui is also sort of divisive thing. And I do believe it doesn't deserve hatred. Okay. Like I don't think I, if I put it in detail, that's almost mean. Cause like the truth is I've seen people be racist about Cui. All right. Like on another school trip, I went to Ayacucho and I remember they served us, we went to this like restaurante campestre, you know, like big outdoor restaurant and they served us Cui in addition to other delicious things. And I remember like, you know, these like, you know, kind of like fancy like white girl teachers being like, Oh, come on, please, come here, please. So, ooh. And it pissed me off cause it was like, it's just an animal. It's still food, but it's like, oh, I'm sorry that it's food that is normally prepared by people that don't look like you. And that irritated me also. And like they were, they were, they were like, dale los obreros. And it made me mad. It was like, dude, don't like, seriously, like you're going to act like this is something that only like those people should eat. That actually made me angry. And I ended up taking it over to a bunch of my students and let's pick out on Cui. And actually we had the legs and it was pretty good. All right. Sea tier. It's a sea tier food. If it weren't so overly priced and so difficult to eat, it would be up here. But because it's, cause it's got some issues, we're going to leave it down here. That takes us to Kausa. All right. It's probably going to be one of the more controversial takes on this, but I don't like Kausa. And let me tell you why. All right. Here's the problem with Kausa. First of all, it's got too much mayonnaise. All right. It's way too, I personally believe that mayonnaise should never be included in any food. All right. It should be an optional item. It should never be included. Mayonnaise to be as disgusting. So I don't ever want to see mayonnaise in or around my food. You give me a Kausa and it's got like just a teeny little bit of mayonnaise and I can eat that and enjoy that. But normally what I want to do is like eat around it. And then you got some random vegetables in here. There's a lot of vegetables in there. It's kind of like, I don't really see the point of Kausa. I never order Kausa myself. It's the kind of thing that if I go out to eat with friends, somebody will order a big one to share and I'll take a bite maybe, but I'm actually going to say I think Kausa belongs in detail. To me, that is one of the foods that I've never been a fan of in Peru. And I think it's just like, you got these random vegetables and you got this mayonnaise. Two things I don't really want in my life. All right? The potato-y part is really good. Give me that. But put something better in there and get rid of the mayonnaise. Kausa is a deuter food, okay? Let's say it. Something has to go there, all right? And we got a pretty normal distribution going right now. So I think we're doing pretty fair where we're taking care of business. It seems okay to me. We now have something in a glass. Is that Leche de Tire? Hang on, I'm looking at my photo list. I gotta make sure. Oh, it is Leche de Tire. All right. Now, Leche de Tire. Really, really good item. I like this stuff a lot. I do order this. I actually just had some last weekend, very quality food. The, hmm, trying to think. Like, again, this is kind of like in that chalfa section for me of like, I order this with other stuff. I don't just get this by itself. You know, I want something else. This is an appetizer. This is a, you know, side dish. It is very, very good. But it's also a little bit unwieldy to say the least. Not as very, you know, not so convenient. You got like a bunch of fish chunks in there. You got things in there that you gotta like, get out, you know? But I do love the acidity. I do love it when it's spicy. Give me a nice spicy cup of Leche de Tire. We're gonna have us a good time, okay? But again, it's kind of like not, it doesn't go up in these top tiers, okay? It doesn't. Cause it's not the kind of thing I'm gonna order like on its own. Like I will straight up get a bag of chifles and go right now in the corner. I can go to the corner, get a bag of chifles and take that home and just destroy that in 20 minutes. I'm not gonna do that with Leche de Tire. I think that it's like in the back end of B tier, you know? It's good. It's definitely good. It's starting to give me a rethink this. I actually think we should bump these up and move Adobo back because we gotta, we should move Chalfa up a little bit because now I'm kind of measuring it on the same length as Chalfa, which is like, it's a side dish. I will get it with something else. I do order it. I do like it. And I think that it's, that's where it kind of belongs. So I think we're gonna bump Chalfa up with the, with the Leche de Tire a little bit, move Adobo to the back of the B tier. That seems fair to me. It seems reasonable. Now, we got Chupé. Looks like Chupé de Camarones. Classic, delicious. This is one of those dishes I think that can either be made amazingly or kind of like, man, it really depends on where you get it. I have a friend who makes like a freaking amazing Chupé de Camarones. He makes it really, really well. His mom had the recipe. It's absolutely banging. I also like to get that at Tombé Smart as well. They got nice, again, Tombé Smart, maybe. Gigantic soup bowl, all right? You can wear it as a protective helmet in a war. It is just fortified, okay? Very, very good soup. I will say this, I gotta take a side note on soup. Before coming to Peru, I was of the opinion that soup was a waste of time, okay? It's a liquid. I don't want liquid, I want solid. I'm here to eat, not drink. And Peru changed my views on soup, all right? I used to never order soup. Now, I like me some soup and I have questions. I'm always like, what soups do you have? What do we got? Because you guys have some really good soup, all right? You got some very legitimate soup choices. I don't think there's ever gonna be such a thing as an S tier soup. I don't think that exists. I don't think soup can break into the S tier class. But I do think that a good quality Chupé, like, can, I mean, it could be A tier. I don't hesitate to put it up there though. That's a high rank for a soup. Because at the end of the day, it is still a soup. But it is a really good soup. It's difficult choices. Now, I think there's a strong case to be made that this could be like leader of B tier. This could be, I feel like Chupé, being a soup, does not belong high in A tier. Could I see it behind the chifles? Maybe, maybe. I don't know. It is something I order. I order this voluntarily, not super frequently, but like enough, you know, here and there, I will get a Chupé. I think that's a solid like B tier leader. Like, this is a really good item. I would order this on my own. It's not gonna be my top choice, but it's like, give me a good Chupé de camarones on a good, cool day, like a winter day. I mean, we got something going. We got some possibilities. All right, so I think that's where that belongs. All right, we're going back to desserts. Sopiro de la Rimeña. I like this better. See this, this is a better dessert. This is a dessert with a little bit of like, you know, mixed flavors, okay? This is clearly better than the C tier desserts. To be, this is definitely a B tier dessert. I think that this is a good choice. I enjoy the lemoniness, you know? I like the, you know, the creamy parts. It is good, it's simple, you know? But it's tasty. I would eat this. I would order this. Like, if you brought me the dessert menu and you're like, what do you want for dessert? I would choose this over most other Peruvian desserts. I think Sopiro de la Rimeña is a solid Peruvian dessert. I don't know if you guys have any A tier desserts. I'll be honest, but I think that this goes in there in that same, yeah. I feel like it kind of belongs next to that leche de tigre. Like, here's the thing I will occasionally get. It is a side item. It is tasty. It's a B tier dessert. It's quality dessert. You guys have some desserts that are worth talking about. That is one of them. All right, I already, ooh, I see this and it makes me kind of like, a little bit sick. Um, we got pulpo al olivo. All right. This may be our first F tier trash, okay? I'm gonna say the al olivo thing. Like, what is up with this choice? Why would you take one of the most disgusting vegetables? I don't even know if it is a vegetable. Is, like, are black olives a fruit? Are they a vegetable? Are they just something that Satan created to like make life worse? I can't think of a single situation in my life where I want a black olive anywhere near my food. Not one. You could fill black olives with money and I would still be like, keep them away from my food. Like, you could take 100 soles, fold it up, stuff it into the olive and put it on my food and I'd still be like, get this out of here. Get this out of here. I don't want your dirty olive money. Green olive? Acceptable. Get a martini? Perfectly fine. That's about where it ends. Black olive, black olive completely destroys the flavor of anything else. It dominates so hard. It just bombs the flavor of anything you put it on. You know, it's the one thing that I can't stand. Like, they put it on like, pop it on one cajina. You know, I put that one little olive and I always just get that olive away from my food because it's like, everything's good. We don't need this on the food, okay? And because one cajina is so great and because it's just one olive and it's solid, it's fine. I can just remove it and go on with my day and everything is wonderful. But when you liquefy the olive and you just put it on the food like this, like this, you get, it's disgusting, all right? I've even tried this. Look, I don't want to be fair. I've tried to give it a chance, okay? It's not like I have some sort of child olive problem that I haven't grown out of, okay? This is a consistent adult experience, all right? I went to the very lovely restaurant San Cefarino and that place is mad expensive, very nice restaurant in San Ysidro. Took a lady friend and my mom there while my mom was visiting. I wanted to introduce my mom to a lady friend. We went to San Cefarino. I was paying. I was making, you know, I was feeling like a baller for a day, okay? So I go to San Cefarino and I was like, you know what? We're gonna get pulpo al olivo at San Cefarino because if there's one place where it should be amazing, it should be this restaurant where it costs like 90 soles for this dish. It should be freaking amazing. Nobody finished it. Nobody at the table liked it. Not my mom, not the lady friend, not me. We all took like three bites and left the rest. And that to me is proof. Like, how does this dish continue to survive at this point? Who really wants dark olive sauce all over their food? I don't understand it. It's not good. It doesn't deserve to be there. Pulpo, delicious, does not belong. It should not be covered in disgusting black olive. This is f-tier. This is legitimately f-tier trash. This should not be served. We should get rid of the dark olive sauce. We should, I think we should actually get rid of black olives entirely. We should declare war on the black olive, get rid of it, eliminate it from our life, turn it into olive oil, I guess. I don't know if that's the one they use for that, but get it into a format where it is okay, but liquefying black olive. Do you want black olive on your pizza either? Like, green olive again. Maybe I can understand it, maybe. Not my favorite, but I'll eat it. I'll eat it, you know? But black olive just takes away the whole flavor of the pizza. I'd rather have mushrooms. I'd rather have anything else. Yeah, sorry. Pupololivo, you get down there. Stay down in your f-tier hole where you belong. Absolutely disgusting. Black olives are great when you're drunk. Hey, what's up, Kato? I can't, see, that feels like it would make me sick. I feel like if I had them when I was drunk, it'd be worse. I'd be like, oh, what did I just eat? No, I can't imagine it. Can't picture it at all to save my life. Gotta be honest. So, maybe that's just me? But, I mean, if you have to be super intoxicated to enjoy something, that's not a good sign either. Now, let's take it back to the other direction. Let's go top-tier with the ticanos. All right, ticanos are absolutely amazing. All right, whoever came up with the ticano deserves some kind of medal or like some kind of, I don't know, like trophy, a statue, maybe like a plaza dedicated to him, like Señor Ticano Plaza, like, hmm, ticanos. The best part about ticanos, they're cheap. You get them at the bar. They're amazing, a coutrement for your bar drinking nights. You go out, you know, you have a beer, you get your order at ticanos, and they're really, really good. You get the cheese in them. Sometimes you got ham and cheese in them. Sometimes they put other stuff in them. That's the cool thing about ticanos. You can put anything you want in there. You want to put in some pollo de la brasa? You can do that. You want to put in ají de gallina? You can do that. You want to put in lo mo salto? You can do that. You can put anything in ticanos, and they're gonna just become more better. Whatever was in there just became better because you wrapped it up in a flaky, buttery, fried crust, it's so good. I could, me and my buddy Ben, shout out to Ben and John Jack if you're out there, Ben, miss you man. Ben was one of my first real homie bros here in, yeah, ticanos and campagnossi. See, that's a great combo, exactly. Put the, ticanos in anything. Ticanos and divorce would be delicious. You could, if I got divorced, I'm not married, but if I got divorced, I would get ticanos right away and I would immediately feel better. That's how good ticanos are. Ticanos and divorce would be a good combo. You would totally forget about your ex. Like, that's how good they are. Me and my buddy Ben, we used to go to Pizza Street before Pizza Street was turned into a commercial copy of every other outdoor capitalist eatery. I'm very sad about Pizza Street. Maybe one of these days I'll do a Peruvian birthday stream just talking about Pizza Street memories because I have so many stories from Pizza Street, but we used to sit down at Los Incas and which doesn't exist anymore and we would have ticanos and Ben had an incredible capacity to eat ticanos. He's one of the only people I've ever met that can eat more food faster than I can. And the thing is they would come out so hot. You know, you take that first bite and the hot oil just like burns you, didn't matter to Ben, he just boom, boom, boom. Like, he could down ticanos like his life depended on it. And so it was a race. We'd order like the 12 ticanos and it's like you would expect a reasonable person to say, okay, well, there are six for me. There are six for me, Tim. We shall share the ticanos. No, it was like Ben is eating them as fast as possible to get more ticanos and so I gotta keep up. If I only get four or five, it's my fault. And that thing about ticanos, they're so good that you actually have to compete with other people to eat them. And that, I mean, that is a sign of a quality food, all right? If that food goes first, if that food goes fast, that is good food. If you gotta fight for it, that's good food. And I think that's true of all of our A tier options. Like if you order parrilla and there's anticuchos, people are gonna hit those anticuchos fast. You order jalea, people are gonna start picking at it and it's gonna go fast. You put down the chifles, everybody's gonna have their hand in those chifles, you know? And I think that's why ticanos are a solid A tier choice. I feel like I would even put them ahead of chifles right here. I think the ticanos are a solid A tier. Definitely, again, just so many possibilities. You could stick them in guacamole, you could stick them in guacamole, you could do so many things with ticanos and they're so freaking delicious. Mm, ticanos. Love me some ticanos. Now, boy, we are just, we are doing this right now. We are going back and forth because next we have trondedonia pepa, all right? This is another example of Peru not knowing how to do dessert. Now I gotta be honest, all right? And I don't wanna offend nobody, but here's the thing. All right, yesterday, you know, from Peruvian birthday I was gifted a box of delicious Peruvian desserts and there were some really good things in there. There's afajores and there's like, you know, manjar blanco and stuff. There was some really good stuff in there. There are two big blocks of tron that I have not tried yet, all right? So maybe I should go get those right now and try one and see what we think on this, all right? Because I generally have nothing but negative opinions about tron and I wanna see if my opinions can be changed. So I'll be right back. I'm gonna go get a piece of tron, all right? And I'm gonna eat it and I'm gonna find out where this ranks, all right? I'm gonna do this in real quick, all right? All right, all right, look, let me show you what we got here, okay? This is what I received for Peruvian birthday. There's some things in here that I'm not even familiar with. Already the paper inside this box is sticking to the tron like you wouldn't believe here. Let me see if I can get that in here to show it, well, hang on, my thing wants to cover the thing. Let's see if you can see the tron. Come on, it's something that you should not block out. There you go. See if I put my hand on there? All right, look, there's tron in that box, okay? It's hard to see, I know, because my graphics card thinks it's smarter. All right, now look, I've always felt that tron deserves to be at the very bottom of the Peruvian food tier list, okay? Because it is, in my opinion, just 20 different forms of sugar. It's like somebody said, it's like there was a guy whose job was to make sugar in as many forms as possible, like a sugar refiner. And he was like, hey, look, I've made 20 different kinds of sugar. Let me just put them together in different layers. But I'm gonna give this a try. All right, we'll see. All right, right away, confirming everything I know. I am pushing down with this fork, with incredible force, nothing is happening. That's the thing about tron, why is it so dense? Why is it so hard, okay? I mean, I am trying to get a P, I can't. I just broke the top off of it. It's sticky. Here we go, a little tiny. All right, that's the top of it. All right, that's solid, not bad. Let's see if I can actually get the parts in the middle that actually matter. All right, see, this is the thing. You could build a house out of tron and it would never demolish itself. You could build a fortress with this stuff. And like Russia could bomb it with their biggest nuke and it would not move an inch. Like, tron is indestructible. I don't understand why that's a good thing for a dessert. I'm trying so hard to even just get a bite out of this and it's literally impossible. Hang on, I seriously don't think you understand how much I'm struggling with this tron. Like it has got glue all over it. These are tasty. I'm trying to pull off this little decorative piece of candy and it is stuck to this thing with the force of a thousand gods. Like, okay, all right, there's a fork full of stuff. I mean, is it good? I feel like four-year-old me would be so happy right now. Four-year-old me would be like, yay, sugar. But like adult me is kind of like, what is this? I mean, again, it's just a bunch of different kinds of sugar. My tooth already hurts. This stuff is like, this dentists must hate this stuff. Like if you're a dentist, you probably want to make tron illegal. This is immediately how you lose a tooth. Like if I was a child, if I was a dad, let's say I was a dad and I accidentally had a child and that child needed to lose a baby tooth. I would just give them a block of tron and be like, here, bite. And then when he tries to unbite, his tooth would come out. Because this, you can't eat this. Like, again, I'm just gonna try to shove my fork in here and twist around a little bit and get a big bite so I can properly evaluate the tron. All right, here we go, that is a massive chunk. But again, okay, it's just a bunch of sugar bread stuck together with more sugar and there's sugar on top of it. In the form of little sugar crystals. Hmm, good point, Carolina. Maybe, maybe they just want money. Maybe the dentists, maybe this is actually a conspiracy. Like, what if the dentist really does love tron? What if Donia Peppa was a dentist? Has anyone thought about that? Do we know Donia Peppa's background? Was Donia Peppa a dentist? And like, she really wanted to just get rich and so she made like a whole bunch of tron and then gave it out to everybody in the neighborhood and then, you know, they all had tooth decay. Oh, but it's too crunchy, too hard. I just hurt myself. See, it's like, this is like the hardest thing to eat. It's difficult to eat and also very hard. And it's, it tastes fine, but it kind of just tastes like sugar. Like, I would rather go into my cabinet, grab a bag of sugar and just stick my face into it. It would be easier and it would be over quickly. Yeah, that's all I'm having with that. That's literally, that's all we need. So it's already negatively affecting my health, I can feel it. Now look, that's a really good one, right? Supposedly this is like really good tron because this is like a really fancy box of desserts. And I will say, everything else in this box has been delicious, okay? There's more stuff in here that we can maybe eat in a bit. Really good stuff in the box. But the fact that like two thirds of the box is these two giant thick tronis, like, I just, I would never eat those. I really wouldn't. I don't see how those can be considered like a quality item and they're everywhere. They're everywhere. You can't go anywhere in Peru and not see that stuff. And it's just like, how did we decide that that is like one of our favorite desserts? This stuff is just too much sugar. I'm torn, I'm torn because like, I feel like this belongs in F tier. And I just had a bite of it and it wasn't, I'll say this, it wasn't as bad as a pulpo de olivo. All right? If you gave me a pulpo de olivo, I would not even try it. Tron, I just tried it. It was okay. I mean, it's, I would never get it again, but I'll eat like, I would rather have a causa with mayonnaise than a tron. But I also would not find it absolutely disgusting, which is what I think about F tier. That is a D tier dessert. All right? That's how I feel about it. All right? I don't want that around me. All right? Sorry, no offense. And thank you guys for buying me desserts and I don't want to sound ungrateful. I love everything else in this box. And I knew as soon as I saw the tron, that it was going to, you know, just not be my thing. I'm going to save it, see if I can, maybe one of my neighbors wants it. I don't like wasting food, you know? Somebody else will enjoy it and they can have it. All right. Cow-cow. Dude, I don't, here's the thing. There's certain parts of animals that just don't go well for food. I've had cow-cow before. I don't really see the point of eating tripe for intestines in that way. The only thing intestines are good for is stuffing them with delicious meat and making sausage. That is the only application of intestines that I think is good. All right? So if you're going to give me cow-cow, you better, I mean, you have to do some magic to make that even edible, to even make it like palpable. All right? I don't want this. I don't think cow-cow really deserves to be a popular dish. Look at what they did with antikuchos, all right? They took the beef heart, which isn't a bad ingredient, because it's just muscle, right? Beef is muscle, all right? Some muscles are a little bit more delicious than others. Some have more fat, make some a little tastier. Cow-cow has nothing to offer. It's not a muscle, it's just a chewy thing. And you cover it in a sauce that kind of tastes like intestines. I don't, this is not, to me, a good one. This actually is, I think, F tier. No offense if you like this stuff. Hey, good, somebody got to eat it, you know? Don't waste the parts of the animal. But for me, cow-cow, that's down here with the bulbalo libo, all right? That's how I feel about it. That's out of here, man. I don't want it. No, thank you. All right? Yeah, ew, I tried it a couple of times. Maya, one school, used to serve it at the menu at the school every once in a while. I'd always be like, who is ordering this at a school? What kid wants cow-cow? And nobody ordered it, and it was always there. And I'm like, you guys are just wasting money. Like, what is the deal? Everybody's ordering the other option every single time. No way, dude. All right, finally we're bouncing back with something tasty. We got the papa relleno. Mm, mm. Sa, bro, so. I do like me, a papa relleno. That is a tasty, tasty dish. You know where I like to go get a good one is a cariolo, the antigua taberna, you know? You go to that spot in Pueblo Libre, get that delicious papa relleno. They make it good over there. They make good sandwiches, make good, you know, papa relleno. That's a good quality side dish. I would say if you made it like bigger, this could even be a solid, like, main course. I could enjoy a papa relleno, start to finish, very tasty. Again, we do present the issue of the causa where there is often too much mayonnaise. I hate when I order a papa relleno and they just put the mayonnaise on top. Like, put that crap on the side, okay? Give me freedom of choice. Do not cover a delicious food in something disgusting. But, having said that, mayonnaise is not an integral part of the dish. So, I am not going to count that in my evaluation here. It's not like causa. Causa, you have to have it. It's literally like the thing that keeps it together. So, you have to have it in causa. But, papa relleno, I can tell them yo, leave the mayo out and they'll do it and I'll eat it and it'll be good. The meat, super tasty. We do have a stupid black olive that is hiding inside there. I gotta watch out for that stupid black olive. Again, why do we take a delicious thing and cram stupid stuff into it, all right? Cause there's always that black olive and he's like hiding in the papa relleno and you're just like eating and then all of a sudden you hit the pit of the olive, like the hard part and now you got the black olive taste everywhere and it's like gross and now you're like, ah. So, I always gotta watch out for that. Gotta like eat the dish very carefully and then if I see the stupid black olive, I get them out of there so that I can enjoy the rest of the dish. And yeah, there's a little bit of black olive flavor in that immediate area. But you know, I can get over that, okay? I'm a big boy, all right? I'm a grown man, I can deal with it. I think that this is a strong, strong B-tier item. Like this up here, cause I would get this on the side of my food. Again, kind of in that same territory of these other side dishes, like a leche de tigre, but like for comida creoye, you know? Like I like this around here. I think that's it. I think it's like a solid mid-B-tier, tasty. I will order it from time to time. Gotta watch out for some things I don't like, you know, it's not perfect, but it is pretty good. I think it's pretty solid. Now, we come to a very important dish in Peruvian culture, the ceviche. This is a very colorful picture of ceviche. I'm not sure why Mika chose like the most weirdest looking one. I've never seen Peruvian serve a ceviche with this many colors in it, but we're just gonna, you know, take it like it is, ceviche. Ceviche, ceviche, man. I mean, it is, it is so good. It is, first of all, I love how you managed to figure out a way to take raw fish and turn it into something fricking delicious. Only other culture that has pulled that off is Japan. There's two cultures on this planet that were like, I got raw fish and I've made it good. Watch. Now you take the lemon, you cook the fish. I know technically it's cooking the fish. It's not quite the same as cooking the fish in terms of chemical transformations over heat, but it is cooked fish. It's safe to eat. If you think that ceviche is not safe, you got problems. All right, it is the best thing in the effin' world. It is a quality item that deserves to be a top tier contender. I like that you can get it spicy. Got the camote, you got the, you know, choclo, you got like the yuccas if you want. You get those on there. You get the different, oh man, it's so good. Like I, mm, I just had me some ceviche the other day. Also, very good hangover food, okay? Excellent hangover food. Like you, you know, you hungover, you had a long night out, get up in the morning, go to your ceviche to get your ceviche, hit that. That changes your day. Like it restores your vital energy. It gives you like maximum HP. It is so good. And it just changes my mood for the rest of the day. Like give me ceviche and a beer and I can do anything. All right, I can do anything after that. I like it spicy, you know, I like that ahilemo. I like it when they got that nice like cut of ahilemo and I can just crunch down on that and feel the pain because that reminds me I'm alive. Man, ceviche is really good. I can't think of too many negative things to say about ceviche. I can't really think of anything negative to say about ceviche. Like what's there that's bad about ceviche? I'll wait. Like I don't think there's anything. I don't think you can give me a single negative thing about ceviche. To me, that means it's gotta be up in the top here. This has to, like if I can, I feel like it's up here. It's in this territory, right? So it's gotta, this has to be another S to your dish. Like this is just so, so good. I miss ceviche when I leave Peru. Like when I go to the US, right? And I spend like three or four weeks there with my family. This is what I want that I can't get. I am walking around going man, I wish I could get a ceviche right now. Like oh, it's Sunday, I want a ceviche so bad, you know? And it's so hard to find in most parts of the US and it's, even if you can find it, it's never the same, it's never the same. And it's always expensive. And like here, you know, I can go to the Mercado, get a freaking bang in ceviche on the cheap. And to me, like if I had to live without ceviche, I would be a different, sadder person. It's an S to your food. I think it goes right there. I still think Lomo Saltado like takes the cake. I think just because of the general amazingness that is Lomo Saltado, I feel like ceviche is just right there, you know? But I would put it above my first ever dish seco. I think that's fair. I think that's solid. Man, ooh, buen ceviche, you know? Like there's nothing quite like a really good ceviche. You just, you gotta have it, you know? I feel like it really just makes life better. All right, we get to another staple of the cuisine, the arroz con pollo. Oh man. Esto está bien rico. I mean, who doesn't want arroz con pollo? You know? Me gusta. It's just so good. I like arroz con pollo because it's like, you know, it feels like something mom could have made. Like I like how it doesn't look like anyone really tried. Okay? Like you never get an arroz con pollo with like an amazing presentation. It's just like, here's a pile of green rice. We threw in some things inside the rice and here's a big chunk of chicken on top of it. It's like, it looks like something your mom can make when she forgot to make dinner. Like she's like, oh crap, I only got 20 minutes. Kids are coming over. I gotta make dinner. Dad's almost home. Like can I make this in 20 minutes? Yes, I can. Is it gonna be fricking delicious? Yes it is. Like arroz con pollo, probably one of the best like values in terms of how much time you put into what you get out. Simple dish, delicious results. I like that about it. You know, that's another reason I think ceviche is top tier item. Like ceviche is quick. Also, that's an added bonus point up there. That's the other thing that separates it from the rest of these items. Arroz con pollo. Also, super quality dish. Man, you know, I'll order this anytime it's available. I think that means it does belong in the A tier. I feel like I would still prefer my antique cuchos or jalea first. And I think Tecaneo's versatility gives them the edge but I think it's up here in A tier. Like, it's arroz con pollo, man. What more do you want? It's simple, it's tasty. You know what you're gonna get every single time you get an arroz con pollo. You know what you're gonna get. There is no doubt, there's no mysteries. It's just good and you're gonna enjoy it. Quality food. Quality food. All right, now. What am I looking at on the next thing here? I can't even tell. It looks like some polipo or something. Like some sort of like, I'm just looking at my pictures here, I can't even find it. What am I looking at here? What is this next thing? Okay, oh, this is another. Okay, ceviche de polipo. This is like a polipo thing. Well, I've already said by piece about ceviche in general. I feel like to judge this one separately is kind of a strange thing. I don't know if it needs to be on this list as a separate item. I'll just say this, I like octopus, okay? I think they're tasty. I also like them because they're smart, all right? Octopi are some of the smartest things in the world. They're very intelligent. And so when I eat them, I feel smarter and I like that. I like to eat things that are smart as well, okay? So in general, I think this is a quality option. I don't know that I would put it up like with the classics of ceviche. To me, this is kind of like a, I'm gonna leave this in A tier here because it's still a ceviche. It's still amazing, but it is also like, I would probably get like, you know, chicharron de polipo first, maybe? I don't know, it's good. I'm not gonna spend too much time on that. Choclo con queso. All right, choclo con queso is an interesting case. I like this, all right? It's not a bad dish. The only thing about it is, it does feel very lazy. Like it feels like somebody ran out of food, opened the fridge and was like, all right, all I have is cheese and there's some corn outside. Kids, breakfast is served. Here is your corn and here is your cheese. Like it's the most random combination I've ever seen. Okay, it's just like, here's cheese, here's corn. Like it feels like somebody just randomly picked two things and put them on a plate together. They don't combine in any sort of way. There's not like melted cheese on the corn, you know? It's not like they stuffed the cheese into the corn. It's not like they took the corn off the cob and put it around the cheese. Like it's just cheese and corn. Now, do I like corn? Yes, do I like cheese? Also, yes. Is there anything wrong with cheese and corn? No, at the same time, I don't know that it's something that like, I would reach out and go get, you know? There's other options. Cause I find that usually you get this in the morning. I would rather get like a Pancom Wave-O, you know, from the corner. There's other options that I think would just be better. But like, give me some corn, give me some cheese. I'll eat it. And that's kind of how I feel about my other sea-tier choices. Like it's a good quality sea-tier. Corn and cheese start with C's. This is sea-tier food. It's like, all right. Again, if you give me a plate of chocolate con queso, I'm gonna be happy. I'm gonna be fine with that. No problem, you know? But at one time, now that I think about it, I do have a chocolate con queso story. I do remember once I stayed overnight at a friend's house, or a lady friend's house. And I slept on the couch. I was being a good boy. Her family was there, you know? And I slept on the couch. And in the morning, Dave said, hey, stay and have breakfast with us. I was like, okay, cool. This was very early in my time in Peru. Something I did not fully understand is that breakfast in Peru is not usually very big, you know? Sometimes it is with like chicharrones and stuff. Okay, that's cool. But most of the time, it's like, you know, you do something small for breakfast. I'm a big dude, and I'm American. And we like to start the day right, especially on the weekends. You know, big breakfast. Get the pancakes. Get the eggs. Get the bacon. Get the sausage. Give me all of those things together. Give me some waffles or french toast. Like, we eat breakfast like there's going to be a global famine within the next four hours. And we need all the calories we can get. So I sat down and they served chocolate con queso and some like juice. And I remember thinking like, oh, this must be like the beginning. Like this must be the first thing that they give me. And then something else will come out. Like they will bring out, I don't know, whatever Peruvians do for breakfast. So I ate my chocolate con queso very quickly. You know, I ate it like a very hungry, ravenous man. And I noticed that they seemed uncomfortable. They were kind of like, mm, okay. And everybody else was kind of taking their time, eating their corn, you know, eating their cheese, little bits at a time. And then I had an empty plate within like five minutes. And everybody else was still eating. And they didn't offer me more food. So I was kind of sitting around kind of waiting for more food and there was no more food. And eventually I could tell the mom realized what was going on and she brought me out more chocolate con queso and I ate that again. And that's when I realized, oh, this was all we were going to get today. And that's okay. I know this now. I understand this better today, you know, but at the time I was like, oh, this is like the entrée. It's like the entrada. Where's my Segundo? And there was no Segundo. That was it. Chocolate con queso. Perfectly fine. Not the kind of thing I'm going to order. Not the kind of thing that like, you know, I'm going to get too excited about. I'm like, ooh, it's like, no, I don't, I don't get that hype about that. Rocotto riedo on the other hand. Now this, this is really good. This is really good. All right. This quietly, perhaps one of my favorite dishes in Peru. There's something about it. All right. First of all, I like spicy food. And this is food inside of spicy food. I like when you can eat the container of a food. That's also very cool. Like you ever get a bread bowl? Like if you go to the US, you go to like a Panera, they got the bread bowl and they like put a hole in it and then they put the soup in it and you eat the soup and then you got the bread and you can eat it. And it's like, there's no plate. You know, it's just, this is inside thing. Now yes, I know there's a plate here, but there's food inside of food and I get to eat all the food. That's amazing. First of all, great job. Excellent idea, people. Second thing, my mom used to make something kind of similar actually. Interestingly enough, American food, people always think American food is just like hamburgers and pizzas and stuff. And while that is a lot of our cuisine, most families have like a variety of dishes that they make, which they have inherited from their parents and grandparents. And because the United States is such a diverse country, my mom would make a lot of different things. She made her own sort of saltado, nowhere near as good as Lomo Saltado, but like she made a saltado that was pretty good. She also made a version of a cotterino, like stuffed peppers. Not as good as Peru's, I must say. Love you, mom. Your food's delicious, but Peru got you beat here. And one time I tried to get her to make it their way. Something, we messed up something because like when we put the top on the pepper, the pepper like exploded out the side. I don't know what you guys do to keep the pressure from building up. But to me, you take the meat and all the good stuff that goes into a papel arena, but you don't put the stupid black olive in there. You know, I don't usually see a black olive, my cotterino. And then you got the cotto, which is even better because it's spicy and it's so good. Like the best place for that right there is Maido. All right, if you ever have the opportunity to go to Maido, it's a very fancy restaurant. It's not the kind of place I can go very frequently because it's expensive. But I went to Maido and they have a cotterino and it is just divine. It is just like, oh my God, so good. I could eat these all day. And that I think is another measurement of food. Like would you eat this multiple times in the same day? To me, that is a characteristic of A tier food. Like if you serve me anti-cuchos for lunch and then we go out and there's anti-cuchos for dinner, I'll still eat them. I'd be like, I will eat this twice in one day. You give me tequillos at any time of day, I will eat them. I don't care how many tequillos you give me, I will eat them all day. Give me a jalea in the morning, jalea in the afternoon. I know you can't normally get jalea at night, but if there was like jalea at night, I would eat it. No problem. Chief lays at any time, a roast con pollo at any time, multiple times in the day, no problem. And so I feel like the ricotta relleno belongs in this A tier. It's tempting for me to stick it up in the S tier. I don't think it's S tier quite, it's, I mean it could be considered. It's kind of like at the back end of S tier. I don't know, man. I don't see it enough in Lima because I know it's more like Arquipa food. I wish we had more ricotta relleno laying around. Again, cariolo. I like to get the cariolo, like that's a good spot to get one in Lima, but like, I wish there were more of these. I don't, I don't know that I would put it necessarily up here though with these guys. These are like sacred dishes to me. It's tough to give out that S tier. Do I like ricotta relleno more than I like anticuchos? No. More than jalea? Actually, yeah. I think so. I think that's a really good choice. Dang man, I mean, now I want one of those. Those are so good. Those are beyond delicious. Anybody who tells you otherwise is just wrong. If you can't handle the heat, don't order it, all right? Stronger people can do it. Oh boy. All right, people we're gonna just need a moment, all right, because we're about to talk about one of my favorite dishes of all time. This is easily one of the best dishes in Peru. What am I talking about, ajide, cajina? Esto está bien rico. I'm telling you guys, this is, this is so good. It just, celebrate it. Celebrate the ajide cajina, all right? Boom. Personally, this might be my favorite thing in the country. Okay, ajide cajina is so freaking good. Simple, delicious, consistent, all right? Every single time I get it, it claps, okay? Every single time. I've never had a bad ajide cajina. Never, never, never. Every single time it is absolutely banging. It's simple. And you know what I like? I like how easy it is to eat, because it's almost like somebody chewed it up for you. You know, because the little pieces of chicken, they're just like little pieces. They've been shredded already through the process of making the food. And then like, you know, it's got the creamy ajizas, it's spicy and it's cheesy, but it's like really, really good. And then you put it on top of a bunch of potatoes and rice and like when you are done eating ajide cajina, you feel like you don't need to eat ever again. And you will, but you don't feel it. You're like, I am good, I'm full. I got carbohydrates all over my body. This is why I live. This is good. And yes, yes, there's black olives on the top, but again, pick them off. They're not part of the food. They are a garnish. Since they are a garnish, I can remove them and it does not negatively affect the flavor of the food. And I like that ajide cajina is like not sure if it wants to be a solid or a liquid. It's like, I'm not a liquid. You gotta chew me, you know? But I'm also not a solid. Like you're not gonna cut me open with a knife. All I need is a fork, one instrument and I can just dig in, you know? Which also makes it great for ajide. I like to add ajide to everything, okay? I like spicy food. So I like that I can put the drops, you know, all over my ajide cajina, stir it up and then it changes color a little bit and it gets even better. And like, this is straight up, I will totally drop whatever I am doing for ajide cajina. Like, perfect example. Every day, the menu in my neighborhood sends me a text on WhatsApp and they're like, hey, this is the menu that we have today. Do you want us to bring you something? They do delivery. They started doing this in the pandemic and me, you know, sometimes I look at what's on the menu. Don't see anything too exciting. I say, eh, I'll just make something at home or I'll eat something that I had in the fridge from yesterday, right? But if the lady sends me ajide cajina, we stop what we're doing and we say ajide cajina, yes please. And I don't care if there's leftovers in the fridge. I don't care if someone's gonna invite me out to lunch. I will order that ajide cajina, I will eat it and I will enjoy it and then I will continue with my day. It is just easily one of the best dishes in this country. I think the bigger question now is which of the, where does it belong up here? Because this is S tier food, people. Ajide cajina is S tier food. There's no debate in my mind about that. What I put, I would actually even go as far as to say, I prefer ajide cajina over ceviche. I know it's a hot take. I still don't know that I would put it over lomo saltado, simply because lomo saltado has so many delicious ingredients. It's like I get to have multiple delicious things, but man, oh man, ajide cajina just solves world problems. Like forget about political problems, forget about global hunger, forget about inequality, forget about the climate, ajide cajina, man. That solves all my problems, you know? Esto está bien rico. It really is, it really is. Oh man, oh, so good, so good. Love me some ajide cajina. All right, now we've got another variety of things on the plate. Let me look at this up. It looks like I'm looking at pacha. Yeah, pacha manca. All right, pacha manca, interesting choice. I've had a few pacha mancas. There's a really good spot in La Molina. Also, there's one in La Victoria, I believe. What's that place called? Juancahuasi or something like that, I think. They make really, really good Andean food here. I've had it also up in the mountains on some school trips. I do enjoy some pacha manca, you know? I like the way it's cooked. I think it's very cool, the whole concept of like, let's shove the food in the ground and forget about it for a while, and then we'll come back and it'll be tasty. It has a very unique flavor. I like that. It has a very unique cooking method. I like that too. At the same time, it's the kind of thing that I will never make. I'm never gonna make a pacha manca that's gonna be like really, really good. All right, I don't have a hole in the ground. I live in an apartment. I can't put dirt on the floor and then like put food in the dirt and light a fire in my house. Just can't do it. Maybe I could go out to the park here. Got a park outside my window, but I have a feeling my neighbors would probably call the set in Asgo if I started making pacha manca there. Which doesn't mean that it should be a low tier item. It's just saying, it's the kind of thing that I don't get very often, even though I would like to get it more often. I like pacha manca. It's just, you know, it's hard to get. You gotta go to a place that does it right. You gotta be in an area where they make it. You can't really just get pacha manca anywhere, which is a little bit of a downer. I think this is a solid B tier choice. Like I would, I do order this from time to time. I do enjoy it. I like it. I think that I would definitely put it up above these like other items here. I would even say it sits right up there with that chalfa maybe. Yeah. I would still say Arosco Mariscos before and like the, I would take the seafood before the pacha manca. I think this is up here with that like chalfa and kind of pulgra like it's in that same territory of like good food. Don't get it all the time. It's situational. It's very situational. You're in the right situation, right place, right time, right food. I think that's how I feel. All right. All right. Pretty good. We got more dessert, masamora. Okay. Again guys, Peruvian dessert game has got to improve. I don't really understand what this stuff even is. Like anytime I get it, it's got the strangest consistency. It's, I don't know what form of matter masamora is. I don't, I don't understand it. It's like, it seems liquidy, but then as soon as you try to like scoop any of it out, it's like hanging on to its brother for dear life. You know how like every time you take a spoon of masamora, like the spoon goes in just fine and then you pull up on the spoon and it seems like everything's gonna be okay. But then it's like the bit that's in your spoon just grabs onto the rest and it's like, don't take, no, don't let him take me. Save me, save me purple stuff. And the purple stuff, it hangs on. It's like, I got you, I got you. He won't get you. And then there's like long strings of purple stuff. And the next thing you know, you're like, flinging it all over the place. It makes a mess. It's all sticky. If you get masamora on your fingers, that, your fingers are basically useless now. You have permanently stuck them to things. Like this stuff could be used as like mortar to build a house. You could use it for like all kinds of things, honestly. You could stick stuff to stuff with it. It's extremely sticky. It's very like, I don't know. Oh, is there any kind of teja like a choco teja? I don't see any choco tejas here. I can give you my opinion on those. We could maybe add a couple of things in here. I think, I think we can add, I don't know if I can add stuff in here. That's a good question. I don't, maybe not, maybe not. But I can like, you know, maybe put pictures into my OBS and put them on top here for you. So, yeah, this, I never ordered this. And again, it's like, it's so difficult to eat. And it's like, it tastes fine. I don't dislike the taste, but like, I also don't want to order it. There's other things that are better. I'm like, I feel like it is kind of like the Kui of desserts. It really is. It's the Kui of desserts. It's like, all right, here's a dessert. It's not bad on paper, but then when you realize that like, it's so difficult to eat. And it doesn't really, I don't know, do much for you. It's kind of like, meh, meh. That's the sound it makes. Meh. It's better than Tehron. Doesn't deserve to be in the same categories, Tehron. Tehron needs to be burned. Alfa Hortes, all right, there's, speaking of Alfa Hortes, we have some Alfa Hortes, I think, here in my box. Yeah, yeah, check it out. Um, big, chunky, eh, hang on. Yeah, that's a nice Alfa Horte right there. Um, I like Alfa Hortes. Now, this is a decent quality dessert. This is, this is okay. This is like a cake. The only problem with this, all right, is that Alfa Hortes make a mess, all right? It's like, you take the tiniest bite and now there are 200 million particles of Alfa Hort in the area, all right? Millions of Alfa Hort particles just fall everywhere. You take one bite and just push. You know, have you ever like tried to eat an Alfa Hort when you're out of breath? If you do that, you can die. Okay, I'm convinced that you can die because you could take a deep breath after biting an Alfa Hort and all of the powder, all of the powder sugar, all the powdered cookie will go into your lungs and probably kill you. Like, I literally think you could die from eating Alfa Hortes because of how they pulverize into just like a bajillion little particles and then they make this huge mess all over the place. To me, it is, it is a little excessive in terms of the best. Having said that, I'm eating one right now. I don't know, good, mm-hmm. Also in this, this box came with some strange, green-looking kind of ones, which I haven't tried yet. I don't know what's going on with these. I don't know why they're green. I wanna try a green one, too. Let's see what's up with the green one. Okay, I actually like this even better. Yeah, this is different. This isn't really like an Alfa Hort. Yeah, this box came with some really big giant ones that I ate last night. Like, Alfa Hortes, probably one of the best Peruvian desserts. However, due to its potential for death and the mess that it, because dude, like just, you always get them at like weddings and stuff, too, when you're in your nicest clothes, right? Like you're in a suit and tie or a really nice dress and you have to like eat it like this because you don't want any of it to fall all over you. Like it's impossible to me to eat an Alfa Hort and stay clean. The only way it works is if they were like those really tiny ones and then you can just eat it in one bite. That's how they should be, I think. But then again, I do like the big ones, you know? I like the big one because the big one's got more manjarablanco. It's like a big, thick with triple Cs. That's the good Alfa Hort, you know? But then it's so messy. Look how much powdered sugars on these. These are like, these are just such a mess, you know? And maybe I shouldn't judge food based on that, but I do think you have to take into consideration, you know, the convenience factors of your food. To me, this is by far the best dessert on our list so far. I would say I would definitely get these before I get to be to out of the mania. I would move them up in here. These are, I'm kind of grading these as a dessert, not so much against the other foods here. I'm gonna leave it up ahead of the other dessert. I'm gonna leave it up there. I think that's fair. It's a B tier item. It's good. I will get them from time to time. I enjoy it when someone gives me one. But yeah, they need some improvement, you know? They need some improvement on like just some general flavor things, you know, stuff like that. All right, we're down to our last, what do we get here, about 12, 13 dishes. There's still some really good items on this list. Yo, all right, let's go. We got ta-kat, we got ta-kat with tessina, let's go. I love me some ta-kat with tessina. Oh man, jungle food, all right. Jungle food, I've been to the jungle a few times, all right? I know about the jungle. I like the jungle. I like that it's crazy. I like that crazy stuff happens in the jungle. I like that anything in the jungle can kill you. That's why I like the jungle. Like, I love going to the jungle because you see things that could easily kill you, right? And it reminds you that you are an insignificant being on this planet. You are nothing. I've eaten alligator in the jungle. I like that. Like I said, I like to eat things that are intelligent and I also like to eat things that can kill me. If it can kill me, I wanna eat it because that's how I let them know I'm the boss, all right? I'm the human, you're the animal. Get in my belly. I don't care if you're an apex predator that has been around for 200 million years. You're going in my stomach, all right? And that's why I like the jungle because they're like, here, eat this snake. Here, eat this alligator. Here, eat this deadly insect. Like, the jungle is all about just a war with nature. It's awesome. And then you got, you know, I got you going, Cecina. I mean, it's just a really good dish. First of all, Cecina is like, somebody somehow got the flavor of bacon into a giant, thick piece of meat. I don't understand it. Like, anytime I get Cecina, I'm always like, this tastes like bacon, but it's better because it's bigger. It's not a thin little piece of bacon. This is like thick, chunky bacon. It's delicious. And then, we got the tacacha. All right, look, I've said it before. Banana is objectively the best fruit, you know? So when you get a little bit of banana involved in your food, it's just really, really good. Give me some of those like jungle ahis, you know, and put that in there, and mm, bangin', all right. This food claps. Now, how hard does it clap? I think this claps at your level. This is quality at your food. I go out of my way to get jungle food on occasion. I have been to a few jungle restaurants here in Peru and Lima. I like to go to the jungle. I've been to the jungle on like three separate occasions, I think, yeah. So like, I like it up there. I enjoy their food. I think this is definitely an A tier food. I would say it's like right up around this territory, right in the middle of A tier. I would actually put this ahead of a Roscombe Pollo. Like, don't get me wrong, a Roscombe Pollo's amazing, but like, if you give me the choice, if you say mechim, you can have this delicious plate of jungle food, or you can have some Roscombe Pollo. I think I'm gonna go with the jungle food. Like, I get some banana flavors and some bacon flavors. It's like, two of my favorite things. So, I think that's where that belongs. That is a solid choice. I like it. All right, it looks like I got sanco chalo here. Yes, sanco chalo, nice. Again, soups, you guys have some solid soups. Give you credit. Sanco chalo's a good quality soup. I kind of wish there was like sopa kereoya here, because that's my favorite soup. That is an A tier soup. That is the only soup that I go out of my way to order regularly. Like, I will get a sopa kereoya any day of the week. But sanco chalo's solid. I think that it's like the paparena of soup. You know, it goes right in B tier. It's like, good, you know, it's solid. There's nothing, but there's also like, nothing to write home about. Like, I'm not gonna be like, oh my God, I had the best sanco chalo today. Like, no, like, it's got good stuff in it. There's plenty of nutrition. The flavors don't really do much together. There's just like a bunch of items in a bowl, you know, which is fine, nothing wrong with that. But, I wouldn't rate it higher than mid-B tier. I think that's reasonable. All right, what am I looking at? It looks like, what am I looking at, ribs? I don't know, what am I looking at? Oh, okay, according to my folder gallery, this is piste calopobre. All right, I have a question. Maybe you guys can help me understand this. Why is egg correlated with poverty? Like, alopobre. Like alopobre, first of all, like, who did you do? Why did you decide that this is what the poor people do? Is that really what poor people do? And then second, alacubana is like, even less protein. Like alacubana is like, here's egg, oh yeah. And we put in some banana. Like, which again, banana's the best fruit. So I would definitely get an arroz alacubana before like a arroz alopobre. But like, I feel like alopobre is like, I mean, really, that's all you got is egg. Like, I feel like poor people can find some more food and put in there and make it better. I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm wrong. But like, just seems like a weird way to call it. Now, piste calopobre, to me, if this is how the poor people are eating though, I'm happy with it, it's pretty good. This is another quality, like, menu item. You know, if I'm at the menu and I see piste calopobre, I probably won't get it first, because if I see an ajide gallina, if I see a seco, if I see arroz saltado, I'm gonna get all those things before I get it. If I see an arroz con pollo, I'm gonna get that before I get this, you know? But it's not bad. It's got plenty of protein, plenty of things to eat. Like, this is a solid meal for the day. I would put this up here ahead of the adobo, you know? I think it's kind of there. This also has me thinking like, I'm gonna nudge, I'm gonna nudge kind of put it down a little bit. I think we're gonna move chafa up just a little bit. Like, now that I think about it, I would have chafa before I have carapulco, probably. And then pachamanca too, I like that a lot. But this is a good spot for this, I think, now. So, chafa has been sliding up for you, Paolo. I just want you to know. You know, I do respect chafa. All right, B tier's getting pretty heavy, man. Again, Peruvian food is just overall a very high tier cuisine. I expect the majority of things to be up here in this SAB. Okay, we got like some kind of like konjac negara's kind of thing here. Like some sort of seafood dish. Yeah, like I honestly prefer like American style oysters, like grilled oysters or raw oysters even. That's actually really good. Like if you ever go to the States and go to like an oyster bar, we have some pretty banging like oysters. These guys, I'm not liking how much crap is on them. Like, if you gotta put that much stuff on top of the shell, then maybe it's not that good, you know? Like what's in the shell that I, that's what I want to eat. Like if I get oysters, I just put a little bit of lemon, a little bit of Tabasco, drop it down. Give me 20 of them, put them on ice, bring them to my table, just, but Uncle Larry, you know, love me some Uncle Larry. He makes the hell out of some oysters, right? He goes and gets like clams and oysters. He lives in Virginia Beach, goes and gets them, shucks them, he knows how to crack those shells like in a second. And he puts them on the grill sometimes or he'll just like make them raw. And every time I go over there, it's like my man makes good seafood. And so I feel like these, these is like, he's a sea-tier food, all right? On their own, they're nothing special, covered in a bunch of different vegetables also. Just like, I would much rather have a Roscoe Mariscos, I'd much rather have a ceviche. You know, I'm never gonna order these like on their own, no way. All right, so let's see what we got here. Now we got the tamales. I never understand why they call it tamale when it's a, there's your dad joke of the day. I like tamales. They're pretty solid, your umitas, tamales, like those kinds of things, they're pretty good. Again, they sneak that damn black olive in there every time and it's like, if it weren't for that one stupid black olive, I could enjoy these so much. I would enjoy them for ever and ever and ever. But no, there's gotta be a black olive somewhere in there that's gonna pop out and ruin my day. The other thing about them is like, I feel like they get kind of dry and then like, I'm always really thirsty when I eat these things. Like, I do, again, this is another one of those things where if you give it to me, I'll eat it, but I won't order it on my own. And I think it's a solid sea-tier choice. Like, it's a solid sea-tier. Like, I feel almost bad because I feel like it belongs higher, but maybe it's just not for me. Like, I always feel like the corn part of it, like the mash, the part that goes around it, is like, the masa, is like, very dry, doesn't have a ton of flavor. And then, you know, it's what's inside that I like. I do like the wrappers, you know? I like how it comes in that like, corn leaf wrapper. That's kind of cool. You know, it's an interesting way to like preserve and present food. Um, that's cool. But usually the best ones are in Ika. I haven't tried them in Ika. I've been to Ika many times. I've never had them there. So maybe I'll have to try them next time I go to Ika. I've had good ones. I will say, I have had good tamales. But like, also, just, I don't know, wouldn't be my first choice. Not usually even my second choice. Like, it's a sea-tier food, I think. I think that's a sea-tier food. Not a bad choice, not a bad food, but it's kind of like a sea-tier food. All right, we got some Ikaveche. Ikaveche is pretty good, too. Again, this is that like, this is another one of those like staple, you know, menu foods. Ikaveche is like solid. I like those a lot. I feel like it's in that same neighborhood of like, all right, so really the ones in Lima are worse. That's interesting. I'm gonna take that into consideration for future opportunities. I think like Ikaveche, you know, it would be interesting to just do a menu tier list to really break down all the menu options because man, there's some really good options out there. Ikaveche, to me, is like right in that same territory is like the steak a la pote, you know, like it's a menu item that like, I probably won't order that often. I get it once in a while from my menu. I like it, it's good. Nothing wrong with Ikaveche, but that also like, you know, I mean, it's not my first choice, right? There's so many other, so many other good options to get. Now, we got a Pariwela. I recognize that. Pariwela is probably like my third favorite soup in the history of Peruvian soups. What's up, Sophie, I see you. Pariwela is awesome, right? Like for soup, it goes sopacriolla. I gotta put that in here somewhere. I may start like searching for some other things that we can put in. Sopacriolla, right? Like, okay, best soup by far. It's got beef, it's got egg, it's got like all the nutrition you need. It doesn't have any stupid vegetables that you don't want. It's just a really good soup, tastes delicious, goes well with that heat. Choupe, right there, that's soup number two. That's a quality soup, all right? Choupe de Camarones is just like, fill me up and make me happy, okay? And that's what she said. Now, the other soups we have discussed here, the San Cochal, also a quality soup, nothing wrong with the San Cochal, but I think I would get a Pariwela before I get those, because I like the texture, I like the feel of that liquid, that broth. The Pariwela's got like a nice viscosity, it's got something to it that I think other soups lack. I would say, because I'm gonna put it higher than my San Cochal, I think I'm gonna stick it like right up in here. That's another quality beat your choice. It's, you know, I would never say no to a Pariwela. You know, it's solid. Tidarito! Man, I'm kinda weird on this front. I never get Tidarito, ever, ever. Like I literally never get it. And I think that's not because Tidarito is bad. It's because Ceviche is just so damn good. Like, you know, you go to Ceviche and it's like, they have like 20,000 things on the menu, you know? But you know what you're gonna get when you go there. It's one of like two things. Like, there's so much good food in Peru that you can't even compete. Like, you can be a really good dish and you're still like nothing because there's just so many top tier dishes here. That's the thing that blows my mind. Like, I've lived here for 13 years and there are still a bunch of dishes that I have never tried. And it's not because I think they're bad. It's just because like, there's so many good things that I just want to eat that I want to eat those more. You know? Like, there's only room in my stomach for so many things. And that's what makes it hard sometimes. Like, I look at the sheer variety. Every time my mom comes down here, right? She'll be like, what's this? What's this? Like, she'll go through the whole menu with me and she wants to know like what every single thing is. What up Pedro? What's up, Mr. Fuerte? What's good? You know, like, she always is looking at the whole menu. She asked me to explain what each and every dish is and I realized how difficult it is. I'm like, oh my God, it's taking me like 45 minutes to explain the menu to mom because there's so many good things. And then she's like, well, what would you get? And I was like, well, I only get these five things because I just love these five things and any one of these five things will just make me happy. You know? But she's always like trying to figure out what other good stuff is there. Tidadito is one of those things. Like, that is a really good item of food. If somebody orders a tidadito at the restaurant, I will definitely reach over and be like, give me a piece, you know, give me a piece of that. But will I go and order it myself? No. And the reason is not because I don't like it. It's because there's freakin' ceviche, there's freakin' jalea, there's freakin' arroz comediscos. Like, there's so many other good foods. Why would I order those other things? I just, it doesn't make sense, you know? Like, there's so many other good things that I would get before I get a tidadito. I'm never in the mood for tidadito. You know? Which to me, I think makes it like King of Sea Tier. Like, this is the kind of thing that if you give it to me, I will love it. I will never order it on my own. And that is the key thing for me. Like, the Sea Tier is stuff I never order on my own. I never get it, but I don't mind it, it's fine. And I almost would put it maybe at the bottom of B. I've been very considerate. It is kind of like the adobo of seafood, in a way, for me. Yeah, I think I'm, it's better than all of the other Sea Tier items. It doesn't belong in Sea Tier, but it doesn't come close to what God items are up here. It just doesn't. It's not good enough. Sashimi, man, it's sashimi. And like, that's the other, and that's maybe the other thing too, is like, I like the Japanese style, like just the thin filets, like the way they don't really just put a lot of sauce on them. Here, tidadito, they always gotta put something on it. You know? And it's kind of like, yeah, just leave it alone. You know, it's kind of good without it. All right, we got Juanes. But going back to the jungle. I actually, so here's a funny story. I went to the jungle several years ago with my buddy, Jason. And one of the things we wanted to do on that trip was, you know, just have a good time at the jungle and play a little prank on our boss, right? So we played a prank on our boss where, and I was, here's the thing, I'm a prankster, okay? I like to play jokes on people. And if I do it, it means I love you. All right, because that's the kind of guy I am. I play jokes on people when I care about them, okay? I don't do it to strangers. I don't do it to people I hate. I do it to people I love, because it takes thought and energy. And in this particular occasion, I played a fantastic prank on my boss. So what I did was, when we went to the jungle, I told my boss, I was like, hey, we're going to the jungle, be in Jason. I was like, okay, cool, we're going to the jungle. Be careful out there, guys. And right there, I saw my opportunity. I was like, don't worry, nothing will happen. I'll take good care of Jason. And so I already saw my opportunity. And I told the boss later, I was like, hey, we're going out, we're going to go hit the clubs, go out, have some fun in the jungle, you know? And he was like, okay, okay, all right, be careful. So I'm just letting him know we're going to go out and party. And then I set it up, right? So I get my phone, and I get my buddy Jason's phone. And I have Jason's phone play a bunch of like Rick at Done, and I call my boss. I was like, hey, what's up, boss? I was going, I'm like shouting into the phone. And he's like, what? Oh, are you guys at the Dico Teca? I can hear the music, it sounds good. It's like, yeah, yeah, we're having a good time. It's a lot of fun, a lot of fun. We're having fun. Say hi, Jason. And Jason's like, hey, hey, hey. So, you know, he thinks we're still together. I call him about like 15 minutes later. And I was like, yeah, I love you, buddy. I love you so much. Like, I'm, you know, doing that whole like, oh, you know, when you're drinking, you like start getting friendly. So I do that to my man. And then he's like, he's like, okay, how's Jason? Is he good? I was like, I think so. I haven't seen him in a while, but I think he's okay. So I'm setting it up, right? I'm setting him up to think that something bad is gonna happen to Jason. And then like an hour later, I call him again and I was like, oh my God, he's gone. I can't find him. And then like I call him one more time and I was like, they have him. The police took Jason, you know, they're trying to, you know, extort him or something. So basically I've set this up with like five phone calls over the course of like three days. This has been a very long setup. So the payoff is he is now fully in panic mode. My boss thinks that his employee has been captured by jungle police. Okay? He literally believes this. So I wait for a while and then I call him up and he was like, hey, put me on the phone with the coroner, you know, like give me, give me the most important guy. Like comisario, no, I don't remember. He was like, you gotta get me on the phone with this guy. So I go ahead. I was like, all right, here he is. And I give the phone to Jason. And my boss goes into this full, like five minute, amazing speech of like how he's important and how like this guy is not and how he needs to listen to him. He's like, so you're boy, I am out of the heresy. Don't boy, I'm out of the heresy. Hit it out. Like he was name dropping important people, mini-stadios. Like he was dropping like all the names. And then my buddy Jason just goes, ah, it was great. I tell you that story because when we finished that whole event, as we were laughing our asses off, we were eating Juane's. We got Juane's delivered to the hotel room. We were in our hotel the whole time. We never even went out. We literally just sat in the hotel and played a prank on our boss and had fun. And like, you know, just put on some music, hung out, had some beers and enjoyed some Juane's. Juane's are really good. I think that they are like, yeah, they're just good food. It's also kind of like an arroz compoyo in the jungle. Like I, the thing is they're a little bit awkward, you know? Cause you got like to unwrap them a little bit awkward. They're tasty though. It's good food. I feel like it's kind of like the jungles version of an arroz compoyo or pachamanca. Like it's got that weird preparation. It's got the jungle factor. It's got the arroz compoyo factor. It's got good things going on it. I don't think I would put it down here. It's better than that. To me, it's better than some of these classic menu choices. But again, it's not something I would get very frequently. I think right there. I might get this once a year, maybe, you know? That's a beat your item. The jungle is so much fun guys. I love the jungle. All right, we got guys, we got some bangers. I don't know if you've looked down at the list and seen what is at the bottom here, what is left for me to evaluate, but we have some absolute bangers coming up here. We got some absolute bangers. Esto está bien rico. Juan Caína, fight me. Challenge me on this, please. That is S tier food. I don't care who you are, what you think. Pablo Juan Caína is easily S tier. That is so freaking good. It is the absolute best entrada of all the entradas of Peru. It beats to Caños. It slaps to Caños around. Like, because what do you dip your to Caños in if you want them to be better, Juan Caína? You can add Juan Caína to just about anything and it makes everything else better. You got some pasta, put some Juan Caína in it. You know, you got some extra Juan Caína sauce from your entrada, put that in your segundo. You know, what do you think I do when I order seco? I put the Juan Caína sauce in the seco, on the rice. It makes it all better. Why would I not do that? It's so good. Juan Caína makes everything better. It goes with everything. I cannot think of a situation where I would not want Juan Caína. I could put it on freaking pizza and it would be better. And like, Pablo Juan Caína just makes potatoes better, right? And you get the eggs in there too. You're a little bit of eggs over some extra protein. It's like, oh, Pablo Juan Caína. Like, I would love to have like a bag of Juan Caína just sticking in my vein. Like just stick it right in here and just like take it and squeeze the bag. I mean, it's so good. Juan Caína is clearly the best entrada of all the entradas, definitely. And it is the best addition to any sort of like other dish. Like again, the leftovers, I waste nothing from Pablo Juan Caína. When you serve me a Pablo Juan Caína, the rest of that sauce is going into the next dish. I actually plan what I'm gonna order next based on what combines best with the entrada. Think about that. The entrada dominates the entire meal. It's like, I am so good. I am Juan Caína and I am so good that I will change what you order next because you want to put this sauce on the next thing. That is incredible. It's not just, oh, I'm gonna choose, you know, which entrada do I want with this food? No, no, no, no, no, no. We start with the Juan Caína. We say Juan Caína first and then we go from there. And that is why it is an S to your food. It is a absolute champion of the Peruvian scene. It's proof that even the little guy, you know, can get up there. And think about, when you have to sell it in packets for people, a la cena, like they got, you can buy Juan Caína like made in the store, like just the fact that every store has to have some form of Juan Caína for you to buy says a lot about its power. I mean, it's just, you know, it's an essential item for survival. And I would argue for happiness. I'm pretty sure Juan Caína cures depression. I've had it. And I, the more Juan Caína I have, the less depressed I am. So I think that that makes sense. That's just science. Forget pills, eat more Juan Caína. Like, when are you ever gonna feel sad when you're eating Pablo Juan Caína? When you run out at the very end, that's the only time you feel sad. That is how amazing it is. Pablo Juan Caína people, you know what? It's so good. And then that brings us to an amazing dish, another absolute clapper, just clapping away. Sachi Papas. I am, I have so many thoughts on Sachi Papas guys. First of all, I am disappointed in the United States of America. How did we not think of this sooner? How is it possible that we did not invent this? This is the most American food that Peru has ever produced. It is obviously something that we should have invented first and we did not. And that is proof of Peru's genius and power in the kitchen. All right, because look, what is Sachi Papas? Hot dogs and french fries? That's like two of the most basic American staples. You know how many hot dogs I had when I was a kid? You know how many french fries I had when I was a kid? That was like 70% of my diet as a kid was hot dogs and french fries. Kobayashi, Joey Chesna. Every year we do a hot dog eating contest, okay? We eat 50, 60 hot dogs in minutes. All right, hot dogs are as American as invading third world countries and trying to change their governments. It's like you got to have hot dogs in America and french fries, America, you know, we call them french fries, but they're freedom fries. We know this is America. Every America basically took the french fry and made it a thing. So you have two of the most American foods and nobody thought to put them together. Nobody ever said, let's cut up some hot dogs and put them on some fries. No, but one genius Peruvian, one day, bless his heart, woke up and said, today is the day. I have hot dogs, I have french fries, I should put the hot dogs on the french fries. And then I will cover them in more delicious things. And Salchie Pappas were born and on the day Salchie Pappas were born, the sky opened up, all right? A hole appeared in the clouds and light shone down. All right, that's how it happened. And there's a legend about this, I'm sure. I'm sure like Pacha Mama like brought the hot dogs and whatever somebody else from Incan history grabbed the french fries. Something happened, all right? A condor flew over Machu Picchu and dropped a hot dog onto some french fries. I don't know what the true origin story is, okay? But I'm telling you right now, this is one of the best foods in this country and it is also one of the best achievements because here you took something that was not yours. You took hot dogs and french fries. You took the most American items possible and you found a way to make them both better. And I cannot believe, I am so ashamed of America. How did we not do this sooner? Here's how confident I am about Salchie Pappas people. If a score went out of business tomorrow, you know what I would do? I would go to the United States and I would start a Salchie Pappas restaurant. That's my plan B because I know that the minute I go to the U.S. and I go, hey guys, look what I did. Look, I got hot dogs and I put them on the fries and to la cremas, you know? As soon as I do that, I will be a wealthy man in the United States. I will be rich because Americans will just like, pff, they'll be blown away. And when I tell them that that comes from Peru, it'll blow their mind even more because they don't even know where Peru is. All right, I'm serious. Esto está bien rico. Salchie Pappas, I mean, when are they not good? And the best part about Salchie Pappas is like, you can get the cheapest, most basic Salchie Pappas. It's cheap, it's extremely cheap and it hits the spot every single time. And like, you can make it better if you wanna do like a premium fancy Salchie Pappas with like some chorizo or something. You can. You wanna use like Pappas nativas and something. You can. The base form of Salchie Pappas is already amazing and you can only make it better. You can only make it better. That's what's mind-blowing me. You know, I used to go, when I lived in Linsa, I used to go to Riso and I used to go to like the chicken restaurants right there in Riso and Ataquipa and I would get my Salchie Pappas late at night. And that's something, those places typically are open late. They're the perfect drunk food, perfect hangover food. Good, easy lunch. Like just every single time I get Salchie Pappas, I'm a happier person. And it infuriates me that as an American, I had to come to Peru to get this. How did we miss this opportunity? Yeah, and you can add more things. It's like, it's a foundation and you can build a house on top of that foundation. More things can be added to the Salchie Pappas if you want, if you wanna get creative, you can throw cheese, you can put on bacon. Like you can turn them into chili cheese fries if you want, like Tip Top. Tip Top kinda does that sort of like American style thing, but like, you know, it's just incredible to me. It's incredible to me how you guys thought of this and we did not. And for that, I have to say, I'm extremely proud of Peru. Like you guys, you know, just let me just give you a little, you know, round of applause or something here. I need to give you a round of applause. Hang on, where's my, I don't even have my applause. Like, you know, I don't want to. I need to have like applause, just like. Yeah. There you go, there you go, there you go. Fixed my soundboard, let's go. Clap for Peru. You guys did a good job. Sachi Pappas. This is us to your food. It really is. Look, it's customizable. It's cheap, it's delicious. It can only get better from its basic form and it's probably the most brilliant manipulation of another country's food that I've ever seen. So, to me, it, and yeah, is it healthy? No. Is it good for you? Not at all, but it's effing delicious, man. It's so freaking good. Oh my God. All right. Yeah. See, you've never seen anyone that excited about Sachi Pappas. Few people, few people really understand the value and the greatness, but as an American, I see it, okay? I see it and I appreciate it and it's just, I mean, I don't, look, it's just like, sometimes you see something so beautiful, you know that you're just moved emotionally and that's what I see when I see Sachi Pappas, man. I see something beautiful. I see like, just, I see heaven. I see the face of God in every basket of Sachi Pappas. I'm sorry, you know, oh, okay. All right, picadones, picadones. This is another interesting Peruvian dessert situation where like, I think this is one of the better desserts in the Peruvian dessert pantheon. I like that they're kind of like donuts. I like that they got their like sticky saucy put on them. I like that it's always like an old lady that sells them on the corner of the street. That's also cool to me. I don't know why it's always old ladies, but like it's always old ladies. I've never seen a young dude or like even any kind of dude or even like a young, it's always an old woman selling picadones. All right, that's just facts. When I was doing Boulevard de Asia for score when we were passing out flyers, some lady came up and she was like, you want picadones? And notice it's not like, do you like picadones? It's like, do you want them? Because everybody likes picadones. You're crazy if you don't like picadones. Like, they're just freaking good. And she comes up and she's like, you know, here, here's a bunch of picadones. And I was like, oh, cool. You know? And she's like, that'll be 50 soles for all of these because it's for all of you people. I was like, damn girl, that's an expensive picadones. And we paid her. We didn't even think about it. We were just like, yes, picadones, please. All right. So I think, picadones, they are probably, I still don't think they're an AT or dessert. I don't think you guys have any AT or desserts. I gotta be honest. Again, we fall into the problem of like the mazamora with the stickiness. You gotta have the sauce and they gotta be hot. If the picadones is not hot, then they are no good. Like, picadones start out at like a nuclear temperature and must remain over like 80 degrees. If you get below that temperature, they immediately lose their appeal. So there's a short window of enjoying picadones, like just a little window. But I will say, I think they're the best dessert that you guys have. I think that of all, and I'm gonna put them ahead of like some of the other, you know, I had other desserts here kind of packed together. I'm even gonna nudge these boys up, okay? I'm gonna say like, these guys kind of belong even higher up the tier list because I would actually order these before some of these other dishes in the middle. I would rather have picadones, for example, than a papre jena, or a sancho chal, or whatever. Like, solid food, it's your best dessert. Go with it, all right? And now we're getting down to another one of the final grates. Pollo a la brasa. I mean, what Peruvian food tier list would be complete without Pollo a la Brasa? My people, it is, all right. Here's the thing. First of all, I gotta tell you guys, you need to eat your Pollo a la Brasa from Don Tito. It is the best chicken in Lima. I don't care what people, some people say Parimos. Some people say Gran Hasur. You know, there's always people, they got their chicken restaurants, but look, facts are facts. Don Tito, all right? Here, I'll help you out. Oh, see, let me show you. Let me help you out. I'm not sponsored by Don Tito, although my friend is the owner. But look, you can make your order online. That's, look at that chicken, maybe. Don Tito's chickens go to the gym, all right? And they're like getting buff, all right? They're always like, they're always getting pumped. They got like thick, freaking, you get a chicken breast from Don Tito. You're satisfied for a long time. Delicious fries, excellent ahi. Generous amounts of palta on the salad, okay? You know, it's got history, and there's multiple locations, they do paris. Go to Don Tito, I'm telling you best food, best chicken in Lima. I pretty much don't get any other pollo alabrasa unless I absolutely have to. Like, if you force me to go to another polleria, okay, fine. But Don Tito is my metric. Now, the question is though, where does pollo alabrasa fall on a tier list of Peruvian food? This is tricky, all right? It's tricky because here's the thing. I come from a country where rotisserie chicken, I wanna clarify something. Everybody in Peru thinks that pollo alabrasa only exists here, or that you completely invented the concept. I don't know if that's totally true. Look, here's the thing, guys. All right, I'm gonna be honest with you. It's chicken on a stick that rotates over a fire. Humans have been doing that for tens of thousands of years. Tens of thousands of years. It's not like nobody ever put a chicken on a stick and put it over a fire before Peru, okay? I don't mean to take this away. I'm probably gonna trigger some people. But like, it's not like you invented pollo alabrasa. You didn't invent rotisserie chicken. You perfected it, okay? Understand that, you perfected it. I'm giving you full credit on that. I don't think you can say you truly invented it, but you did perfect it. You took rotisserie chicken and you put it up in its best possible place, okay? So again, you know, just congratulations to Peru. Because here's the thing. Let me tell you what it's like where I come from. Do you know what we got for pollo alabrasa in the United States? We have this hot garbage called Boston Market, okay? Pollo alabrasa in the United States is something that you order when you don't have time to cook and when you're in a hurry, okay? At the supermarket, they usually have like a display of pollo alabrasa that's sitting under a lamp all day. It's gross, it's oily, it's greasy, it's like, ugh. Like it's mushy chicken, it's not tasty. Boston Market was a chain restaurant. I don't even know if it still exists, honestly, because it sucked. And it was like home-cooked meals to go. So they had the pollo alabrasa and they had like mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese, like side dishes and stuff. And like, if mom came home with a rotisserie chicken, it was always kind of like, oh, okay. Like that's how we feel about rotisserie chicken in the United States, because it's such a underdeveloped food. But here, here, I don't know what's going on, but you guys, I don't know if you're putting like the special extra Peruvian powder, you know what I'm saying? Into your chicken, I don't know what you're doing, but your rotisserie chicken claps. It is so incredibly good. I am amazed. When I first came here, I probably went, I must have lived here for like a year without having pollo alabrasa, because I just thought in my head, I was like, what's the point? It's rotisserie chicken. Rotisserie chicken kind of sucks. And then finally, finally someone was like, let's go get chicken. We went to Roque's or whatever. And I was like, dude, this is rotisserie chicken. This is like, how did you do it this way? How is it so good? What is going on in Peru? So like, just an absolutely amazing experience to have pollo alabrasa in this country. I did not know it could be that good. Now, here's the thing. Where does it go on the list? Now, I would get this a lot, you know? And I think for me, I want to use the Don Tito point of reference, but I feel like that's a little bit unfair because that's not the average pollo alabrasa. You know, it's not like I'm only picking the best of the best when I measure these things, right? Cause that's kind of unfair. And Don Tito is in fact, the best of the best. Having said that, even like a B tier pollo alabrasa, like a mid range one is like still pretty freaking good. I mean, the other day I just tried a local place nearby just because I was in a hurry and I wanted to just get it to go. And there's like a place right down the street and it was freaking good. Like pollo alabrasa is always freaking good. I don't think that I can quite put it in S tier. I'll be honest, okay? Cause at the end of the day it's chicken, all right? And chicken is chicken and chicken is good. But like, look at these other things that we got going on here. I mean, we got all these other preparations and combinations and this is chicken on a stick over a fire. It's amazing. I think pollo alabrasa is the undisputed king of A tier. I think it is like the face of A tier. Would I, like I would order it any day of the week? No problem. I might even have it twice in the same day. No problem. But I also don't think that like, if I was given the choice, I would get all these things before. You know, I really would given the choice. I do get don tito a lot. Do love me some don tito. But I think that pollo alabrasa belongs firmly as the top of the A tier. One of your best creations, honestly. Good job, you know? Sa brozo! It's really good. Okay, we're getting down to the very end of this here, people. I'm curious to see if there's an option for me to like add more stuff. But I don't see one, so whatever. Okay, taco taco. Taco taco is another one of my favorite dishes. First of all, I love the name. It's so much fun to say. Taco taco taco taco taco taco taco taco taco taco. Like, how do you not want to order it? I love when I get to order taco taco because I'm so excited to say it, you know? Taco taco. It just comes off the tongue. It feels good to say. It's very satisfying to say taco taco. I recommend you try it. It's good. Try it with me right now. Taco taco. Tell me it doesn't feel good. It's nice crispy sounds, a T and a C like front to the back, front to the back. Taco taco. It really just pops, you know? I love taco taco. Also, it's amazing to me how you managed to take two very basic ingredients and you have put them together in a way that was like delicious. I mean, beans, rice. Two of the simplest, most economical items. And you have found a way to put them together and make something better. Like, the final result is better than either of those two things by themselves. I don't fully understand what sort of magic is going on inside the taco taco because it's like, it's just rice and beans. It's just rice and beans, but it's never just rice and beans, it's freaking delicious. And I'm always like, how is it so good? And it fills you up, you know? It just satisfies at a level that most other things cannot, okay? It satisfies. It's filling. It's tasty. And then, and then, here's the other thing. You can put stuff in it. Versatility. It's like a tequeño. I can stuff it full of mariscos. I can stuff it full of beef. I can put lomo saltado next to it. You know what? I love to get lomo saltado con taco taco. You know, it's like just, how do we make lomo saltado better? Add taco taco. That's the only way you can make lomo saltado better is by bringing taco taco in with it, if you think about it. Taco taco comariscos, even better. Like, taco taco is an upgrade to anything. Be steak con taco taco, better than just be steak. It's always an upgrade. It's always like a freaking delicious meal. It always leaves me so full and so satisfied. At the same time, is there any negative? Really? I can't, I mean, I can't think of a negative. And I feel like every time I get taco taco, I'm happy. Is taco taco, S tier food? Like, I feel like it's too simple to be S tier food. But then you look at stuff like Papua Loongayena's up there and it's cruising. Sachi Pappas is up there and it belongs there. Those foods belong there. I'm torn. It's like on one hand, I kind of want, I kind of want to say taco taco is an S tier food because it works with everything else. It makes everything else better. It's simple and yet amazingly delicious. There's never a bad time for a taco taco. I can't, I can't even find like an argument to put it in A tier. Like, let's just hold it up against things. Like, would I order taco taco before I lay it? Yeah, I would. I would. Would I get it before I get taco taco Saseena? Yeah, I would. Before Cotto Reino? Yeah, also, I would. Anticuchos? It's tough, but like, here's the thing. Taco taco's still really, really good, man. I mean, anticuchos, it's kind of like, all right, you know, might get a little tired of them. Compared to taco taco, I'm going to clean my plate every time. Better than Pollo La Brasa. That's where it gets tricky to me. Like, because I feel like I definitely ordered Pollo La Brasa more than I ordered taco taco. So now we're getting into a bit of a different territory. I don't know that it's fair for me to put this up here. Does this Pollo La Brasa belong, wait, can I get out of here? Oh, I can't seem to put it back down out of the list. It's not F tier, I promise, okay? Does Pollo La Brasa belong in S tier now? Maybe taco taco is the ultimate A tier food and this is S and I've been short changing it. I don't know though, but I feel like, mm, Peruvian food is so good, it's so difficult to make decisions. I'm going to say this, I think it does belong in A tier and I'll tell you why, because here's the thing. What are the best taco taco dishes? Taco taco con, whatever, right? It's never just taco taco, right? If you just give me taco taco, if you give me taco taco comarizcos, con lo mo saltado, like it has to be accompanied by another high quality food in order to go up into that territory. So to me, taco taco does not stand alone as well as any of these other dishes, which makes it an A tier choice. Okay, I think we have the official tier list, people. I noticed a couple of items that were not present that maybe I would have liked to include. Chicharron sandwiches would have been nice to have on here, like Mica, if you're watching this later, I'm not firing you because you didn't do your job well enough, but just saying, feedback, you know? Some chicharron sandwiches would have been nice. I think that's a quality A tier food. I would have liked to have evaluated that. Carlos was asking about chocolate tejas, solid choice. I think I would put those in B tier as well. I think that's like another B tier dessert, right up there with the alfajores. I mean, it is just chocolate with stuff in it, but you know, it's good. I like those. What else? Is there anything else that should have been on here? Cause I'm trying to think like if there's anything. We haven't talked about Pisco. That's an issue. Pisco is, in my opinion, a very high quality in the core. I would still prefer whiskey over that. And speaking of which, I am gonna enjoy some Peruvian whiskey tonight. There's a company called Black Whiskey. Check that out. This guy is making Black Andean Corn Whiskey in Peru. It is excellent whiskey. It's on sale at Wong right now. Go check it out. I feel like there's something I'm forgetting. There's definitely stuff that I'm forgetting here. I mean, there's so much food in this country, you guys. I really want to say we are blessed to live in this country. I love Peru so much. I love eating Peru's food so much. I miss Peruvian food when I go home to the States. Like I try to find Peruvian restaurants while I'm in America, just so I can have like a little taste of Peru. Cause I miss it. I miss it. When I spent like a month in the U.S. last summer, my last destination was Miami. And you know what I did? I went straight to a Peruvian restaurant and I ordered an Ajide Gaena. I was just like, give me a Ajide Gaena, bro. Cause I miss Peruvian food. I was like dying for it. That's how good Ajide Gaena is, by the way, that I will go to another freaking country and order it because I like it that much. That's impressive. I mean, you gotta give it to Peru. So I just want to say people, you know, we got a delicious country's food here. We got amazing cuisine in this country. And you know, I appreciate it very much. It's one of the reasons I originally came here was cause I read that like food is really good here and it's affordable and it is. And it's still, after all these years, I haven't gotten tired of it at all. I still want to keep eating it. Like everything on here, literally everything through C tier, I will eat everything. The only stuff I don't, and even D tier, you saw me eat some Turron today. You saw, I'll take a little bite of Calca, okay? Like even the D tier food of Peru is still not bad. Like that's what's amazing to me. And I've never had a bad prepared dish. Like every place cares about their food. There's this level of care and valuing of food that you just don't get in other places. How is Calca D roll out, bro? Cause it is, it's, look, it's just some potato with some random vegetables and mayonnaise in the middle. Mayonnaise is disgusting, simple as that. Like, come on man. What's really in there that's so good about it? What's so good about Calca? Come on, it's overrated dude. It's so overrated. Um, but like, I know that's gonna be one of the more controversial picks here. But like, that's the thing, when I was in Japan, again, Japan is the only place I can say that truly compares to Peruvian food because in Japan every meal was amazing and everybody cared about the quality of the food. And I see that here. I can go into the cheapest, crappiest menu and you can tell they care about what they're making. Like, and I appreciate that so much that like it doesn't matter whether you're going to a nice restaurant or not, every place cares. Every place puts a lot of effort into their food. And only in Japan, it's the only other place I've ever seen, like in the United States there are restaurants that I will not go to because they're disgusting. And yet, somehow they stay in business. Here, no, every place is good. Every place is fine. You know, nobody's bad. Yeah, no, sorry Rola. I made a case for why I think it belongs there. I personally hate mayonnaise, okay? Mayonnaise is like, blah, disgusting to me. And that's the killer for me with causa. As much as I like the concept, I like other ingredients. It's just not, you know, I don't want it. I don't want a causa. No, there's so many better things here to choose from. Right, why would I order a causa, you know, it's like an entrada when I could get, I'd rather have tamales, you know, I'd rather have, what else we got here? Like, I'd rather have a paparriena any day. I'd rather have tequeños or woncainas and entrada any day. You know, if we're going seafood, give me chifles. Just give me a bowl of chifles. I would rather have that than a causa any day. No questions asked. Like, easy peasy decisions, man. Easy peasy decisions, but y'all are free to disagree. You know, it's okay to be wrong. I don't have a problem with that. Yeah, I'm doing a little like last minute evaluation. I feel pretty good about this. I don't feel like there's anything here that doesn't make sense. Like I got, you know, again, B tier foods are like foods that I order from time to time. I don't get them super frequently, but like I like them and I will eat them. A tier is like, I order this a lot, you know, I get this regularly and I like these a lot. And S tier is like, this is the, I mean the best of the best, right? So that's where we're at. C tier is the stuff that I don't order, but like if you give it to me, I'll eat it. And then D tier is like, I don't wanna see that. And F tier is like, get that out of my face, dude. Like, you know, so that's how I feel. That's where we're at. So anyway, that's all I got for Proving Birthday today, people. I appreciate you hanging out. I'll have to figure out something more fun to do next year. Next week we go back to our usual Thursday programming. I got a video talking about big changes in Denmark. I'm also gonna be talking about sports scholarships soon because I got like some, I'm gonna be recording some people's athletic videos over the weekend. So I'm gonna be recording also some episodes about sports scholarships, about like how you can get them, what you gotta do, how you make a video. So like all those things, that's gonna be coming up. That should be a lot of fun. There's a possibility that I will be in Albuquerque soon. And I'm going to Texas soon as well. So like, I might have some videos coming out of those events. I'm not sure yet. I'm working on that stuff. There's a lot of variables to figure out still. So we'll see how that goes. What else? What else is on the works? I mean like, I'm definitely going to the States in September and we're going to Spain in October. So there's gonna be a ton of university content down the road. For now, we're just like covering some of the things that, you know, how to's little new information that is relevant for the college application world. And you know, we're gonna be getting into some travel later in the second half of the year. I'm looking forward to it. So hopefully you guys will be checking that stuff out. But thank you so much for hanging out and accompanying me on my Peruvian birthday. Salute me familia. Salute me familia. All right guys, I'm logging off. I'm heading out. See you next week.