Maido: Lima

Nikkei food is the Peruvian-Japanese cultural blend that has emerged from more than 100 years of Japanese immigration into Peru. The Miraflores restaurant Maido is widely regarded as the place to find the finest execution of the cuisine, led by its leading proponent: twinkly-eyed Lima-born chef Mitsuharu Tsumura.

Tsumura studied in the US and trained in Japan before opening the restaurant aged just 28. Located on the first floor of a modern building, the restaurant’s clean Asian lines and wood-and-paper screens hark back to the land of the chef’s forefathers. Sit up at the bar where you can watch the brigade at work, or at one of the modest tables, and choose from either a relatively simple Japanese menu, with expertly tuned nigiri made with Peru’s first quality fish, or the full 15-course Nikkei version.

Dishes on the latter combine Japanese delicacy with Peruvian indigenous ingredients to spectacular effect, with creations such as grilled octopus, botija olives, tofu and crispy black quinoa and confit of guinea pig with molle pepper, chilled harusame noodles with sanbaizu and rocoto. Finish with milk ice cream scattered with cushuro, a spherical tapioca-like algae that grows in the high lakes of the Andes. You don’t get much more Peruvian than that.