Cusco Day Uno Part II : Pork, pork, alpaca and baked goodness!

I decided to head back to the hotel and get some rest and see what else I could find and then I found a street that I have heard about from a previous read and thought was a myth and I will now call, chicharron alley. 

 I know delicious in other languages too!
 
This street, which was really called Ave. San Andres is a non-descript and really had nothing going on except from about noon to 4pm these hole-in-the-wall restaurants set up the fryers near the door and the perfume of fried pork clot the air advertising their tasty offerings. 

 Stopped me dead in my tracks

 

I picked the one that had the most people and ordered some food. I made one mistake. I did not take a picture of the chicharrons before I devoured it. It was a piece of crispy pork belly and it was served with the roasted corn kernels you find all over the place. Unfortunately for you, you will not get a picture of it but fortunately for me, I have the image and the taste imprinted in my mind. I also tried adobo which is a soup that is made with pork. It was sour and you got a big hunk of pork and a roll to dip in the soup. It was flavorful and the pork was still tender and juicy. 

 Adobo, so, so good!

 

Those pots hold pure awesomeness...porky awesomeness. The lady is the pork awesomeness conductor 

Dinner that night, I guess I was still on a carnivore high, I decided I was in the mood for alpaca, which is llama for us gringos. I went to eat at Kuikuy and got myself an order of alpaca. 

Alpaca and sides of starches

The dish came with 2 roasted potatoes and a side of what I could tell was a Peruvian version of creamed corn. The alpaca was cooked well done but it was still moist and tender. I expected it to be gamey and tough but it was surprisingly tender. From the looks of it if you did not tell me that was alpaca I would have guess that they gave me a skirt or flank steak. So what does llama taste like? No it did not taste like chicken. It tasted like of beefy lamb without any gaminess to it. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It came with a side of salsa criolla, which is a slightly spicy condiment of red peppers, aji peppers, onions and vinegar. It is a condiment that balances out the richness and of course, a bit of a kick to any dish. 

 Salsa criolla

Me being on vacation, I turn into Fatty Mcphee and I was still hungry and want to eat everything in site. I wanted something sweet and there are no cupcake shops around here. Apparently trend has not caught on here but I am sure a Crumbs will be there by 2012. I saw kids and people just walking around with plates of cake. So like usual, I walked around until I saw a fairly crowded shop and got myself a piece of cake that everyone seemed to be walking around and chowing down on. I realized that others were also getting empanadas here so I got myself cake and empanada. I guess this became supper/late night snack/just me being a fatty.

Beef Bomb aka carne empanada

I got a carne empanada which was an empanada that was filled with ground beef, onions and slices of hard boiled egg. It was good but it was a hefty sucker. One or two of these things were a meal on its own and tasty meal. The cake itself was a basic vanilla cake with frosting and a bottom layer was jello.

Jello and cake together?

It reminded me of the cakes I see in Chinese bakeries, they looked pretty but overall, tasted alright and was not really transcendental eating. It satisfied a sugar craving, but cool eating cake and jello, I mean you can not really go wrong with that combination. Overall, I had a great first day of eating and still had another day to chow down before I went hiking and I was excited to eating more and meet people. I came to Cusco thinking that there would be nothing that interesting there but left wanting to stay longer. Up next, Cusco Day Dos: Tamale chowdown, fancy fusion and saucy chicken.