By Robin Garr
LouisvilleHotBytes.com
Not that many years ago, we didn’t have many Hispanic neighbors around Louisville, and the puny quality of our Mexican restaurant scene reflected that deficit. But times have surely changed!
Nowadays, more than 30,000 Louisville Metro residents boast Hispanic ancestry, according to the U.S. Census and the Statistical Atlas of the United States. More than 40% of those list Mexican ancestry, and another 30% trace their birth or their roots to Cuba, making Louisville one of the nation’s top ten Cuban cities.
Where’s Peru? The ancient home of the Incas, tourist destination for Machu Picchu, the Amazon, and the Andes, Peru ranks well down the local list. But more than 500 of our neighbors list Peruvian birth or ancestry, and that’s enough to hold a heck of a party … and to support a few really good restaurants.
I’ve got a couple of new Peruvian eateries on my to-do list. This week, let’s celebrate Friend’s Fusion, a Peruvian dining room that opened just last month in a short strip center across Westport Road from the Ford Kentucky Truck Plant.
That location is no coincidence: For three years or more, owners Saul Terry and Yolanda Barahona have operated their business as a food truck, offering lunch-break Peruvian specialties along with Mexican-flavored tacos, burritos, and more to hungry Ford-plant workers.
The restaurant represents the culmination of their dream, and it’s a winner: bright and cheerful, with white walls and red accents evoking the colors of the Peruvian flag, and a colorful wall mural depicting ancient rock carvings, farms and forests, and historic Spanish colonial cathedrals.
The potato may have originated in Peru, and corn too. With its long Pacific coastline providing a world of seafood and fish, Peru stakes its claim as the originator of ceviche, although that gets plenty of pushback from Ecuador, Chile, and Mexico.
What’s more, Peru is home to a large Chinese and Japanese community that dates back to 19th century immigration. Over the years, fried rice, stir-frying (“saltado”), and the flavors of soy sauce, ginger, and garlic have become integral to Peruvian cuisine.
Friend’s Fusion draws its name from this historic fusion, and its menu reflects all that. Fifteen appetizers, ceviches, and soups range in price from $7 (for tamales with Peruvian aji amarillo spice and pork belly) to $20 (for Tallarines a la Huancaína con Lomo, a pasta dish with steak and cheesy Huancaína sauce).
Twenty Peruvian and Peruvian-Asian fusion dishes – four of them available only on weekends – are priced from $4.75 (for one steak lomo saltado taco, but we’ll bet you can’t eat just one) to $25 (for bisteck a lo pobre, a classic Peruvian dish of steak, eggs, and rice).
The room is set with undraped tables and simple chairs, but table service boasts good stoneware plates and heavy stainless flatware. Small paper napkins are more basic, but they’re plentiful and get the job done. Service by the host was helpful and friendly, and I was delighted that she eagerly welcomed my awkward attempts to converse with her in Spanish.
Even the complementary chips and salsa get a Peruvian spin, with a bowl of bite-size, thick but crunchy, and intensely corn-flavor chips served with a small dish of gently spicy pink salsa that carried a mild Peruvian aji amarillo flavor.
The food was uniformly delicious without a perceptible flaw.
An appetizer, Papa a La Huancaína ($8), traces its roots to the Huancayo region high in Peru’s central Andes. Beautifully arranged on a white oval plate, this preparation started with thick slices of perfectly textured, pure white waxy potatoes, neatly arranged atop fresh, dark green romaine leaves, topped with hard-boiled egg slices, pitted Kalamata olives, and snipped scallions, then slathered in Huancaína sauce, a bright-yellow, creamy mix of Peruvian aji amarillo, dairy, and queso fresco.
A ceviche choice, Leche de Tigre ($13), means “tiger’s milk” in Spanish, and it’s easy to imagine a baby tiger growing strong on this aromatic concoction. A smooth blend of lemon juice, finely chopped onion and celery, yellow Peruvian aji amarillo peppers, and spices, this potent potion is used to “cook” pieces of mah-mahi fish. The mild, firm fish, the gently spicy tiger’s milk, and two kinds of corn kernels to add texture all fill a tall glass-handled goblet that’s garnished with a large cooked shrimp and two crispy strips of cooked plantain.
A Peruvian-Chinese fusion dish, Arroz Chaufa (pictured at the top of this page), is available with seafood ($18), beef ($16), chicken ($14), a combination ($19.50), or a meatless veggie mix ($11.99). It was colorful and attractive, and it tasted as good as it looked. Perfectly prepared short-grain rice was tinted orange with mild yellow aji amarillo and spicy red rocotto peppers, scented with ginger and soy, and was mixed in a resounding flavor symphony with red, orange, and green peppers, perfectly diced carrots, onions, and fresh spinach leaves.
An excellent lunch for two totaled $34.97, plus an $8.25 tip. The friendly Spanish lessons were free.
Friend’s Fusion
4111 Murphy Lane
384-3925
friendsfusionfood.com
Facebook: bit.ly/FriendsFusion
instagram.com/friend_fusion2022
Noise Level: Happy South-of-the-Border music on the sound system boosts the fun quotient without hampering conversation. Average sound level was 5dB.
Accessibility: The restaurant appears accessible to wheelchair users, but the front door is heavy, and we couldn’t spot a curb ramp nearby.
