Central, Lima

I spent two weeks in Peru chasing Patagonian light and made a detour to Lima specifically for dinner at Central. Virgilio Martínez's tasting menu is organized by altitude — each course represents an ecosystem at a specific elevation, from minus 10 metres at the ocean floor to 4,100 metres in the Andean highlands. We worked our way up through the levels: black clams and sea cucumber from the deep Pacific, corn and quinoa from the coastal valleys, freeze-dried potato and llama from the altiplano. The altitude dessert course — ingredients from 4,100m — featured a sweet made from mountain herbs I've never tasted anywhere else. The kitchen is open and the team is almost entirely Peruvian. This is food as geography. The complexity of flavours building across four hours gave me the same feeling I get watching a mountain range come into view on a long approach — something earned and enormous. Dinner runs about $200pp with the beverage pairing.