CEPHALON COOKING SCHOOL TORONTO

(following is quoted from a CNN article):

Fusion in Lima: Machu Picchu can wait

POSTED: CNN, 11:16 p.m. EDT, October 22, 2006

LIMA, Peru (AP) -- The tour buses don't line up outside Javier Wong's place.
His 10-table Sankuay restaurant, steps away from a wide avenue lined with tire and rim vendors in Lima's industrial La Victoria district, is sort of a speakeasy for ceviche, raw fish soaked in lime juice and pepper that is Peru's best-known dish.
Wong prepares a ceviche so striking it is bound to make even the crankiest traveler forget his jet lag and the rows of soot-encrusted buildings around the corner.
Known as Chez Wong by locals, the restaurant is in his three-story home, so don't bother to look for a sign outside. Just say the chef's name when the door cracks open and you get a suspicious look.
There are no menus at Sankuay. Wong, who was born of Chinese ancestry, will
determine your first and second courses with a quick glance at your party.
Peru's sprawling, chaotic capital is for most travelers little more than a launching pad to other destinations like Cuzco, the main stopover en route to Peru's top tourist attraction, Machu Picchu.
But it's worth spending more than the 24 requisite hours in Lima just to sample the
restaurants. This city of 8 million people is a focal point for a cuisine that has exploded in the United States, where Peruvian dishes have appeared in some of the most prestigious food magazines.
Lima chefs like Wong take particular advantage of the high quality and variety of fish that thrive in cold Humbolt Current waters that run northward past the coastal capital. Behind a spotless white counter, wearing his signature woven golf cap, Wong vigorously chops an onion with his US$900 (euro719) Victorinox knife. In a metal bowl he stirs it with cubes of fresh raw flounder, juice from acidic Peruvian limes, aji (Peruvian chilies), salt and ground pepper. He dumps the fragrant mix unceremoniously onto an oval plate. Absent are the traditional ceviche additions of camote (sweet potato) and choclo (corn with huge white kernels). Wong's ceviche is salty and the unorthodox use of ground pepper gives the dish a crunch.
The fish's texture is not lost but enhanced by the juicy mix's strong flavor.
A blue and orange flame encircles his deep paella dish as he shakes a stir-fry of green onions, soy beans, flounder chunks, red peppers and four tablespoons of beer. "Every day you're in the kitchen, you discover something new," Wong says above the sizzle.
The secret to this fusion of Asian and Peruvian cuisine found in fine restaurants
throughout Lima is the country's intricately woven ethnic tapestry. Chinese and Japanese immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th centuries brought with them Asian ingredients, cooking techniques and a new take on traditional dishes, especially on the capital's beloved seafood plates.

It's 100 degrees out today, and to cook with cast iron I MUST have all my windows open. Did that stop me? Ha!

I got wind that there was some fish market that just opened up by my apartment, so I decided to walk down and check it out. (Again, in 100 degree heat.) I was pretty disappoined by Succulent Seafood. They had a ton of frozen stuff, but their fresh fish counter was smaller than a normal grocery store. The "fishmonger" working there seemed fairly confused when I started asking specific questions. (I have fishmonger in quotes, because calling someone a fishmonger implies they have a certain expertise in the field.)

They did have fresh "exotic" fish, which was kind of cool I suppose. Everything fresh was very expensive, and I didn't want to buy $20 worth of fish and mess is up since I've never cooked something like giant sea bass before. So, I settled with the Walleye Pike filet and went home- since most white fish cooks about the same.

I breaded it in world-famous Panko bread crumbs with a ton of pepper, some salt, and a hint of chili powder and ground red pepper just for fun. I just bought a 14 inch cast iron skillet a few days ago, and have been excited to use it. Everything probably would have cooked a little more even in my hard anodized pans, but that's nowhere near as much fun as filling your apartment with smokey cast iron goodness.

Meanwhile, I used some leftover potatoes and garlic I had sitting around that I were scared were going to go bad soon, so I mashed them up Alton Brown style. He peels the regular potatoes (or in my case, Yukon Golds) for mashing, then keeps red potatoes with the skin on and cut up in to smaller chunks to give the potatoes some texture. The potatoes took way less time to cook than I thought they would, so I experimented with fluffing them with a fork to give them some ridges, then throwing them under the broiler. The fish was still taking longer to cook, so I tossed some mozzarella cheese on top with some parsley flakes and put them back under the broiler.

And just because I'm trying to clear my freezer out of the weird bags of frozen vegetables I bought months ago when they were 10 for $10, I made some lima beans with enough butter to cause two heart attacks.

Oh, and I've been all about every form of green tea possible lately, so I had some iced green tea with my dinner to use up the rest of the lemon.