The Peruvian restaurant Inka Heritage is perfectly placed in Madison’s most diverse neighborhood. Inka Heritage opened in 2007 at 602 South Park Street and quickly became a favorite in a neighborhood populated by a variety of Italian, Asian, and Mexican restaurants and markets. In fact, Inka Heritage won this year’s Best of Madison award in the “Best Latin American cuisine” category, and the New York Times has called it “one of the brighter spots on the city’s culinary scene.”
Inka Heritage is a small space made welcoming with its bright orange walls and relaxed-yet-sophisticated atmosphere. It’s run by a husband-and-wife team, both originally from Peru. Owner Daniel Rodriguez is from Loreto, in the Amazon rainforest. Head chef Esmerelda Bascones was born and raised in Lima, Peru’s capital and biggest city.
Bascones graduated from Le Cordon Bleu as a pastry chef. According to the Inka Heritage website, she combines traditional Peruvian cuisine with complex pastry techniques.
So what is traditional Peruvian cuisine? Don’t feel bad if you don’t know. (We didn’t, either.) That’s what great about Inka Heritage–it offers a bit of an education along with a delicious menu.
Potatoes are the most traditional Incan ingredient, which maybe doesn’t sound extremely exciting at first. But did you know that the Incas in Peru were likely the first civilization to cultivate the potato? And did you know that there is a dispute between Peru and Chile about which lays claim to having cultivated the ancestor of all of today’s modern potatoes? (It might be both, according to this article in Science magazine, tantalizingly titled “The Secret History of Potatoes.” National disputes and secret histories? Potatoes are starting to sound a little more exciting, aren’t they?)
Of course, things have changed a bit since the Incas. Inka Heritage owner Daniel Rodriguez has described modern Peruvian cuisine as a “post-conquest mix: Inca with Spanish, Japanese and Chinese influences.” Which means Inka Heritage is in the most perfect location possible, with Ichiban, a Chinese restaurant and Edo, a Japanese restaurant as its next-door neighbors. One of Madison’s best Mexican restaurants, Taqueria Guadalajara, is just a few blocks away.
Besides potatoes, you’ll find many popular Peruvian dishes on the menu, including many kinds of ceviche (fresh, raw white fish marinated in citrus juice, which Peru claims as its national dish) and the restaurant’s specialty, “Pollo a la Brassa,” which is a slow-roasted Peruvian chicken. The menu claims it as “our famous but secret recipe.” (First secret potato histories, and now secret chicken recipes? Oh, the intrigue!)
A popular drink is the chicha morada. It’s a dark purple, nonalcoholic, corn-based beverage. According to Rodriguez, the Incas drank it to lower blood pressure. Inka Heritage lists the ingredients as purple corn with pineapple, apple water, cinnamon, and lime. And for those who prefer something a bit more alcoholic, the menu also offers Pisco Sours, a popular drink throughout South America.
And what about those complex pastry techniques Bascones learned at Le Cordon Bleu? Don’t worry. We’re not going to mention pastries without delivering a little more detail. Inka Heritage offers several on its menu, including tres leches, which is sponge cake soaked in three kinds of milk, and suspiro a la limena, which consists of a creamy, caramel-like base topped with meringue and can be translated as “the sigh of a woman (from Lima).”
We’re quite certain that sighs of both genders (from Madison) can be heard coming from the small orange space on a daily basis. And while a few may be sighs of dismay due to the busy traffic on Park Street that’s just a few feet from the front door, we’re quite certain that most are sighs of delight from the delicious (and educational) dishes being served.
