Panchita

An anticuchería reinvented, in 2009

According to the restaurant’s website, Panchita opened in Miraflores “one summer in 2009”, then in Chacarilla (San Borja) and in Santiago de Chile. The website’s footer links it to the Acurio Restaurants group; Wikipedia places Gastón Acurio’s project in the same year: taking up the idea of neighbourhood anticucherías and rediscovering old criollo recipes. The restaurant presents itself as a tribute to Lima’s traditional cooking, generous and family-style.

Reading the menu, family by family

• Starters and piqueos: tamalito verde, papa a la huancaína (potato, cheese and yellow chilli sauce), ocopa (peanut and huacatay herb sauce), papa rellena, causa, cebiche limeño; and platters, including the Doña Pancha, which brings together about ten of these bites.
• Soups: sopa criolla, chicken aguadito, as an individual portion or to share.
• Criollo dishes: ají de gallina, olluquito con charqui (an Andean tuber and dried meat), tripe cau cau, chanfainita, patita con maní; then the heartier dishes: seco of asado de tira, northern-style cabrito, and the jarana limeña, a platter of eight criollo dishes.
• Stir-fries and rice dishes: lomo saltado, tacu tacu (rice and bean cake), arroz con pato, chaufas.
• The grill: beef heart, chicken and octopus anticuchos; grilled offal; meats by the cut.
• Lima desserts: picarones, suspiro a la limeña, mazamorra morada and arroz con leche.

Anticuchos, and the month of October

An anticucho is a grilled skewer; in Peru, it is mostly made with marinated beef heart. Wikipedia recalls its link with colonial Lima, where offal was left to enslaved Africans, and its place in October, the month of the Señor de los Milagros processions, along with picarones, squash and sweet potato doughnuts in syrup. At Panchita, the plate of beef heart anticuchos costs S/ 49.

Prices that include service, portions to share

The menu states that all its prices, in soles, include taxes and the “recargo al consumo”, the service charge. Several dishes come in two sizes: the sopa criolla costs S/ 32 as an individual portion and a little more to share. With four people, a platter and two or three dishes in the middle of the table let you taste more than four individual plates.

For comparison: the lomo saltado costs S/ 88 here and S/ 55 at the Antigua Taberna Queirolo, whose menu is not dated. The two restaurants serve neither the same portion nor the same setting.

Two branches in Lima

The original branch is in Miraflores, Calle 2 de Mayo 298, a few streets from Kennedy Park. The second, known as “Chacarilla”, is at Av. Primavera 557, in the district of San Borja (and not in Surco, despite the name of the neighbouring shopping area): convenient if you are staying in San Isidro, San Borja or Surco. Both publish the same opening hours, but confirm the menu of the day on site. For a table with more varied cravings, see also Tanta, from the same restaurant group, and our twelve places in Lima.

Going further

See dishes to discover, cuy before ordering the fried guinea pig on the menu, and real prices for other costed meals.

A typical meal, based on the menu

Our suggestion

A meal of criollo cooking with several people, ordering for the middle of the table: a platter of starters, two slow-cooked dishes and a plate of anticuchos, as in a neighbourhood anticuchería, but with a booking.

What to ask before you go

• The size of the portions: the papa a la huancaína and the causa are announced as “to share”, the lomo saltado as a “generous portion”.
• The fish of the day for the cebiche limeño, and the dishes with the most chilli (rocoto, ají).
• Booking: the website sends you to an online booking platform for Miraflores and Chacarilla.

Have the opening hours, a dish or a price changed? Let us know and we will correct this page.