Talking Traditional Chilean Food with Juan Manuel Pena Passaro

Juan Manuel Pena Passaro is an Argentine chef, whose popular Santiago, Chile restaurant, Peumayén serves pre-Hispanic food from indigenous Chilean cultures, from the north and south of the country, as well as Rapa Nui (Easter Island). 

“I like traditional food, and I like it cooked traditionally.” This is what Pena, originally from Buenos Aires tells me, as we talk in the spacious garden section of Peumayén, which means “dreamed of place” in Mapundungún, the language of the Mapuche people from the south of Chile. The restaurant serves what he calls “ancestral food” in Bellavista, one of the capital city’s busiest neighborhoods for nightlife.

It might seem surprising that a chef cooking food from the indigenous traditions of the north, south, and Rapa Nui in Santiago is neither indigenous, nor Chilean. But Pena has been cooking in other people’s kitchens since his late teens, when he made his way backpacking around Argentina by treque, that is, trading cooking for families in return for a place to sleep.

Dinner at Peumayén starts with the panera, or bread course. It comes on a long rustic board that has several examples of breads and bread-like items from the Aymara culture from the north of Chile, to the Mapuche culture in the south, and, along the way, takes a quick dip out to Rapa Nui, Chile’s little slice of Polynesia, which is about five hours away by plane.

Next, Pena shares his inspiration… 

There is the thick flour tortilla-like calatanta, which is a simple dough cooked on a hot rock, and po’e, a firm square of starchy banana pudding from Polynesia. And there are two versions of milloquínes, which are colorful balls of bean pureé, that he’s seasoned with onion, cilantro and lemon juice, and which you can pick up with your hands and pop into your mouth.

One of the things I like about the food at Peumayén, I tell him, is that it’s food I wouldn’t make at home. I’m thinking of the dish I had several months ago, of southern hake with a cilantro-gevuina (Chilean hazelnut, which is actually from an evergreen tree) crust over a crab reduction.

“Even if you were Chilean,” he says, “you wouldn’t be able to, because there are products that come from the north, from the south from Rapa Nui, from everywhere. Sometimes they’re difficult to obtain, sometimes impossible.”

If not the ingredients from my fish dish, he might be talking about algarrobina, a syrup from a the black carob tree, which shows up his pork rib glaze, or a type of freeze-dried potato that’s part of a spicy rabbit stew, or the fresh sprig of chascú (a kind of savory) that sits atop a sauce, or lamb tongue. Or the herbs rica rica or huacatay (black mint) that might flavor your pre-meal pisco sour.

So how does he source these far-away ingredients? “They’re not businesses that I call, they’re people,” he said. At a certain time of year, he knows that, for example, he has to talk to Tariki, one of his providers on Rapa Nui. “Technology is amazing,” he says, musing that the Chilean ancestors could never imagine shipping a food product 2000 km away, never mind how they would have coordinated it. For his part? Like nearly everyone in Chile, he uses the free messaging service Whatsapp.

Next, get a taste of what Pena is cooking up…

And Pena puts together these far flung producs to yield traditional meals. There is a little bit of theater, sure. But nothing molecular. “That’s not my style,” he explains. His main concessions to modernity, include ovens and mixers, but mainly for practical reasons. And hygiene. “I’m not I’m not going to leave the meat with 200 million flies flying around,” he says. But he’ll stay traditional, if he can, in that if a traditional preparation for a rough-cut of onions, he’ll do that, as opposed to delicately slicing the onion into even slices, despite his rigorous training.

And how does the design of the dishes work?

“From the beginning, I design the dish, but I give the people in the kitchen freedom, we work as a team. It would be impossible for me to say I do it all. It would be a lie, for example, I couldn’t be sitting here right now with you,” he said. “Sometimes in the kitchen, someone will have an idea, that their grandmother cooked it a certain way, and I say, ‘let’s go’. “

Although it was never his intention, some 80% of the people that eat at Peumayén are foreigners. But though many Chileans may be somewhat familiar with food products from the south (like the myrtle berry) other products, like the cactus fruit ocopa are less known, even to locals. Each dish is described in brief, as it comes to the table. Pena would love to educate people more about the ingredients. “In the future, Peumayen will probably feature more of that,” he said, “for version 2.0.”

One of the keys to Penas’ success is that he’s patient. He came to Chile as a traveler, he says, but then he ended up staying, and has now been here ten years. “I’ve been cooking in Chile for a long time. People know me, and have a favorable view of my work.”

He acknowledges that that kind of slow entry into Chilean cuisine was necessary, to fit in with the culinary culture.

“If I’d arrived here in Chile, and the same day, opened Peumayén, they’d have strung me up in the Plaza de Armas,” he said. “But my entry into this group was slow, very slow, and with a lot of respect. There were no surprises. Today I have the vision of an Argentine but the heart of a Chilean.”

Get a taste of what Pena is dishing out at his restaurant, with his recipe for Milloquín. 

Milloquín

• 2 cups cooked white beans or split peas, well-drained
• 3 tablespoons minced red onion
• 2 tablespoons minced cilantro leaves
• 2 teaspoons lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Get the full recipe.