Author and Photographer: Shivam Gupta

Price: $$$$

Dishes to try: Classic Pisco Sour, Cebiche Trio, Cordero Norteno, Tres Leches

Location: River North

Tanta Chicago, a restaurant located in River North, is a culinary gem that offers its guests a wonderful exploration of the cuisine and culture of Peru. Led by the esteemed chefs Gastón Acurio and Roberto Rocha, Tanta captures the lively atmosphere and intricate flavors one would expect to find on the bustling streets of Lima. At first glance, the restaurant immediately stands out. Its vibrancy is second to none, and it makes for an incredibly welcoming restaurant experience. As soon as you enter the establishment, its colorful paintings and lively music instantly transport you to South America.

Peruvian cuisine is complex, since it incorporates a variety of foods from around the world. Tanta brilliantly showcases the local flavors of Peru while also highlighting its influences from Spain, the Middle East, Japan, China, and more. Beyond the delicious flavors of the meat, fish, vegetables, and sauces themselves, I think one of the coolest things about Peruvian food is the contrast and complexity of flavor combinations within the dishes - salty brine balanced by sweet corn, fatty meat balanced by an acidic dressing, tender white fish elevated by a citrusy leche de tigre. In her 2017 cookbook titled “Salt Fat Acid Heat,” Samin Nosrat discusses the importance of the four mentioned flavors in cooking. I believe Chefs Acurio and Rocha at Tanta Chicago have mastered all four elements in their intricate presentation of Peruvian cuisine. Tanta highlights the interplay between these contrasting flavors, with a particular emphasis on acid, to produce dishes that are much greater than the sum of their parts. I recommend Tanta Chicago not just to people who want to try Peruvian food but also to anyone interested in cooking and experimenting with flavors.

Cocktails and Starters

We started our exploration of Peruvian cuisine by ordering the Classic Pisco Sour - the national drink of Peru and arguably the most popular item at Tanta. The cocktail consists merely of Pisco (a type of grape brandy local to Peru and Chile), lime juice, simple syrup, and egg white, which are all then shaken to give it a velvety smooth consistency. The shaken egg white produces a thick foam, and once topped with aromatic bitters, it creates a cocktail that smells just as complex and refreshing as it tastes. The Pisco Sour is simple and highlights the tangy, herbal, and mildly sweet flavors of Pisco - serving as an excellent introduction to the bright, acidic component of the cebiches that follow, and whose sharpness cuts through the fatty flavors of the more meat-heavy main dishes.

Our starter for the evening was the Pollo Anticuchos, a common street food in Lima. The dish consists of grilled chicken skewers brushed with a bright, garlicky anticuchera sauce and a creamy polleria sauce and served with roasted fingerling potatoes and a large-kerneled Peruvian variety of corn called choclo. I found this to be a great appetizer to go along with the drink. The chicken was juicy, its marinade was bright and balanced well by a flavorful sauce, and the crunchy potatoes and sweet corn on the side paired well with the tender meat. I found this dish to be ordinary on its own, but excellent as a precursor to cebiche, and it certainly set a high bar for the rest of the meal.

Cebiche Bar

When I first heard about Tanta, I was most excited to try the various cebiche dishes they offer (spelled with a b at Tanta). I love ceviche, so ordering the sampler here was a must. Typically, a Latin American ceviche consists of raw fish marinated in citrus juice, among other add-ons. Tanta uses this basic structure to present three cebiches with strikingly different flavor profiles. We were given mini portions of their three famous dishes, the Clásico, Nikkei, and Limeño cebiches. The Clásico combined white fish, a citrusy leche de tigre, evaporated milk, and a variety of vegetables such as choclo and sweet potato to create a sweet, salty, acidic, and texturally unique appetizer that Samin Nusrat would certainly be proud to serve. I would describe this dish and the ones that follow as overwhelmingly flavorful in the best way possible. Each bite of the Clásico introduces a new flavor and texture, and comes together with the leche de tigre base. Nikkei, the next cebiche, draws from the Japanese diaspora in Latin America by incorporating common Japanese ingredients in Peruvian cuisine like avocado, cucumber, tuna, a Japanese leche de tigre with soy sauce, nori, sesame seeds, and pickled daikon. Although the content of the ingredients is completely different from that of the Clásico, its similarities were incredibly surprising. There were similar contrasts in flavor, but different flavors themselves - like looking at two paintings of the same object, but made with entirely different colors. This was easily my favorite cebiche of the three. The final cebiche we tried was the Limeño, which came with assorted seafood like shrimp and squid in a spicy leche de tigre. This dish certainly had more in common with the Clásico, but the spicy rocoto leche de tigre added a new dimension of flavor to an already powerful dish. If I had to rank the cebiches, I would place Nikkei first, followed by Limeño and then Clásico.

Cebiche Trio (left to right: Clásico, Nikkei, Limeño)

Mains

In true Peruvian fashion, for our main courses for the evening, we ordered the Churrasco Anticuchero and Cordero Norteno, two fatty meat dishes that perfectly complemented the bright ceviche and cocktail we had. The first dish was a NY strip steak with anticuchera sauce and chimichurri served with roasted fingerling potatoes and cheese. The steak was cooked nicely, but in my opinion, the chimichurri was the star of the dish. My only request would have been for more chimichurri sauce - it brightened the deep, meaty flavors and gave the overall dish more flavor than a normal steak. The next main dish was the Cordero Norteno, which included grilled lamb chops with norteño sauce and was served with a lima bean puree, a nikkei carrot salad, and arroz con choclo. The lamb is, without a doubt, my favorite dish at Tanta. The rich, fatty lamb is tender and juicy, but unlike the steak, it does not overpower the flavor of the dish as a whole. The lamb blends in with the creamy bean puree, and when incorporated with the various sauces on the plate, it creates a rich, luxurious flavor in each bite.

Dessert

To end our meal, we decided to order the tres leches as suggested by our server. Before it even came out, based solely on the dishes that came before it, I knew it would not be an ordinary dessert. The dessert itself looked like a piece of art - a square slice garnished with flowers, a raspberry, a cookie crisp, and a sweet, creamy sauce poured by the server at our table. Unlike most tres leches, this cake was not overwhelmingly sweet - it had a more subtle and complex dulce de leche flavor to it. The cake was not too soggy either, since it had a perfect balance of cream and sponge. The dessert was rich but absolutely a must-have if you choose to dine at Tanta.

Conclusions

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed Tanta Chicago. My dining experience started with a tangy cocktail and a street food appetizer, shifted to an exploration of flavor combinations in cebiche, peaked with the rich, fatty main courses, and ended with a creamy dessert. If you choose to visit, I would certainly recommend the Classic Pisco Sour, the cebiche sampler, the lamb, and the tres leches dessert. I think the quality of food and drink generally justifies the high price tag for some of the dishes, and I would still recommend Tanta as a must-visit in Chicago.