hey youtube alex living abroad here and i'm at the garwal indian restaurant in cusco peru of course this is the top-rated indian restaurant in cusco on google every single review is is fantastic people have been telling me through
the reviews that this customer service here is above and beyond that there's there's really really nothing better here in cusco as far as indian food goes so i've come here today to meet with chef amit and to experience
the tali that he offers here and to share the experience with the viewing audience so uh what i'm going to show you a little bit of the restaurant and then we'll meet the chef and the owner of this
restaurant so as you can see here he has some wonderful hindu inspired decorations paintings very very detailed for those who don't know i used to sell arts and crafts and i have a sharp eye for artwork even if
i'm not the most talented artist and this is just incredible i do want to make clear before i get into this video it's not a sponsored video i have not been compensated this is just uh me kind of
reaching out because i loved what i saw online hello chef so uh what are you uh uh making here uh mango lassi i'm making tea also oh wonderful yeah and and so with the mango lassi um is it
uh challenging to get mangoes here or do they grow uh mangoes here in peru we are though we have a good mango in the kia bamba it's the best mango and we we imported the we import the green
cardamom to india and we we make ourselves a yogurt here and we buy the fresh milk in the urubamba and we have a good vendors for the selling for us for the milk and then we make the mango
lassi i want to try okay okay thank you i make i'm excited to try it oh oh one wonderful the mango lassi here the mango yagurt and green cardamom so this is the mango lassi here at garwall and
uh i'm really looking forward to trying this wow wow it's the best i've ever had in my life thank you thank you first yes that's incredible yeah um wow that's this this guy is working magic here i mean
that's that's the best lassie i've ever had in my life uh when you have it in some other places you get this kind of a flat mango uh like yogurt flavor but this is vibrant and and it's like
oh wow and here's this flavor and here's this flavor and you put the actual cardamom in too which some people don't do because the cardamom can be quite costly yeah but wow that's uh something that you're going to
really enjoy here in peru is that the the chefs and and the the people who cook here they make really good use of the the big variety of ingredients that can be found here but i'm going to pause
for a bit and uh he's got some wonderful creations he's coming up with so i hope you enjoy this is the brown onion we put in the on the top the rice and this is a mustard this is
a this one the this is a mustard and a green cardamom fenugreek seed garam masala and coriander powder clove and black peppers and roasted cumin and then some spices here the cinnamon stick is easy to find cinnamon stick
and bay leaf and clove and clove and black pepper is easy to find here but some spices like a mustard seed and green cardamom and fenugreek seed and garam masala is not easy to find here and then we
import it to india but garam masala we make ourselves oh okay we make ourselves because i'm a chef and this is not a big deal for me because we need whole spices for imported to india bring to india
and then we i made to myself our secret recipe for make the garam masala and we have some spices for um sometimes i make myself and but importing the whole is tied to india oh wow because we we
want we don't we don't we don't want compromise with the foods because we we don't have big menu but we have a small menu but our menu is uh have all that we want we're making the like a
menu like a perfectly this not any complaints no nothing no compromise with our gas no we want to perfectly for the spices yeah that and that's something that i absolutely really appreciate and respect about uh this gentleman is
that he's he's focusing on doing some things incredibly well something that that makes me nervous when i go to an indian restaurant is seeing two or three hundred different menu items to me there's no way to get that
many different things uh done really well so this is yeah i'm really excited to be here uh but yeah let's uh let's go ahead and check this out so this is here we're making the tea masala tea here
we here here we're making masala tea and uh here we have we have fresh milk we have mango layers also explain you urbamba and they are coming in the morning and here's a boiling the milk for the tea
and milk for the yogurt this and here this here that we making the masala tea masala tea we put the spices black tea green cardamom black pepper cinnamon sticks and ma ginger and ginger and black peppers this is
our masala tea yeah this is a recipe of masala tea here is boiling and coming the flavors then we then is boil well after then we add [Music] i'm definitely gonna try them next time yeah uh there's there's
so many things i want to try here it's yeah it's incredible um so you mentioned that you're uh from india of course uh what part of india are you from i'm for i am part of the north yes
i'm basically i'm sturdy in the new delhi and uh i'm born in the gardwar that was the place of the ones like cusco like one place of the north of india is the state of bhutan it's a famous
place of life it's similar like a hill place oh nepal yeah yeah nepal and the china borders and the bhutan himalay like that's a place yeah and it's it's so beautiful and i love couscous because it's so so
beautiful place and it's good for living and here coming the many peoples for um traveling do you feel that coming from this mountainous region that uh living here in cusco uh it um it's an easier adjustment for you
yeah you think so okay yeah yeah i love to love i love the cusco it's so nice place for living and here fresh ears you feel like a blaze plus uh place plus the town know you know like
these and good feelings and have a good climate no i'm living for the best place for and i love here then i opened the business here yeah and i also traveled like oh you traveled so that's how you
came here yes i coming for travels and uh i come in the 2017 traveling and then i like oh wow the nice place i'm a good chef and people love my foods and i'm hotel management and finally i
decided why no cousco have one good best restaurant because you are coming many travel they know yeah indian restaurant here missing that one indian restaurant they're not doing these jobs here it is and uh something that i love
about your restaurant is it um it feels very homely it feels like i feel like i'm in india yeah yeah yeah you're feeling us just you are just a small india yeah we are we want to feel here
the people coming here and the people feel oh wow i am coming just indiana and yes it's just one feeling so you have just little bitty india and you can feel your like homely yeah like this yeah it's
uh it's it's incredible i believe that uh my father he was from um like andhra pradesh uh like yeah yeah uh gunther so i'm i'm uh i'm half indian oh wow yeah oh i thought oh yeah yeah nice
oh yeah yeah you're speaking a little bit oh no no unfortunately i know oh your momma is from us japanese uh japanese american and dad was from uh india oh wow then your first look notice your face were
coming in yeah yeah yeah yeah high cheekbones yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah surely yes i i won't say you they like the same things your face is a little bit coming the indians but yeah you told me you
are from yes and then i say no i think but yeah wow but you which you speak some language for india no uh no no uh unfortunately uh uh it's kind of long story i didn't really know my
dad very well but uh as i've gotten to be an adult i've made some really wonderful friends from india wow and so uh even though i didn't really i grew up in that uh culture i feel very much
um that it is the fatherland for for me you know i'm looking forward to going i haven't been yet i intended to go about a year ago but unfortunately the lockdowns happened i was i was in thailand and
hoping to fly there next but i know that when i go it'll be a really wonderful experience but um i i love meeting indian people around the world because um it's there's this this kinship this this brother and
i'm i i don't have um being an american and being open-minded i don't think about it like oh this guy he's from north indian oh i'm from south india no we're we're all indians yes we're all indians and
you have blood of india yeah yeah yeah oh wow so nice uh and and so um yeah it's just a really good feeling to to come here and i'm uh you know this gentleman is from india i'm from
the united states we're here in peru having this wonderful experience of shared culture shared background uh we i didn't eat indian food for the first time until i think i was 18 or 19. oh and i loved it
though immediately the first bite i had oh this is amazing you have a lot of india then your body missing the food yeah yeah yes the food yes and um yes and the hospitality and the warmness and the
kindness it's ironic but i befriended an italian family and they love indian india even though they're italian-american so they started telling about oh we we have an apartment in gujarat and we love going to india we love staying
in india and and yeah i just opened my mind up and opened my world up uh but but this is really an incredible thing you're doing here so something that i kind of wanted to pivot to here because
i definitely want to inform people as much as i can about this wonderful restaurant is um what kind of ingredients do you get here in in peru you mentioned some of these are there any uh peruvian ingredients that
aren't indian or aren't traditionally indian that you do incorporate yeah one basically what is this uh some spice we find to here so they are local even though we're on a totally different continent they're able to get yeah
that's what and and do you think part of that is um perhaps uh some of the altitude if you're at altitude in india if you're at a certain altitude and then you come to peru and you're at a
certain altitude uh would you find comparable ingredients because they're at similar altitudes or yeah and because right now the climate is like a good for cusco yeah and couscous cold place and if people eat the indian food they
digest very fast yeah because this is a this place is like a huge place of india that's our food is the the place like like uh like a climate is a basket for the eating for people can digest
the food if basically we have the chana masala and we know that chana masala we if you put the fenugreek seed if you put the we putting the the mustard seed that is the very digestible for the for
the health then we we know that this is important for the people and our food what is our food we have flavor in the inside of food but not spicy if people want to spicy as a choice which
we add some more you know spice hot like a chili no but spice flavors is different then our food have good flavor but not not very spicy for if people want we we do but otherwise the food have
one level of the if you try then you don't all right well well thank you so much i'm to take a moment to have some more of this lassie it's absolutely incredible i'm i'm so grateful to be here
with chef amit singh at his restaurant garwal i hear in cusco peru this is magic right here this is as close to magic as magic can be in reality so yeah this last season credible i'm getting ready to
join chef singh here in a couple of moments i just wanted to show you that the thing i keep experiencing here in peru is these people are such incredible chefs it attracts so many culinary masters that in a
lot of places that i i've traveled the more you eat the more tired of it you get but here in fact many of these dishes the more i eat the more i drink the better it tastes the more
flavors i noticed there's so many layers ingredients variety in the food here it's really mind blowing that humans sheer human ingenuity coupled with mother nature's gifts is able to manifest these kinds of experiences so i'm going to go
ahead and come through here and wow we're making in the world i make the i do myself first time i do is the first time in myself the japanese right now i am making i will see huh yeah
okay we are first we need to one ball of the naan dough and then we add little oil here and then we put the green coriander and then on the top the flour flour and then we fold and
this then we give the second edge for the one moment for one minute right now we're preparing the thali this is our thali and this is called the key in india rice pudding and rice milk green cardamom and
cinnamon sticks wow and he started that looks absolutely gorgeous the the uh the red onion the tomato and then this is the curd with roasted cumin and tomato onions green coriander salt and paprika as actually and this is
something that's absolutely fascinating to me is that it seems like here you're doing this really wonderful job you're bringing indian food here but you're you're um you're showing respect to the peruvian culture and the country of peru and
that's really admirable okay right now this is the chana masala chickpea garbanzo people call here in the spanish language and this chicken curry this chicken curry and the rice is here and uh yeah so i just wanted to
mention some people might be wondering am i vegetarian i am not vegetarian so i do in fact eat chicken and i'm really looking forward to trying this dish the smells here are absolutely incredible it's it's uh chef it's
like nothing i've ever smelled before it's almost like for me uh coming here to your restaurant it almost seems like uh the equivalent of um of watching an incredible movie uh but with my sense of smell because that's
something i think some some people may not be familiar with is that uh one of the things that you're doing here that's i think different from some other restaurants or some other folks that's really special is you're not
just appealing to our taste buds you're appealing to our sense of smell so when you come here it's this it's not just oh i'm eating a good meal and it tastes good but also that you um the smells
take you to almost like a different world uh i for me personally uh growing up i didn't really eat a lot of indian food as you may know from from what i had said before so to be in
this kind of environment is is a real treat and uh this is an experience i'm gonna appreciate remember for a long time and i mean it's it's almost like this um this chemist mindset uh so uh chef um
when um when you traveled here in in 2017 you had mentioned before uh you you didn't notice an indian restaurant doing what you're doing here yeah okay so that so that's really part of what prompted yeah the the
um in 2019 and here's a lot of indian travel they are leaving the u.s and europe to many uh many indians coming for traveling also many people know about the indian food they are missing the indian foods in
cusco me also when i am travel and i say oh couscous is so nice city but don't have uh no not indian restaurant and i feel oh wow i know i am i'm a chef and i'm learning i
love cooking i love cooking then i opened up i love it's my best and i love the talk the peoples give my foods i'm very happy to do these jobs and so why not is it's good place for
me living and for the my restaurants when i open my small restaurant is my first business now before i never do the business i have i am only doing the job but then i i i created my i
am working working a lot of place and i have experience and then finally i'm doing these jobs here yes and something else i i really want to give the chef credit for uh for those who are are not
familiar uh in fact if i'm not mistaken here in south america we're about as far as you can get from india where if you kind of look at the globe and you go straight through then you'd be on
the opposite side of the planet so in my mind it's it's quite daring and adventurous uh for a gentleman to move to this part of the world from india and i don't say that as a critique or criticism
of south or latin america but it's literally the farthest the farthest place and in some way that that you can go and i think it's incredible because like the chef mentioned there are indian people that are traveling here
that they want a taste of home they want the real thing they don't want perhaps a westernized version and and this is this is fusion done right in my mind this is really fusion done right and i've definitely
had a lot of fusion done wrong um so so i definitely recommend if you're interested in trying that to come here um and yeah i can definitely attest to to the chef mentioning there's just not tons of great
indian restaurants uh throughout south and latin america of course i love colombia i came here from colombia but in colombia there really wasn't very much good indian food and and um that's very different than here in some of
the indian restaurants in colombia you don't get this this it's like a symphony that's the that's the only way i could explain it's like one man uh symphony but um yeah i'm really excited to try this thali you
can see it's piping hot the chef is just finishing up the non his very unique and special take on nan and so chef how did you come up with this uh creation we just yeah because what happened uh
i'm living in jaipur in india and japan is my my my favorite place and it's historical place in jaipur it's so nice place in jaipur and when i visiting and traveling many times of jaipur and i'm when baby
i'm living in jaipur i love jaipur and uh jaipur have one club they call the sari jaipuri sari these are so famous of the cloth and they are putting in the lego for the ladies and this this bread
have the like at the side you have the green corner like yes and then the lady put in the base that's coming the folding like this and then i am creating oh wow is that so nice why not
i create like a japanese and people love this brand the japanese wow wow okay your food is ready excellent well guys i really uh have enjoyed uh sharing some of uh the wonderful conversation that we've had here with
chef sting but i'm gonna sit down and dig in because this smells incredible i can hardly wait to dig in and certainly uh after i eat possibly midway through the meal it smells so incredible i'll let you know
how it goes and and we'll have a chance to talk with chef sing more so anyway this is alex living abroad and we'll see you soon this one the green chutney is spicy and tamarind is sweet and tangy
and this is japanese bread is uh it's brilliant japanese bread is my own creating and that's the veg raita is your yogurt curd with the vegetables and salad the desserts kheer rice and chicken curry and chana masala please
enjoy your meal absolutely chef thank you oh absolutely absolutely that's much appreciated though yeah so this is just mind-blowing it's so beautiful i almost feel guilty to eat but i'm so hungry uh that i'm gonna go ahead and
do it anyway it's just um it's gorgeous i was just telling the chef here chef amit singh from india about what i think about his food he's curious and i just have to say this meal is absolutely incredible
the fact that he is able to use this big variety i find that in some places some circumstances you get kind of a flat flavor some places americanized indian restaurants in america you taste the the dairy or maybe
you taste some kind of peppery heat or something but here it's you get the spice and then you get the umami and then you get some like an acidic acid from the onion and the tomato the rice here
is incredible a lot of the times when i'm eating rice in the u.s even at some indian restaurants it's very very flat you get the rice flavor and maybe you get some like cilantro and if you're at a
mexican restaurant or maybe you get like fried rice but that this is beyond that this this rice is soft it's you have the sesame seeds you have is this onion or um yeah this is the brown onion brown
banana so that's something else that's incredible here is some of the ingredients that uh he uses he doesn't just go one way he's got the the brown onions here and then he's got the the red onions here and
it provides this contrast where you don't just get this flat onion flavor like you're at a ballpark eating a hot dog you get the the layers of the onion and it's it's mind-blowing uh what he's doing here in
the mountains of cusco i never imagined uh coming to what many in some cases would be considered a remote region to have this quality of food at a reasonable price and that's something else i'll mention here too is
this chef is very clear that he's using high quality ingredients you taste his mango lassi you can taste the cardamom he's not he's not using these cheap substitutes that some places do i don't want to pick on other
restaurants but it's very clear that he's not willing to compromise uh when it comes to the quality of this that he has an idea in mind that he is trying to reach every day and also improve upon it
every day and that's that can't be understated his hard work his effort his dedication his focus his creativity these these qualities cannot be understated and i feel very fortunate to have found this uh restaurant i will say i've
tried one other indian place in cook i've only been here for three days and this is far beyond that and roughly comparable prices i'm not going to name it but if you do have to if you could only
go to one indian restaurant couscou if you're only here for say one night or maybe uh a night a day a night and then the following day come here come to garwal indian restaurant like i said this isn't
sponsored it's just my mind is blown this is far better than the vast majority of indian food i've had throughout my life because i haven't had in india yet but but all that being said i mean this is
this is beyond the indian food i had in kuala lumpur malaysia that indian food was fantastic but this is on another level so i want to thank chef saint so much for cooking this wonderful meal for me he
made it look so easy and these are the red onions that went into this just incredible i mean the colors of chef sing what do we what do we got going on here masala chai right now we're adding
the milk milk is already boiled and the tea is boiled with all the spices and so with the milk something that i've heard and i know that you're quite experienced at this i've heard they can be easy to
burn milk uh what do you do to kind of prevent that from happening your milk is is very very good yeah if the what is the good if the you are boiling someone boiling the milk that's a need
to slow flame then uh milk not not never okay that's a one because we are the we are similar um if we boil the milk we are slow fine slow fire okay that makes so much sense okay that
is uh is take time is take more time but um yeah it's a better a better product and that's something that um i i really admire about what you're doing here is you don't take any shortcuts uh some
of these these things that you do i could tell it takes a lot of preparation uh and i definitely would love our viewers to know that because you know in the u.s when you have this kind of uh
tea it wouldn't it wouldn't be surprising to just have some kind of a powder mix and that's it you know but here you're using all these fresh ingredients all the fresh vegetables and the spices we put it to
india good qualities and some spices in peru so here we have the tea and it's uh wow you can even see the cardamom bits right there wow um so uh i guess i i have some questions that come
to mind uh chef um so uh you you came up with this idea um did you plan this menu or from how did you how did you come up with this uh idea to yeah for uh because i'm
a chef and uh before when i i'm working and i finished my job like 2016-15 and then i am working online concept for the people's many restaurants yes and i do the many concepts for the peoples and i
am creating the menu do the concept of the restaurants managing the food qualities managing the food quality and quantities and everything so managing of the food cost no and finally deciding uh that i'm doing the all the menu
for the people's and then i deciding oh why do i do for this one project for me for one of my dreams and then i doing this thing and i create the whole whole menu for then is uh
i am is a big challenge for me because i'm learning i'm sturdy and then i do the the menu for yeah yeah this is just incredible uh and so um i wanted to get on a tangent here uh
if somebody were owning a restaurant here in cusco or looking to open one up and say six months a year two years would they be able to hire you for that as well would they be able to come
to you to ask perhaps for input advice suggestion okay excellent yeah yeah if somebody wanted somebody like to that they want to help me and then i have the ideas and if they want to make the plating something
new disease then i can okay wonderful wonderful i just i want the audience to know that uh you're uh not just a restaurant owner not just the chef but that you also have this cerebral approach to it you're
not just thinking how can i present the food but how can i make this a sustainable business how can i um win over time yeah and and also treat people to incredible food i mean this food this guy
right here the food is just absolutely incredible um i can't say enough good things about the meal that i had here you have to get down here and try it um so another question that came to my mind
um you you prepare both um you have a vegetarian and a non-vegetarian option right yes so um so if somebody is a vegetarian they're coming here to cusco uh what kind of dishes would you recommend them to have
at your restaurant yeah i recommend this uh like you eat the thali meal combo we have also option in the the vegetarian also and you know we we have we make the paneer ourselves here and because it's not
easy to find paneer because it's not easy it's not possible it's not your here don't have no not paneer then we make ourselves because we have a good good milk the cow milk and you put it the milk
no we are fine you hear the urban we have one benders for the milk and um for my best recommendation also veg thali and palak paneer we have chana masala we have we have many dishes i have also
gluten free we have gluten free bread we have a vegan also vegan dish we have many vegan dishes we have seen like chana masala is our vegan dish and it's vegetarian and vegan also so that we have many
options and my recommendation masala because the chana masala is my other recipes my personal recipe food helps us a lot of recipes but chana masala is the best and is our signature dish like if people love if people
love nonveg then chicken curry is our signature dish yeah also we have indian lentils palak paneer and have option samosas you know other thing the pakodas paneer pakodas and we have many option of the foods up no yeah
paneer that sounds really wonderful i love that you you cater uh to the the vegetarians and the non-vegetarians it's there's really something for everyone here um wow um well i i really want to thank you so much for
joining me today thanks for you also oh absolutely absolutely i i uh i can't say enough positive things about this experience i want to thank chef amit singh for joining us today to take time from his busy schedule
to help us to make this youtube video uh he's he's uh in cusco peru and uh can we give the address what's the address uh my address is the kaya umanchata cousco 117 and is near to san pedro
the center of cusco is the boundary of the center and uh the near to san pedro is the plaza de armas and then next uh san francisco next san pedro and then is coming one street kaya one street
and the kayak manchata like this is our address and also we have our uh your people can see how we are in the indian restaurant karwal in the google map and then if you put your your search as
indian restaurant cusco then we are we have all details your facebook page for instagram trip advisors and other happy cow and four square and many also we have our youtube channel but it's not famous it's small and there
have all the links wonderful and uh and if somebody they're busy or perhaps uh they can't do things they they can order your food through delivery right yes we have also delivery options and in our google maps have
our website in website have our number then can also call these numbers and also we are our we deliver the food okay well i i can't thank you enough for for this time and this meal today um i'm
going to be thinking about this meal for a long time uh probably until the next time i come and eat here it's it's so incredible i i just want to once again encourage you to come here and check
out the garwall indian restaurant in cusco peru and uh we'll see you next time here you have food and with love yay i can feel the love here it's definitely a a loving warm uh sweet kind environment a
very peaceful very peaceful so anyway take care
