Like most restaurants of its caliber — it was voted No. 1 this year on the world’s 50 best restaurants list — Central has a large international team of chefs contributing ideas filtered through Martinez. Kjolle is a more personal restaurant, easy to love with more accessible a la carte entrees in addition to a tasting menu from a smaller but ambitious team of chefs led by León.

Native Peruvian ingredients, many sourced through Mater Iniciativa, the research project started by Martinez, his sister Malena Martinez and León, are at the heart of the cuisine at Kjolle. So you might see the fruitiness of spongy white pacay seeds, a kind of ice cream bean, paired with luscious fresh scallops or the Andean tuber black mashua baked into bread or a tart. River shrimp and razor clams, flavored with coconut and cecina, are dotted with tiny green spheres of algae hand harvested from a lake high in the Andes — Incan caviar. Instead of presenting this dish as solemn high cuisine, León sends out lettuce leaves so you can make your own delicious wraps, Vietnamese style, to eat with your hands.

But the tart called muchos tuberculos, or many tubers, served early in the meal, is a statement of purpose for Kjolle. With a crust made from the quinoa-like grain cañihua and an intense potato flavor that borders on sweet, it shows that a culinary exploration of one of the world’s most ecologically diverse places can be delicious and fun. You can use a fork. But I don’t think León would mind if you just picked it up in your hand and ate it.

Address: Av. Pedro de Osma 301, Barranco, Lima, Peru
Phone: +51 1 242-8575