Ah, Restaurant Week. Twice a year I get to trick myself into thinking I can afford to eat at nice restaurants – a lie that I have too much fun living. When it was announced that restaurant week was extended in mid-January, we decided to pick the nicest restaurant we could find, and landed on a new spot called Pisco y Nazca Gastrobar.
Pisco y Nazca is a Peruvian restaurant located in the Downtown/Dupont Circle area. The DC location is an extension of the Miami chain and opened late 2018. The interior of the restaurant ie beautiful, bright turquoise tiles, basket wall art, and a beautiful bar featuring all the alcohol arranged by color (my favorite!). The backroom even featured skylights, which made the whole restaurant brighter – and provided for great lighting for my pictures!
Restaurant week brunch is truly the best deal – three courses for 22$. Drinks are usually extra, but either way, its worth it. Pisco y Nazca offered an appetizer, entree and dessert, with drinks on the side. We started off with corn nuts, or cancha to start. I loved these – a truly superior bar snack to peanuts, and highly addicting!
We also had a variety of drinks – Christine and I got the Sangria Blanca, with sparkling wine, peach schnapps, triple sec, and fresh blueberries and strawberries. I really enjoy My other friends got a coconut ginger daiquiri, a mimosa and a pisco sour.
For my first course, I had the ceviche cremoso, with fish, shrimp, sweet potato, leche de tigre (a citrus marinade), celery and onion. This was really the best ceviche i’ve had in a while, there was a great mix of texture from the beans, the onion, the soft fish, and the texture of the sweet potato. This was my favorite dish, for sure!
For my main entree, I got the Chaufa, a shrimp and calamari fried rice. From the description, I thought it was going to be a more seafood focused fish with rice on the side, but it ended up being a fried rice dish with some seafood. It also featured chopped veggies, sprouts and egg. Overall I enjoyed the dish, but could have used more seafood and less rice for a better balance. Tasty either way, and gave me my dinner for the next night!
My friends and I had two choices for desert, crema volteada, a Peruvian version of flan with grilled pineapple, and suspiro, a dulce de leche custard with merengue. I loved the flan, it was great with the pineapple and the quinoa tulle (brittle like candy). The caramel custard was also good, but Erin mentioned it was a little rich.
The variety of offerings in this brunch were great – the one downside was the lack of vegetarian friendly options in the restaurant week menu. They do have a prix fixe menu with more options for $30 with an extra $18 for bottomless drinks. For the amount of food you would get and the quality of the dishes and drinks, this would probably be worth it.
I would definitely come back here for Happy Hour for the drinks and ceviche. I would be curious to see what the portions and quality are like during normal hours, but the service and experience we had was definitely promising!
The Bottom Line
Modern Peruvian food in a beautiful space ft. great ceviche!!
Location: Dupont Circle, Washington, D.C.
Cost: $$$ ($22 for brunch, $30+ with drinks)
aditi eats 