Ceviche is the national dish of Peru - a country that stands alone in South American gastronomy. It's a bold move to call ceviche your national dish - many countries have it on their standard menus, but Peru is here to say all your ceviche ain't shit. 

There are quite a few decent Peruvian restaurants in New York City, but one stands on a corner in Long Island City that we had always meant to try, and the challenge gave us the means and the opportunity to do so. It is called Jora, a word with Quechuan origins, pertaining to the corn that is prepared to make the ancient corn-based alcoholic drinks that have existed in South America for centuries. Sort of like malt for beer, we're guessing. 

With relatively little to say about Peruvian Americans, the Peruvian chapter of this challenge gives us the chance to talk about uncontracted tribes, one of the few remaining fascinating things about human life on earth. "Uncontacted" is a term of reference more than a literal term, because it's not like these tribes are hanging out In the Amazon with absolutely no idea that there is a whole world out there. But many uncontacted tribes have never Interacted with westerners at all, ever, in any way that's recorded by history and the largest of those tribes In the Amazon (there are larger ones in Papua New Guinea) are in Peru - the Mashco-Piro. While we know that all uncontacted tribes are under threat, it's somehow comforting to know that the an age where everyone in the west is constantly connected via devices they carry with them not only to each other but to almost all the information we have been gathering for millenia, that there are people who are oblivious to that, and who have rarely met westerners at all. Also - we bet they love ceviche, even if they call it something different.