A gastronomic experience in the rarefied air of La Paz – 04/19/2023 – Josimar Melo

“I’m really getting old”, I would have thought with the buttons I don’t have on my shirt as I panted for climbing the slope at the exit of the plane, dragging – regretfully – a paltry handbag. So tired for nothing.

It only dawned on me when the driver decreed: “Is this your first time in La Paz? So let’s go slower or you won’t be able to breathe”.

I had already faced some altitudes. But the ski resorts in Colorado, in the United States, at 2,500 meters above sea level, didn’t shake me. A thousand meters above that, Cusco, Peru, seemed more tragic to me, with its oxygen balloons along the walls of the airport for emergencies – but it didn’t dazzle me either.

La Paz, on the other hand, showed me the effect of thin air, barely leaving the pressurized cabin of the plane. The airport is located in the neighboring city of El Alto (did you catch the name?…), at 4,150 meters. Even higher than La Paz, which can be seen 500 meters below. And almost four kilometers above the mandatory stopover, Santa Cruz de La Sierra —because long flights cannot go directly to El Alto, because (they explained to me) large and heavy aircraft with fuel afterwards would have difficulty taking off, given that the thin air offers little resistance in its aerodynamics.

But the discomfort was well worth it. First, to get to know La Paz, a unique city, a metropolis that, not satisfied with just resting nestled in a valley, also occupies the steep slopes around it, dramatically urbanized with red brick houses that dye the cliffs.

The cable car that connects it to the altitudes of neighboring El Alto, in a literally breathtaking half-kilometer climb, is already a program. Uniting poorer centers and peripheries, it reminded me of Medellin, a masterpiece of Colombian urbanization; and it saddened me to think that the inclusive Rio de Janeiro cable car in the Alemão complex no longer operates, overturned by the avalanche of government corruption and the power of organized crime that plague the state.

The trip also made up for the opportunity to get to know the Gustu (“taste” in Quechua) restaurant, which is celebrating its tenth anniversary. A beautiful story.

Founded in 2013 by the Danish visionary Claus Meyer, who also created Noma, from Copenhagen (which he no longer participates in), the restaurant is a radical player in Bolivian food culture. Its modern architecture is all executed with local materials and elements. Its contemporary cuisine is a showcase of Bolivian products, from alligators to vegetables, from the Amazon to the Andes (even wines and whiskeys are all locally produced).

When it was born, Gustu implemented a gastronomic training school for young people without professional insertion. Today, chef Marsia Taha participates in excursions through all biomes, together with a multidisciplinary team, to learn about and research local products and producers, supporting families, rural communities, native peoples and indigenous nations.

His cuisine is from scratch, it translates the harshness of the rigorous Bolivian nature, but it is delicate: there is a stimulating color, the use of leaves and fruits, a lightness that softens the dramatic contrasts of his land.

On the first night (it was the last day of the 31st), I attended, invited by them, the restaurant’s anniversary dinner, made with Peruvian chef Virgílio Martínez around ingredients from the Bolivian Amazon. The next day, I tasted Marsia’s menu, which explores all of the country’s biodiversity.

I was only in the city for two days. I was instructed, still at the airport, to be careful the first three days in La Paz: avoid walking, alcohol, too much food. It didn’t.

PRESENT LINK: Did you like this text? Subscriber can release five free hits of any link per day. Just click the blue F below.