Peruvian chefs and cooks have brought the country to the spotlight of world gastronomy. This same week, the Lima restaurant Central was crowned the best in the world at The World’s 50 Best Restaurants gala. Now, they want one of their most traditional dishes, ceviche, to be declared an intangible cultural heritage by Unesco.
The country’s Ministry of Culture seeks to inscribe in UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity the practices and meanings associated with the preparation and consumption of this dish, which they define as an “expression of traditional Peruvian cuisine.”
Said portfolio has submitted a file to the international organization that will be reviewed by the evaluation body for its possible registration during the meeting of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Unesco, which will be held in the city of Gaborone (Botswana) at the end of of year.
In the application, the ministry indicated that ceviche is “one of the most representative cultural elements of regional and national identity, which provides resources to Peruvians for their development and citizenship.”
“The application of the practices and meanings associated with the preparation and consumption of ceviche is an opportunity to emphasize the importance of Peruvian cuisine as a factor of social cohesion and mutual recognition among Peruvians,” said a statement from the ministry.
In addition, entering this list provides the opportunity to make visible “the great contribution to food and the work of fishermen, agricultural producers and traditional cooks of the country, as well as promoting the care and sustainability of the resources that are fundamental and make so diverse our traditional cuisine”.
Ceviche was declared as Cultural Heritage of the Nation in 2004 and it is the only country where it is recognized in this way. Although it is a dish linked to the coast, it is prepared throughout Peru with regional variants and its own local inputs and multiple cultural groups are involved in its preparation, where the families of the more than 88,000 artisanal fishermen of the coast stand out, who preserve knowledge of fishing and preparation as a dish for daily consumption, and festive.
It is one of the most internationally known dishes and, in the country, the majority of Peruvians recognize ceviche as a representative dish of the cultural and culinary diversity of the country and transmits its social meanings, which is why they constitute the widest community of carriers. .
