db Eats: Casita Andina

db’s Lucy Shaw heads to Casita Andina in Soho for eye-poppingly bright, lip-smackingly fresh Peruvian sharing plates and cherry-laced Pisco Sours.

The concept: Along with Virgilio Martinez at Lima London, Martin Morales was one of the first to pioneer Peruvian cuisine in London before it became trendy. The Anglo-Peruvian former Apple executive and part-time DJ opened Ceviche in Soho in March 2012, kicking off a Peruvian food boom in the capital that continues to gather pace.

Decked out colonial style with pale blue and white interiors and old fashioned ceiling fans, Ceviche introduced Londoners to the delights of Pisco via various fantastical infusions dotted about the restaurant in demijohns.

Ceviche proved a roaring success and Andina in Spitalfields followed in 2014, which bills itself as a ‘picanteria and Pisco bar’. Last year Morales added a third site to his Peruvian empire in the form of Casita Andina – a spiritual sister to Andina in the heart of Soho.

Salmon tiradito

The décor: Set across two floors with the bar on street level and the restaurant upstairs, Casita Andina is a riot of eye-poppingly bright colours, from the turquoise brick wall on its adorable terrace out back, to the fuscia, red and teal threads embroidered into the beige booth seating.

Dining at Andina feels like being inside a particularly vivid Instragram filter where the saturation has been dialed up to the max. I’m all for it – give me so bright you need sunglasses interiors over self-consciously understated industrial chic any day of the week.

The dining room has a cosy, homely feel, with its rattan ceiling, mirrors in ornate golden frames and wooden shelves heaving with toys and trinkets.

The food: Sharing Andina’s ‘picanteria’ ethos (meaning all the dishes are designed to be shared), the menu is split into nibbles, hot food, ceviches and raw food, and desserts. In a booklet placed on each table, Morales pays tribute to his Peruvian grandmother, Mamita Naty, and the family run picanterias in Cusco steered by strong Andean women who were often the chief breadwinners in their households.

Tempted by a couple of the nibbles, our Andean feast began with great balls of fire in the form of four salty pork and liver croquettes swimming in a vivid red sweet and fiery sauce. The meat was rich and intense, and reminiscent of pulled pork, while the sauce tasted like the lovechild of strawberry jam and an aji chilli pepper.

Aji de Gallina

The cassava chips meanwhile, were presented like golden Jenga blocks, their crunchy jackets revealing fluffy white innards in a quirky Peruvian twist on triple cooked chips.

Most impressive of all was a modest sounding salad of burnt orange, lemon and thyme yoghurt, pistachio and watercress, which proved a lesson in texture and balance, with crunch provided by the pistachios and pumpkin seeds, cooling bitterness from the orange slices and a pleasing sour tang from the yoghurt.

Signature dishes: Having Google imaged the menu before my visit I knew I had to try the salmon tiradito if I wanted the ‘money shot’. There has been talk of restaurants creating dishes deliberately to appeal to the Instagram generation and this little dish is Insta gold.

Formed of curls of peachy salmon swimming in a canary yellow amarillo tiger’s milk among violet potatoes, the dish was as vivid and punchy in flavour as it was in colour.

The only disappointment was that the plate was bereft of the salty orange globes of trout caviar that complete the dish. Presumably the kitchen had run out and substituted it for black caviar, which didn’t have the same visual impact.

Another dish to have done the rounds on social media is the aji de gallina – free range chicken with amarillo chilli and puffed rice flecked Jackson Pollock style in a pretty purple olive sauce. Based on an ancient Andean recipe, the creamy sauce is made by grinding up nuts and breadcrumbs.

Pisco disco – the Gallo Negro cocktail, a twist on a Negroni made with cherry-infused Pisco, quinquinia apéritif, Dictator aged gin and Peruvian chuncho bitters

While it was delightfully comforting, it reminded me of Coronation chicken and left me yearning for my taste buds to have been more assaulted with spice rather than taking a walk on the mild side. A triumphant must order is the maca lamb loin composed of discs of salty, smoke-charred, perfectly pink lamb oozing with flavour.

The drinks: No visit to Casita Andina would be complete without trying one of the many Pisco Sour twists on offer.

I went off piste and ordered a straight up Sour with the bar’s cherry infused Pisco and was rewarded with a pretty pink drink with a lip-smackingly sour core, the addition of cherry sweetening and smoothing out the floral notes of the Pisco into a deliciously moreish drop.

On the wine front we stuck to whites, beginning with a zippy, apricot-laced glass of Albariño from Uruguay-based producer Bodegas Garzón, who are proving that you don’t need to hail from Rías Baixas to make bloody good Albariño. We moved on to Catena Chardonnay 2014, which took a while to open up but eventually rewarded with a waxy, mineral driven palate of preserved lemons.

A word of warning – if you order a large glass of wine the measures are generous to a fault. Our arrived topped up to the rim, which, while wonderful, left us having to ask for a second glass to decant half of the wine into so we could fully appreciate its aromas and flavours.

Who to know: See if you can spot owner Martin Morales milling about. He’s super friendly and a font of knowledge for all things Peruvian, including the latest bands to seek out. He’ll regale you with tales of being cooked for by his beloved Mamita Naty as a youngster in Peru.

Don’t leave without: Sneaking a peek at the tiny turquoise terrace peppered with plant pots in suspended animation.

Last word: Casita Andina is a joyous riot of colour offering cosy, soulful home cooking in Soho. With so many restaurants being opened by big businesses these days, its refreshing to dine somewhere with a beating heart and a genuine story behind it. I look forward to seeing what Morales does next.

Casita Andina, 31 Great Windmill Street, London W1D 7LP; Tel: +44 (0)20 3327 9464