Lima-based blogger Stuart Starrs has a nice post on Chinese restaurants in Peru, or Chifas, over at his blog en Perú. He rightly points out that while chifa food is largely considered an affordable staple to most Peruvians, there are glitzy exceptions. Buen provecho!
Image: en Perú
Peru is going through something of a domestic guinea pig boom at the moment. Long a traditional protein source in the Andes, guinea pigs are now being produced and sold in greater numbers because of breeding improvements and genetic engineering. The animals, which reproduce extremely quickly, are full of protein and low in fat. Cuy, as it is called in Peru, can be fried, broiled, roasted or turned into soup. Peruvians eat about 65 million guinea pigs annually.
The problem for the real cuy entrepreneurs is how to expand their market beyond Peru’s borders. For most, guinea pigs are still furry pets or labratory animals – not especially appetizing.
In the past, Peru has pitched “super guinea pigs” (genetically tinkered, 2.5-pound porkers) to markets overseas. Andean farmers have built small businesses exporting guinea pigs to Peruvian immigrant communities abroad. But, to date, the cuy market has been a niche one. As Lilia Chauca Francia, head of Peru’s National Agrarian Research Institute Cuy Project, sums up in the Peruvian Times article linked above: “It can only be exported to sepecific areas in Europe and the U.S. where Peruvians live.”
Only?
It is time for Peru’s economic planners – at the “Cuy Project” and otherwise – to think outside the box a bit. Why not consider introducing guinea pig as a delicacy in China instead? Consider the following:
1. Cuteness will not impede consumption. Guinea pigs are cute, in their own rodent way. Whereas in the US, any guinea pig entrepreneur would need to find ways to tone-down the guinea pig’s lovableness, in China, it seems, cuteness may just indicate it tastes better. Take for instance, Xiao Fei Yang (little fat lamb) Hot Pot restaurants, ubiquitos in Shanghai and other cities. The restaurant’s mascot is an adorable, anthropormized cartoon lamb in a bow tie. Delicious.
Or, I think about the time I had to point the finger of death at a rabbit hot pot restaurant on the outskirts of Chengdu, Sichuan province. I’d stood next to a large wire cage stacked with white bunnies, a man with a butterfly net and scale, and bloodsplattered white-tile wall. I got queasy watching the butchery, but the three eight-year-old girls standing near me didn’t blink.
2. What pet-vs-food debate? Cuteness brings us to pets. In China, I knew dog owners who ate dog. Yet, this did not mean they would ever eat their own pet, mind you. Any attempt to export guinea pigs to the US or Europe would be a struggle because there are classes of animals that are ruled out as pets for pretty much all people. In China, dietary customs vary widely. In a lot of places, there is plenty of overlap between pets and food. Tip for cuy salesman: start in Guangdong.
3. The guinea-pig marketing campaign writes itself. “Since 2,500 BC, Andean people have believed in the mystical healing and nourishing ability of the guinea pig. The animals were first used by ritual healers to diagnose illness and later consumed on the misty tops of the Andean range. They have brought nourishment, strength, virility, luck and prosperity to Peruvians for generations.” (Well, nourishment, anyway). The more exotic, the better.
4. Food for the recession. Consider the economics from an offical in Lima last December: Guinea pigs can feed a family of seven or eight for US$3.20. Last year, Peru’s governement recommended struggling families eat guinea pigs for Christmas dinner in place of a traditional turkey or pork roast. In China, meanwhile pork prices soared last year, forcing a number of families to cut back on meat consumption. Not even eight bowls of Lanzhou lamian would be as cheap a meal as a guinea pig roast.
5. Peruvian animals in China are already all the rage. Stuffed alpacas are selling well at the moment in China. Alpaca dolls are standing in for made-up animals called “grass-mud horses,” the stars of a current internet fad based on puns.
6. And on the subject of puns… “It’s keyi to eat cuy!” (It’s OK to eat guinea pigs!). Just a thought.