Sunday afternoon at the Maury

in search of the perfect Pisco Sour 

photo - Miguel Etchepare
taken from the Art of Peruvian Cuisine

The Posada de Pedro Maury existed since the days of independence. General San Martin himself stayed there, as well as Miguel Grau. Later the posada was refurbished and modernized and in 1848 became Lima's first great illustrious hotel - the Hotel Maury.

More than 150 years later, I drop in on a warm dusty Sunday afternoon, to escape the traffic and noise of downtown Lima. I am looking to while away a few hours at a more genteel pace, and at the same time check out the declared birthplace of the Pisco Sour. 

In 1956 the original Maury was knocked down and the present six floored building put in its place.  The concrete frontage sporting a lineup of limp international flags is not particularly inspiring. Once inside, it’s obvious that many of the original fittings are long gone, and the lobby looks tired and soulless. We peek into the dining room – the once famous Salón de los Espejos – it’s musty, dim and depressing.

   

 

fig. 1 

But the bar is magnificent. Happily it’s one part of the hotel that has been elegantly and tastefully restored. Come in through the separate entrance on Calle Bodegones, push aside the heavy velvet curtain which serves to block out the outer world, and you are surrounded by polished wood panelled walls and vaulted ceilings. Stuffed leather benches line the space, and muted light filters through a huge stained glass window on to a red tiled floor. 

And then there is the bar itself. Just as it should be: gleaming dark wood with a shiny brass rail.  Looming above it are three larger than life oils by the Peruvian indigenous painter José Sabogal representing life in a bygone Lima. The figures are characteristically colourful, elongated and expressive: a troubadour serenades a woman leaning on a typical latticed balcony, dancers bow and circle in the traditional marinera, veiled tapadas promenade around the city’s Plaza de Acho bullring.

 

the bar - photo from citiHeartBeat

Sabogal was once a longtime resident of the hotel who stayed so long that his close friend and then owner of the hotel, Antonio Bergna, stopped charging him. When the painter finally checked out he left the paintings in lieu of payment of his tab.

Under this majestic backdrop Señor Eloy Cuadros Cordoba holds sway. Cuadros has worked at the Maury for over 50 years. He arrived from a small town in the Andean highlands of Huaral when he was 17, and started off squeezing oranges and lemons, and washing glasses. He watched and learned from the senior barmen and bit by bit honed his trade. 

photo - el Comercio

When I ask him what changes he has seen, he replies: “Before the eighties very important people came to the hotel, presidents, congressmen, diplomats. Things have changed since then. Now we have all types and classes of people. They come from everywhere and we have a lot of tourists too.”

Like me they come looking for the Pisco Sour. Cuadros who, with the explosion of interest in Peruvian food and drink has become something of a minor celebrity in recent years, tells me his story on the origins of the nation’s favourite cocktail. 

“Pisco Sour was born in the Hotel Maury in the thirties.  It wasn’t like the drink we know today. It was just like lemonade with Pisco, lemon, ice and ordinary white sugar, not sugar syrup. The two older barmen here were called Graciano and Achilles, and the three of us talked about it. We thought that it needed a little something, and so we all went out on Friday nights, me tagging along as the young assistant. 

We wandered around the city … Dos de Mayo, Plaza de la Union, with a little bottle of Pisco, chatting about different possibilities and of course sipping from the bottle. And then the next day in the bar we would try out the ideas we had talked about.

They had the idea of putting egg white, but we wondered how we could do it because egg white and lemon don’t normally go together, they curdle. We tried egg white in different proportions, and we tried all the ingredients in different order in the cocktail shaker. At the beginning we had a lot of problems with too much froth. But we discovered we just had to lessen the quantities a little. We’ve been improving it ever since”

He’s happy to share the finished product with anyone who cares to ask. And so here, straight from the horse’s mouth:

-        3 measures Pisco

-        1 measure sugar syrup

-        1 measure of lemon juice and

-        ½ egg white

-        ice

-        drop of Angostura bitters

According to Cuadros, if you want to be able to sustain a conversation, you can put 1 ½ measures of syrup to soften the blow. If not the full strength real McCoy is 3:1:1. And always with a drop of Angostura bitters splashed onto the top, never with a sprinkle of cinnamon, as I have seen it in some places.

To make Sr. Cuadros’ sugar syrup, boil 1 litre of water infused with orange peel and a small cinnamon stick. Then dissolve 1 ½ kilos white sugar into it. It’s important that it only boils once. Once it’s cool you can keep it in a bottle at the bar. But it has to be a syrup, not liquid. If it does become too liquid add more sugar.

fig 2

Cuadros says that when tourists come and ask for Pisco Sour, they’re surprised when he asks which one they want. He explains: “We serve three Pisco sours, the simple, the double, and the catedral”

I admit to him that I already have form with the catedral – the cathedral. The Rosa Nautica, one of my favourite restaurants in the city is famous for its version. Served in enormous balloon glasses it’s not for the fainthearted or weak kneed.

But Cuadros is a purist: “in other places they sell the catedral in that large round copa.  But we always serve it in a vaso – tumbler - because we want to maintain our tradition. We serve it exactly as we always have from when we first invented it”.

When I ask him why it’s called a cathedral he doesn’t have a ready answer.  Later on I read in another source that the name was coined in 1949 at the Maury’s arch rival, the English bar at the Hotel Bolivar, where the cocktail had really taken off, and was drunk by tourists, actors, millionaires, the great men of business and politics of the time, and members of European royal families.

We sit drinking in the atmosphere and the Pisco while Sr Cuadros tells more stories about the Maury, including his stint as lone caretaker of the building.

photo - Miguel Etchepare
taken from the Art of Peruvian Cuisine

“I was very close to the previous owners. Antonio Bergna, and Señora Kika de la Piedra. When they died their children argued over the inheritance, and in the eighties the hotel was left abandoned for several years. I stayed here to take care of the hotel during the years when it was closed.”

In 1998 the building was finally acquired by a Hong Kong based hotel group.

“At first they didn’t really know what they were buying into, in terms of the tradition and history of the place. But they have tried to respect it. And they talk to me about it. They have maintained the ambience and made improvements. For example they’ve changed the old beds in the rooms.  Actually we even have some old clients who complain about that. They say ‘I spent my honeymoon in this hotel, I want the same bed’.”

Over the years Cuadros has seen many people come through his bar. With the Ministry of Foreign affairs a few blocks away, many of his regulars are diplomats: “Now they’re ambassadors, but they’ve been coming here since the days when they were first in the diplomatic academy. I’ve met a lot of people and a lot come back after many years and they remember me. They say to me ‘you haven’t changed at all, what’s the secret, what do you drink?’ I tell them – ‘Pisco!’  

After a couple of simples I find myself flustering through my notes. I begin to repeat myself. It becomes imperative that I’ve got everything exactly right. Sr. Cuadros like all good barmen worldwide, patiently listens. He takes me once again step by step through the process.

“First take your blender. Don’t worry, anyone can do it. Everyone’s got a blender at home haven’t they?  Even if they haven’t got a cocktail shaker. Back in the old days we had three enormous triple sized blenders here, which we no longer have. They were German and we could do huge quantities in them.

So first put in your three measures of Pisco, then add one measure of sugar syrup, one measure of lemon juice, half an egg white, six to eight ice cubes, all together in the blender”.

Got it.

It’s time to go and I ask him one final question. What is it that he most enjoys about being a barman?

“I like being busy,” he says.  “And I like the way that the customers leave here happy. I think they feel young again”.

As for life at the Maury: “I’m the oldest here now – there are a couple in the kitchen but they don’t have as many years here as me. A couple of years ago, the only other guy here who started the same time as me died.  He sat down in a chair in the lobby after his shift had finished, went to sleep and never woke up. They called me at home to come into the hotel and there he was sitting there upright in the chair in the lobby. Who wouldn’t like to die like that? Now I’m the only one left – until God calls me too.”

Jan 2009

the best way to enjoy a catedral -with a friend

fig. 1 the old dining room at the Maury (skyscrapercity.com)
             taken from Rumbo al Bicentenario - blog de Juan Luis Orrego Penagos 
fig. 2  clay pisqueros used to store and transport Pisco 
              taken from  the blog Falca el Jazmin: el valor del buen beber