Amaz

About Amaz

When Pedro Miguel Schiaffino opened Amaz in Miraflores, he was completing a project that had occupied him for years: how to bring the Peruvian Amazon — one of the world's great reservoirs of biodiversity, and one of its most underrepresented cuisines — to urban Lima in a form that was both accessible and authentic. Schiaffino, known in culinary circles as "the jungle chef," had already explored the territory at his fine-dining restaurant Malabar. Amaz was his democratic statement: the same Amazonian ingredients, a more relaxed format, a menu that groups could share and explore together.

The restaurant occupies a warm, low-lit space on Av. La Paz, decorated with textures and materials that evoke the rainforest — natural fibres, wood, an atmosphere that is urban and intimate simultaneously. The kitchen works with ingredients that most diners will never have encountered: paiche, the giant Amazonian fish that Schiaffino helped make famous through sustainable aquaculture partnerships with indigenous communities; camu camu, the super-acidic Amazonian berry that appears in both kitchen preparations and the cocktail bar; huacatay, a native black mint that perfumes sauces and marinades; bijao leaves used for wrapping and steaming in the tradition of patarashca.

Schiaffino received the American Express Icon Award from Latin America's 50 Best Restaurants — recognition not just of his cooking but of his decade-long effort to protect Amazonian ingredients and the communities that produce them. Eating at Amaz is, in a meaningful sense, a political act as much as a culinary one.

Standout Dishes

The patarashca — catfish fillet cooked in a bijao leaf parcel over charcoal — is the table's first commandment. Fragrant, perfectly moist, wrapped in smoke and leaf oils, it is one of Peru's great traditional preparations brought to restaurant precision. Alongside it: tacacho (fried plantain balls with smoked pork, dense and savoury), chunks of paiche stewed in coconut milk with Amazonian herbs, and a series of ceviches that replace the Pacific's corvina with freshwater fish from the jungle's rivers. The cocktail menu, built on Amazonian botanicals — aguaje, camu camu, ungurahui palm fruit — is serious enough to warrant arriving early for drinks.

Why It Works for These Occasions

For Birthday celebrations, Amaz has a natural festivity to it — a menu designed for sharing, a cocktail list that encourages orders in rounds, and an atmosphere that feels simultaneously exotic and convivial. Groups of six to ten eat brilliantly here, passing plates across a table that inevitably becomes an exploration of Peru's least-known culinary geography.

For Team Dinner, the sharing-plate format means everyone gets involved in the meal. The distinctiveness of Amazonian cuisine gives colleagues from outside Peru something genuinely novel to discover together — a unifying experience that a conventional restaurant dinner cannot provide.

For First Date, Amaz offers precisely the right balance: interesting enough to generate conversation, warm enough in ambience to set the right tone, accessible in price without sacrificing quality.