There’s mall food. And then there’s Aventura Mall food. Nestled in North Miami, the Aventura Mall is more of an adult playground than a mall.
Of course, you’ll find the staple Cheesecake Factory and Auntie Annie’s. But you’ll also have the opportunity to experience fine-dining sushi at Norimoto or upscale Mexican at Jacinta. And then somewhere in between, there’s Jarana on the Esplanade.
Jarana blends classic Peruvian dishes with global influences from Japanese, Chinese, and Italian cuisines. Plates feel both familiar and exciting. Drinks play a central role, with a strong focus on pisco, Peru’s signature spirit. It’s also secretly the reason we chose the spot amongst all the rest.
As for the food, there are several signature Peruvian classics to choose from. Getting right into it, if you’re only going to have one dish, make it the Cebiche Clasico – catch of the day in classic leche de tigre with choclo, sweet potato, and crunchy cancha:
Ceviche is one of Peru’s flagship dishes, especially along the coast. It is considered part of the country’s national heritage, with roots that go back to pre-Inca coastal cultures that were already marinating fish in acidic liquids like fermented corn or local fruits. When the Spanish arrived and brought citrus, lime replaced those earlier marinades and evolved into the modern ceviche and its leche de tigre.
This evolution gave rise to the flavors we know today. It’s bright, cold, and punchy. There’s a clean ocean flavor from the fish. It’s super fresh being raw, and then the complementary flavors hit:
- Chili adds a gentle, lingering heat, not a blow-your-head-off spice
- Onions bring a crisp, peppery bite
- Choclo is mild and starchy, sweet potato is creamy and sweet, both balancing the acidity
- Cancha is toasty and nutty, giving you crunch in every bite
- The leche de tigre itself is tangy, savory, lightly spicy, and so flavorful people often drink it from the bow
While it’s not the most authentic ceviche out there, Jarana does the dish justice. And significantly better than a couple of months’ prior ceviche experience. Peruvians are the gold standard, and I’d get this of all of our dishes here every time!
Ceviche is light, so we had to order a second appetizer. Enter the Papas a la Huancaína. One of Peru’s most popular home-style cooking dishes, it features tender steamed potatoes topped with creamy huancaína sauce, served with a hard-boiled egg and black olive.
I would just avoid this, point-blank. The dish arrives exactly as expected: rounds of soft potato laid out on the plate, draped in a thick yellow Huancaína sauce, with a wedge of hard-boiled egg and a black olive on the side.
The real problem is the sauce. Huancaína should be creamy, salty, and just a little sharp, a blend of cheese, aji amarillo, and milk that clings to the potatoes rather than burying them. At Jarana, it bulldozes them. The sauce is dense and blunt, yet somehow still bland.
The potatoes become little more than vehicles for an aggressive, one-note creaminess. The egg and olive, instead of adding contrast, feel like afterthoughts dropped on the plate out of duty.
Our waiter even tried to steer us to a different item on the menu, which should have been a sign. Leave this dish for home cooking (if you’re lucky enough), and skip it at Jarana.
Now for the main, something from the Los Clasicos menu: the Peruvian Stir-Fried Noodles.
Tallarin saltado chicken & shrimp, linguini stir-fried with red onion, tomato, and ají amarillio.
You can really see all of the fusions on this plate. It’s an easy dish to like, but a hard one to remember. The bowl arrives generous and glossy, linguini tangled with the proteins and spices. It eats like comfort food: savory, a little sweet from the onions and tomatoes, with just enough spice. On flavor alone, it is one of the more approachable plates on the menu.
The trouble is, it could be from almost anywhere. Swap out the ají amarillo, and you might as well be in a pan-Asian restaurant serving a “Latin-inspired” stir-fry. The Peruvian influence is more hinted at, and the result feels oddly generic on a menu that otherwise leans into its roots. Families will order it, and no one will send it back. But for a restaurant positioning itself as a window into Peru’s cooking, it is a missed opportunity.
I’d be willing to bet some of the other items, like the Lomo Saltado or even the Ceviche Tasting, would have been winners. Considering how good the Pisco bar is, I’d be willing to give it another try! Hope this one helps. 🐟 🍜
