La Cevicheria

The Infinite Adaptability of Raw Fish and Citrus

March 30, 2016By Heidi EllisonRestaurants

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The dining room at La Cevicheria.

The Cevicheria has taken over the generous ex-industrial spaces that used to house the restaurant Pan. Its pleasing decor includes a funky-chic pink wall that hasn’t been painted in years and a wall of climbing vines, complete with a blooming passion flower, big windows and interesting hanging light fixtures.

At lunchtime, the Cevicheria offers an attractive lunch special for €16 that includes the daily special ceviche dish, a side and a dessert.

Strangely, since the restaurant was nearly empty and there is no cooking – just marinating – involved in making ceviche, it took quite a long time for our orders to arrive. The server acknowledged the wait by giving us

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a free bowl of extra-delicious guacamole with chips “pour faire patienter.” We weren’t bothered by the delay since we were too busy chatting, but anyone on a tight lunch hour would have been.

When our dishes finally arrived, we were all pleased with our choices, especially Daisy (founder of THAT museum treasure hunts), who had ordered the lunch special. Its Thai

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sauce with coconut was brilliant, and the fish sparklingly fresh, as it was in all of our dishes. The fish was not marinated very long and was close to raw, which is apparently how it is done these days (I have read that marinating raw fish does not kill bacteria anyway). Her side

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dish of quinoa salad seemed rather bland to me.

I had the traditional Peruvian-style ceviche with sea bream, leche de tigre (marinade of lime juice, onion, chili peppers, salt, pepper and fish juice), red onions, celery, corn and sweet potatoes. As a side dish, I ordered the puréed sweet potatoes with a topping of

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melted cheddar cheese, an excellent choice as the warm, sweet, mild dish was the perfect complement to the cold, spicy, acidic ceviche. Both were delicious.

Alison was very happy with her tiradito (sliced raw fish rather than cubed as in ceviche), which she had ordered especially for the

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pomegranates it contained, along with red peppers, coriander, kaffir lime, coconut cream and red onions.

The desserts were also topnotch: creamy

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fromage blanc with mango sauce, soothing (but a tad too sweet for my taste) rice pudding with cinnamon and raisins, and a divine chocolate pudding with a crunchy topping.

If you’re in the mood for raw fish but want a change from sushi, the Cevicheria is a great alternative. Ceviche is an infinitely adaptable dish, and they have done an excellent job of adapting it. Everything we ate there was fresh, tasty and made with top-quality ingredients. The house has another location on the trendy Rue Bachaumont in the second arrondissement.

 

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