January 2012

To make awareness of umami and educate Peruvian people about umami, UIC organized Umami Charity Dinner at Lima, Peru.

Peru is known as the country of origins of popular ingredients such as tomato, potato and chili, and the variety of the vegetables, fishes and shellfishes are often used in Peruvian cuisine. It means that Peruvian cuisine may be healthy because of their low calorie. These facts allowed that, in the last few years, Peruvian cuisine have been getting a lot of international popularity and Peruvian chefs have been becoming very influential opinion leaders not only in the culinary field but also in the media.
Therefore, to make an awareness of umami in Peru and educate Peruvian famous chefs about umami well, Umami Information Center and Ajinomoto Foundation Peru invited two Japanese renowned chefs, Mr. Nobuyuki Matsuhisa, the owner and chef of almost 30 Nobu worldwide restaurant, and Mr. Yoshihiro Murata, the owner and chef of Kikunoi Kaiseki restaurant, and held the Umami Charity Dinner at Lima on Dec 1st I in cooperation with Peruvian famous chefs, Mr. Toshiro Konishi, Mr. Pedro Schiaffino, Mr. Virgilio Martinez, Mr. Mitsuharu Tsumura, Ms. Astrid Guche, and Mr. Renato Peralta. In addition, to improve the bad nutrition in an agrarian community, UIC and Ajinomoto Foundation donate the benefits of this dinner to United Nations World Food Program.

During the test cooking and preparation of dishes, to succeed in this dinner, all the participating chefs discussed about the umami rich ingredients and the cooking techniques to enhance the umami in their dishes. We thought that it might help to know umami much better. We also succeeded in getting the media's attention. El Comercio, the biggest newspaper in Peru, voluntary published three articles about this dinner. The first and second ones were based on interviews with Mr. Matsuhisa and Mr. Murata. In these articles, Mr. Matsuhisa explained about umami and its history, and Mr. Murata described that umami was not only one of the most important factors in cooking but also gives health benefits to Japanese dishes.

At the Umami Charity Dinner, the chefs contributed with their own umami rich dishes and gave attractive information about umami. So we made sure that all guests got a very special umami experience and kept this dinner as an unforgettable memory in their mind.