Acknowledgments
Lifetime Achievement Award
Óscar Velarde, A glorious life
“I am what I do,” says Óscar Velarde, the creator of La Gloria, the cult favorite Miraflores restaurant that turns 30 this year. To think that it all began, according to him, with the simple desire to live life; perhaps that’s where the name came from.
For Óscar, cooking is “fun and games,” a way of life. He says it almost without thinking, because it’s something he feels in his skin, his blood, his memory. And he loves cooking, being in the kitchen, talking with chefs, setting challenges for himself, always poking around, first here, then there.
“I started the restaurant more as a place to hang out than to cook,” he confesses. Although it may seem strange, this man— with his background in an endless varietyof other activities that have little t o do with cooking—is profoundly grateful for having discovered his reason for living. Velarde’s other companies went bankrupt, and he wasn’t quite sure what to do. He started thinking about what he liked most in the world: having friends over to his house. La Gloria came into his life (and ours) thanks to that crucial moment, leading him to open a spot that would soon become indispensable, a classic on the Peruvian culinary scene. 30 years have passed!
Óscar says that to cook is to “live life.” And that’s what our time on this earth is all about: living, and most of all, doing what you truly love. The lord and master of La Gloria is happy with his exclusive little restaurant, with its ten cooks and six waiters.
The 50-dish menu is treated like a treasure. Great care must be taken when considering any sort of change. The fans—as he calls his guests—will complain if they come in one day and no longer find their cherished fideuà, a traditional Spanish dish similar to paella but with noodles instead of rice, among other details that make it unrivaled. Óscar’s version is done Catalan-style, and bears his unmistakable signature.
He cooks constantly, “even more so now.” With a smile, he says, “I started with Mediterranean food and now I make whatever I feel like.”
La Gloria del Campo in Pachacamac and La Gloria in Quito, Ecuador, are his other two creations. What does a man like this, who seems to have achieved it all, dream of? His answer: “Continuing to discover myself.” And that includes the infinite world of cuisine.
