La Jama / Magdalena

La Jama
Jr. Castilla 623
Magdalena - 784-3900
La Jama Website
Link to Facebook Page



RT here. La Jama won the “Best Lomo Saltado” title at last year’s Mistura festival; I knew that I needed to check them out.

The restaurant is a small hole-in-the-wall across the street from the Mercado in Magdelena. I think that there were 0nly six tables in the place. There’s no menu, you check the sign on the wall, and the cashier is also the waitress… it’s a small, mom & pop place.



I arrived at a quarter to 12 in the afternoon. That was a good thing, as the place was totally full by noon, with a crowd standing around, hoping a table would open up. I was alone at a 4-seat table, so I let some guy and his pretty girlfriend join me.

There were two lomo saltados on the menu - the regular (15 soles), and the award-winning one made from lomo fino (25 soles). I chose the famoso version. The first picture is the ‘fino’, the second one is the standard model.



It took a while (the small kitchen is swamped), but when it arrived, it was delicious. The girl at my table ordered the ‘regular’ version, and she seemed to enjoy it as well.

That, along with some chicha, was all I ate there. The dish was very good, but so is the Lomo Saltado in dozens (maybe hundreds) of other places. It certainly wasn’t worth schlepping all the way to Magdelena just for the food, but I combined it with an opportunity to walk around a different neighborhood, so I didn’t mind that much. Also, I got to try an award-winning dish!

I am not sure that I would jump in a taxi and head there again, but if you are in the neighborhood, by all means stop by. Many times, I have said that you can throw a rock in any direction, and wherever it lands will be able to put a good plate of food in front of you. La Jama certainly helps back up that statement.

 

The first time I heard of this place was when a friend of mine asked me if I knew of it. When I said “No” he commented “They’ve just won the 1st prize for the best Lomo Saltado at Mistura”. It was the year of 2011.

Living in Lima, I know that you can have great food almost anywhere and that no place is exceptionally better (or worse) than any other, it is more a matter of personal tastes but... first in Mistura... I checked the place in the web and found where it was; not my kind of restaurant, not in a neighborhood I visit frequently… I left it there. Then a Saturday, a few weeks ago, I found myself in the vicinity around lunch time and, with nothing better to do, I decided to give it a try.

The place is located just across the street of the "Mercado" of Magdalena and is really really small. Just four small tables some 2 ft. x 2 ft. in a 10 ft. x 14 ft. area and four more chairs at a bar, but a sign proudly proclaimed their Lomo Saltado was, indeed, the winner at Mistura 2011. I’m afraid I didn’t try it. I was, and still am, on a diet so the fried potatoes, fried onions, fried tomatoes and fried beef of the lomo saltado were out of the question, so I asked for chicken fillet “a la plancha” with green salad and strawberry juice... What can I say... Superb! I’ve been there twice again, once with a friend and once with a cousin, they tried the Lomo Saltado and the Bistec a lo Pobre and both proclaimed the small place to be a gem.

I’m sorry but I 0nly took photos the first time I went there (alone) so I do not have a photo of their flag dish but, believe me, it looks awesome, smells great and my friend said it really deserved the first place it got at Mistura. Just bear in mind that there are two Lomo Saltados at La Jama, there is the regular Lomo Saltado (US$ 6.40) and there is the award winning Lomo Saltado de Lomo Fino (US$ 9.70). The difference is in the quality of the beef, the more expensive one being more tender, but both look great. It is just that, being located where it is, they cannot afford having just the expensive option.