Crowd favorite Peruvian restaurant Colca has opened a second location at North Bund, expanding their reach to Hongkou and making it easier for those traveling from Pudong.
About Colca & The North Bund Location
Colca Hengshan Lu opened in April 2017 and has since become a beloved destination for fans of serial restaurateur Eduardo Vargas’ honest Peruvian cuisine.
The new North Bund location evokes the same ethos of the original—bright colors, casual yet modern, fair prices, and warm hospitality.
It’s at Sinar Mas Plaza, a new mall opposite the W Shanghai hotel and where Wolfgang’s Steakhouse is located. Here, Colca boasts a large outdoor seating area with a bar, and plans to add a children’s play area and more affordable cocktails to the outdoor lounge.
If you thought the space was big, they also have an events/banquet space across the restaurant that seats 180 people comfortably, 220 people at capacity.
Peruvian with Mediterranean Accents
The concept and the food is very much the same—Peruvian cuisine with Mediterranean and Latin American accents. Of those are traditional Peruvian fare of tiraditos and ceviche alongside Josper-grilled meats, fish, and other seafood. It’s all made to share!
Peruvian-native Executive Chef Abel Matos is on hand to ensure that everything is running in tip-top shape.
Here’s what to expect:
Croquettas to start the meal. These make for a good bar snack. I prefer the mushroom-truffle combination.
Next up is a Scallop-Chia Tiradito (¥118). These exquisite raw scallops are lightly torched and served with chia seed sauce, red chili, crispy nuts, and avocado purée. I suggest eating this first—the flavors are delicate and punchier dishes might overwhelm it.
A punchier alternative is the Ceviche Apasionado (¥98). Fresh, thick cubs of tuna are quick cured in a passion fruit boosted tigre de leche with crispy shallots and panca aioli. The crunch from the passion fruit adds to the experience. It’s quite zingy and high in acidity, a requirement of “tiger’s milk” to quick-cook raw fish in traditional ceviche.
The Causa Chalaca Del Mar (¥108) is a vibrant dish of tuna tataki, fresh raw tuna that’s torched and sliced, served with thin slices of octopus and crispy deep-fried squid. Accompanying is spinach potato causa, Peruvian yellow chili sauce, avocado purée, and quail egg. There’s a lot going on and the octopus almost outshines the tuna.
The Tuna Steak (¥108) is a pretty safe dish and would do well to appease any picky diners at the table. Served with sautéed spinach and kale, crispy quinoa, huancaina chimichurri, and radish. (Huancaina sauce is a classic Peruvian sauce made with bright yellow aji amarillo peppers.)
Don’t miss the Octopus al Josper (¥128). Grilled in the Josper, the octopus is buttery-tender and is imbued with the smokiness of the grill. Served with potato causa, kalamata aioli, and olive powder.
Chaufa de Mariscos (¥98) aka chaufan/fried rice is a typical Peruvian dish that originated from the influx and integration of Chinese immigrants to Peru. This is pure comfort food—a massive bowl of fried rice with seafood, omelet, spring onions, and Peruvian wontons. It goes great with the mains as a hearty filler.
For the main event, there’s the 500g Bife Ancho Rib-Eye (¥428). This is a crowd-pleaser, and an easy decision for me—Argentinian rib-eye grilled to medium rare, served with roasted potatoes and vinaigrette salad. It comes with an additional stone plate so you can grill the meat to your preferred level of done-ness.
Additional sides are ¥58 each, including garlic-perfumed spinach and soy-sautéed mushrooms.
What’s For Dessert?
For dessert, there’s the Amazing Cheesecake (¥68), which is really dubbed “amazing” for good reason. It’s a creamy slice of light and fluffy cheesecake with added hazelnuts, a scoop of milk ice cream, and drizzled over with burnt butter.
There’s one for chocolate lovers, the Colca Chocolate Mousse (¥88), made with smooth Peruvian cacao 62% mousse with milk ice cream, dulce de leche sauce, and dark chocolate. And Peanut World (¥78) made with peanut butter mousse with peanut chocolate crumble, yogurt snow, raspberry jelly and raspberry sorbet.
Though, I can never resist Eduardo’s most famous flan. I forget how many years he’s served this, but it’s close to two decades.
Special Deals This March
Colca North Bund is offering a March special—get a free cocktail from the happy hour menu and a complimentary bite. Every Wednesday to Sunday from 11:30am until 10pm all March.
In addition, they also have a wide variety of lunch sets to satiate the heavy flow of office workers within the mall and nearby.
Colca North Bund
Address: Sinar Mas Plaza, 3/F, 588 Dongchangzhi Lu, near Xinjian Lu 东长治路588号白玉兰广场3楼， 近新建路
Tel: 65933666
Hours: 11:30am-10pm (Closed Mon-Tue in March)
