Food to Crow About at San Fernando

In my travels along Highway 99, I’ve made a couple of passing glances at a little strip mall near 208th Street SW in Lynnwood. One end of the petite collection of businesses beckoned to me with the sign “San Fernando Roasted Chicken.” I had made a mental note to check out the place sometime, though admittedly that list is packed with dozens of other Snohomish County restaurants.

Much to my surprise, while driving this week on Rainier Avenue South in Seattle—nowhere near Lynnwood—I spied a second San Fernando restaurant. Research determined that the joint's pair of locations specialize in Peruvian fare, the featured offering being rotisserie chicken. I wondered, with two locations already operational, is Peruvian pollo poised to be the next poultry sensation?

San Fernando vaulted to the top of my to-try list. I returned to Lynnwood to investigate.

The Peruvian eatery, known formally as Pollos a la Brasa San Fernando, doesn’t look like much from the outside. Inside, the mostly barren brick-red walls of the L-shaped dining room house only seven tables. Yet clearly the secret is out on this unassuming hole-in-the-wall as by 6:15 p.m. on a Wednesday the place was full to capacity. Fortunately for patrons not able to score a table at this tiny hot spot, take-out orders are available.

Neither my dining partner nor I recalled having before had Peruvian fare, though several dishes on San Fernando’s menu were familiar at least in name. We started out with two selections from the appetizer list, the first being a concoction called Salchipapas ($5), thinly sliced disks of fried hot dog paired with a mountain of golden French fries. The name is a hybrid of the Spanish words salchica (sausage) and papas (potatoes).

Basically, it’s genius.

The mammoth portion was easily enough for four (or six!) to share as a starter, the meat and potatoes dressed up with our table’s quartet of sauces. We mixed and matched ketchup, mayonnaise, yellow mustard and a pale green sauce boasting fire that defied its serene appearance. I’m confident the Salchipapas covered my month's USDA quota for sodium, but it was a fun (and arguably kid-pleasing) dish nonetheless.

Our second appetizer was a tamale ($4.50) containing pork, hard-boiled egg and olives. I believe the olives were of the green variety, but truthfully I’m not sure I actually ate one because the tamale’s fillings were pretty scarce. That said, the masa corn dough was moist, fresh and nicely accented by the tangy vinegar marinade soaked up from the plate’s quick-pickled red onions.

To digress for just a moment, many years ago, I went on a date with a Peruvian fellow, and we had a dinner of Chinese food at Hing Loon in Seattle’s International District. He proceeded to dispense to me an education on Peru’s food culture that started out rather obtuse in advising me that Peru and Mexico are not one and the same.

The lecture turned more informative, however, when my date explained that there is in fact a great deal of Chinese influence in Peru’s cuisine. In the 1800s, there was an influx of Chinese workers who relocated to the South American country for employment as laborers; the cooking methods and ingredients of the Chinese immigrants’ homeland melted into Peru’s culinary landscape.

This background on Peru’s flavors thus made it unsurprising to me that one of San Fernando’s menu offerings was Arroz Chaufa, described as a Cantonese fried rice featuring the likes of chicken, sliced hot dogs, and flavors of green onion and soy. My dining companion and I opted for a different Chinese-influenced dish, San Fernando’s Lomo Saltado ($9.50). Strips of sirloin steak marinated with garlic and soy sauce were stir-fried with strips of red onion and tomatoes, complemented in Chinese fashion by a mound of white rice. The tender meat was bold in taste, its juices imparting flavor to the “fried potatoes” (aka short French fries) cushioning the dish.

Needless to say, we did not leave San Fernando without trying its trademark dish, the roasted chicken. Much like our plates of Salchipapas and Lomo Saltado, our half chicken ($9) was a generous affair accompanied by salad and once again, french fries. One taste of the chicken confirmed why it's the centerpiece of San Fernando's lineup. The chicken's crisp golden-brown skin was roasted perfection, as was the juicy, luscious meat it revealed. The flavors of garlic, salt, pepper and a hint of cumin were simple yet sublime. Though the plate's salad was little more than shredded iceberg lettuce topped with a bit of tomato and cucumber and a drizzle of Ranch dressing, it was a fitting bit of crunch and creaminess to round out the dinner.

Based on my encounter with Lynnwood's San Fernando location, I'm sold on Peru's pollo and my interest in the culture's other dishes has been piqued. Let the Peruvian roasted chicken domination commence.