Luz de Umbría (Light of Umbría)

What you need to know

- It is a cozy place with country style, where you can enjoy a varied menu of Ecuadorian highlands’ typical dishes and also taste a delicious coffee, snacks, hot drinks, cold drinks, all this while you are accompanied by the warm atmosphere of a fireplace and the hospitality of its owners who will make you feel at home.

- All our gastronomic offer is elaborated with the best products of Umbría and its surroundings

Luz de Umbría Café is the meeting point to start the tourist route to Umbría protect forest. It offers an atmosphere of tranquility and comfort and a gastronomic proposal that rescues the ancestral flavors of Mejia canton:

• Locro de Papa (Potatoe Locro), Seco de Cordero, ají de queso, yahuarlocro or the delicious baked guinea pig, among others.
• And with a dish of their own creation: the exquisite Lamb Fritada.

Address:

- Aloasí - Marqueza de Solanda street S69 and Melchor Noroña

- 45 minutes from Quito, in the Canton Mejia in the Parish of Aloasi, a few steps from the Central Park

Attention:

- Saturdays, Sundays and holidays from 8:00 to 18:00

- Monday to Friday with reservation info@umbritours.com.ec

His grandmother showed him the way

Carlos Quinaluisa, remembers how his grandmother, on more than one occasion, showed him the path that would lead him to find happiness.

This "machacheño" spent his childhood visiting his grandmother who lived in the primary forest of Umbria in the heart of Canton Mejia. Among legends of ravines of terror, goblins and witches, his grandmother sowed in him a deep love for the forest and besides shared with him the secrets of the food knowledge from Aloasí.

Love for the forest, which he explored with his cousins, discovering magical corners and beautiful landscapes. Love for the typical food from the area, because with her, he prepared for the first time the lamb fritada that today national and international tourists enjoy in his café restaurant.

Carlos tells how tourists ask him what lamb is, and how they nod when he shows them pictures of a small sheep. This explanation, together with the nutritional and even medicinal properties of this meat, are the preamble for tourists to dare to taste this exquisite dish.

Mejía's true gastronomic tradition.

Carlos proudly tells the stories of his childhood. His eyes shine when he remembers how his cousins used to choose the lambs, how these were caught and how they learned to slaughter them. The reward for the effort required for the slaughter was the dishes prepared by his grandmother. The recipes for lamb fritters, yahuarlocro, beans, motes, guinea pigs are the legacy of his ancestors.

Positioning the forest of Umbria as a tourist attraction

When in 1994 forest of Umbria was declared a protected primary forest, all the Quinaluisa were happy, they thought that this was the opportunity to develop a tourist product. They asked the village priest for permission, implemented chamizas, cycle routes and opened their first cafeteria.

The death of their grandmother marked the end of this first family undertaking. After all, it was their grandmother's love that brought the whole family together. This was followed by the loss of the premises, which would now serve to accommodate the elderly of the sector.

But it was three years ago that Carlos could no longer put his dreams off and his grandparents' old house opened the door of Café-Restaurant Luz de Umbría. At first it was a café, but the tourists asked him for dishes, which he began to prepare one by one. It was only a matter of time before Carlos decided to take the step into the restaurant, today it offers a wide range of typical dishes in which he shyly expresses his grandmother's recipes.