By David Windsor

Our waiter, Hector, glides around the restaurant with a smile. Two young Peruvian boys with wild, youthful eyes stare down at us from inside a plain frame on the wall. Relaxed and content I can almost begin to gloss over the oversized television screen in the corner and furniture far more suited to a prep school canteen rather than a South American restaurant in the heart of a European capital city.

The meal begins with appetisingly salty nuts combined with a chilli sauce that simultaneously burns and delights the pallet. A delicious start. On recommendation I order the 'Aji a la gallina' and my eating companion the 'Lomo a lo pobre'. And they were tasty. Not, eat-every-last-morcel-and-sit-back-with-a-satisfied-sigh tasty, but tasty nonetheless. Both dishes were a couple of quid over a tenner; which for a full-plate of food in a central London restaurant is not to be sniffed at.

Hector's description of our desert appears to include every last one of the “650 native species of Peruvian fruit” mentioned in the menu. The ‘helado de lucuma’ is an utterly delightful combination of flavours, book-marking the meal with a nutty after taste.

Tito's twelve year history of success that has "not been touched by the recession" is impressive. Indeed, even in the early darkness of a Sunday afternoon in December there were more than enough tables decorated with Inca Cola and chattering Peruvian voices to support that claim. But one cannot help but feel that this restaurant is serving within itself. The menu claims Titos offers “authentic flavours from one of the most diverse and mouth-watering cuisines in the world” yet “lovely people, decent food" was the concluding sentence I murmured as Hector waved us goodbye and we strolled out into the wintery London air.