You can hide a superfood inside pleasure.
En las alturas andinas, los granos que durante generaciones alimentaron en silencio a comunidades enteras comienzan a encontrar un nuevo lenguaje: el del helado artesanal. Roger Choque y su esposa Yina fundaron Yipis hace una década con regalos de boda y una técnica ancestral aymara, transformando quinoa, cañihua y tarwi en postres helados sin preservantes ni colorantes artificiales. Lo que empezó como una apuesta incierta en la Plaza San Martín se ha convertido en un puente entre el conocimiento agrícola andino y los paladares contemporáneos de Lima, Cusco y Puno. Yipis no vende solo helado: propone que lo antiguo y lo nutritivo pueden ser también lo deseable.
- Una pareja con deudas y un carrito de acero inoxidable se planta en una plaza limeña sin saber si alguien querrá probar helado de quinoa — la incertidumbre es total.
- Un reportaje televisivo transforma la timidez inicial en filas de clientes, revelando que existe un apetito real por productos sin artificios, enraizados en la tradición andina.
- La pandemia borra dieciocho meses de trabajo y obliga a Yipis a mudarse a una calle menos visible, pero su clientela fiel los encuentra de todas formas.
- La marca expande su presencia a Cusco y Lima con sabores que pocos competidores se atreven a intentar: cañihua con chocolate blanco, maracuyá con mango, arándano con hibisco.
- Para 2025, Yipis apuesta por conquistar el mercado limeño con picolés innovadores, confiando en que más consumidores estén listos para arriesgarse con sabores que nunca han probado.
Roger Choque comenzó Yipis en enero de 2015 empujando un rodillo de acero por la Plaza San Martín de Lima, con helado de quinoa adentro y dinero prestado encima. Su esposa Yina estaba a su lado. Ese primer día vendieron 70 soles y se fueron a casa con dudas. Pero un reportaje televisivo sobre sus helados de quinoa, coca y tocosh cambió el rumbo: al día siguiente había filas. Habían encontrado algo que la gente quería sin saber que lo buscaba.
La historia de Yipis es inseparable de la historia familiar con la quinoa. Los padres de Roger la cultivaban en el altiplano puneño y su madre la llevaba a Lima en hojuelas. Cuando Roger estudió ingeniería alimentaria, la familia ya producía pop, barras energéticas y harinas instantáneas. Pero fue el matrimonio con Yina lo que derivó en el helado. La técnica que adoptaron venía de las comunidades aymara del sur de Puno, donde se congelaban golosinas con un rodillo de calamina soldado con estaño, sin electricidad. Roger y Yina modernizaron los materiales y le dieron nombre a la marca con las iniciales de sus propios nombres: Yina y Pío, el segundo nombre de Roger.
El festival Mistura los descubrió y durante cuatro años regresaron, tejiendo vínculos con productores de frutas de todo el país. En 2018 abrieron su primera tienda en Lima. Luego llegó la pandemia y cerró todo por dieciocho meses. Al reabrir, se mudaron a una calle menos transitada esperando lo peor. Sus clientes los encontraron igual.
La filosofía de Yipis es de contención: nada de fudge ni caramelo encima, solo la mejor fruta disponible — guanábana de Chanchamayo, chirimoya de Huarochirí, lúcuma de Huaraz — y los granos andinos que pocos se atreven a usar en helados. Hoy operan en Puno, Cusco y Lima, con picolés de arándano e hibisco, cañihua con relleno de chocolate blanco y quinoa con salsa de mora. Roger observa que Lima aún prefiere los sabores clásicos, mientras Cusco y Puno abrazan los granos andinos con más naturalidad. Pero él es paciente. Este verano, con el calor creciendo en Lima, Yipis apuesta a que más personas estén listas para probar algo que sabe a tierra propia.
Roger Choque stands in the Plaza San Martín on a January afternoon a decade ago, pushing a steel roller across the pavement. Inside it, quinoa ice cream. His wife Yina is beside him. They have no idea if anyone will buy what they're selling, and they're nervous about the borrowed money they've already spent. This is how Yipis began—not in a factory, not with investors, but with a wedding gift converted into stainless steel and a willingness to look foolish in public.
The story of Yipis is also the story of quinoa itself. In the Andean highlands where Roger's family farmed, the grain was once invisible to the world. His parents sold it in flakes. His mother carried those flakes to Lima and opened doors. When Roger studied food engineering, the family began transforming quinoa into pop, energy bars, instant flours, crackers. But it was still a regional product, still fighting for relevance. The world had not yet decided that quinoa mattered.
Then Roger married Yina, and they decided to make ice cream. The technique they borrowed came from the Aymara communities of southern Puno, where people had been freezing treats for generations using a calamina roller soldered with tin—no electricity required, just cold air and patience. Roger and Yina took that ancient method, upgraded it with modern materials, and married it to the superfood their family had been cultivating for years. The name Yipis came from the first letters of their names: Yina and Pío, Roger's middle name.
Their debut in Lima on January 18, 2015, was humble. They sold 70 soles that first day and went home wondering how they would repay their debt. But a local news segment about their quinoa, coca, and tocosh ice cream changed everything. The next afternoon, lines formed. They had stumbled onto something people wanted—ice cream without artificial colors or preservatives, made from grains their grandmothers knew. Mistura, the country's largest food festival, noticed. They were invited to participate, and for four years they returned, building relationships with fruit producers across Peru.
Success brought a physical location. In 2018, they opened their first shop in Lima. They had a storefront in Puno's city center. Then the pandemic arrived and erased their plans. They closed for eighteen months. When they reopened, they moved to a less visible street, expecting the worst. Instead, their customers found them. The shop filled on weekends. People had learned to love what Yipis was offering, and they came back.
The brand's philosophy is rooted in restraint. In Puno, ice cream traditionally came topped with fudge and caramel. Yipis rejected that. They sourced the best fruit they could find—guanabana from Chanchamayo, custard apples from Huarochirí, lucuma from Huaraz—and let the fruit speak. It took time for customers to understand that philosophy, but they did. Now, in 2025, Yipis operates in Puno, Cusco, and Lima, with popsicles that combine flavors most competitors don't attempt: maracuyá and mango, blueberry and hibiscus, lime and mint, pineapple and orange. There are quinoa popsicles with blueberry sauce and cañihua with white chocolate filling.
Roger notes that Lima customers still lean toward traditional flavors—lucuma, passion fruit, strawberry. Cusco and Puno embrace the Andean grains more readily. But he is patient. He and Yina interact directly with customers, gathering feedback, adjusting, innovating. They opened a location in Cusco's Mercado del Sol in June 2024 and found unexpected fortune when a well-known restaurateur set up next door and drew crowds. This summer, as Lima's heat builds, Yipis is betting that more people will take the risk on flavors they've never tried. The brand's entire premise rests on that bet: that people want something real, something rooted in the earth they walk on, something that tastes like home.
Citas Notables
With my wife we always remember the beginning of Yipis fighting and arguing, because we went out without really knowing how the roller worked.— Roger Choque, founder of Yipis
Starting from zero even in your own town is complicated: you have to make the product known until people become familiar with it.— Roger Choque
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why ice cream? Why not keep selling quinoa flour and energy bars?
Because ice cream is democratic. Everyone eats it. It's a vehicle for something people might otherwise dismiss. You can hide a superfood inside pleasure.
The pandemic closed you down for eighteen months. How did you survive that?
We went back to Puno, to where we started. We had to rebuild trust with people who already knew us. It was harder than you'd think—even in your own town, you have to remind people why they should care.
Your customers in Lima still choose strawberry and passion fruit. Does that frustrate you?
No. It tells us where people are. Lima is more cautious. Puno and Cusco grew up with these grains. They understand them. We're patient. We show up, we talk to people, we listen.
You borrowed money from friends and family for your first Mistura appearance. What if it had failed?
We would have owed them money and had to figure out something else. But Yina and I believed in what we were making. You can't fake that belief. People taste it.
What do you want Yipis to be in five years?
A name people think of when they want something that tastes like Peru—not like a factory, but like someone's grandmother's kitchen. We're not trying to be everywhere. We're trying to be real.