Papas a la Huancaina

Papa a la Huancai­na, (potatoes Huancayo style/Potatoes in Spicy Cheese Sauce) are boiled yellow potatoes covered with an even yellower spicy and creamy cheese sauce, and accompanied by hard-boiled eggs and black olives. This easy recipe is so popular that you can find the Huancai­na sauce everywhere: as a dip for crudites, quail eggs, corn, or fried yucca, as a sauce for spaghetti or risotto (surprisingly good), over Causa Limeña (I love this one), with steak.

The dish is typically served cold as a starter over lettuce leaves and garnished with black olives, white corn kernels and hard-boiled egg quarters.

In the south of Peru (Cuzco, Puno, Arequipa), it is served with ocopa rather than Huancaína sauce, made from freshly toasted peanuts, fried onions and tomatoes, ají amarillo, cream or condensed milk, crushed crackers or dried bread, salt, and huacatay (Tagetes minuta).

Because it is served cold, papa a la huancaína is a favorite food of Peruvians to take on picnics and trips.