Peruvian Potatoes In Creamy & Spicy Sauce

This is a common Peruvian dish called "Papas a la Huancaina" ("Potatoes of Huancayo") in Spanish. Huancaina refers to the city of "Huancayo," which is located in the middle part of Peru.
 
Ingredients (about 6 servings):

2 pounds Yukon Gold potatoes (I used the golf ball size potatoes)
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 heaping teaspoon ground turmeric
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 pound queso blanco, crumbled*
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper, or, if you're ambitious, 1 teaspoon Amarillo chili paste **
3/4 cup canned evaporated milk
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
pitted cured black olives
hard boiled eggs, halved
red or yellow bell pepper, seeded and cut into rings or strips
lettuce leaves

Wash and rinse the unpeeled potatoes, then put them into a pan and cover them with water. Bring to a boil and then reduce the heat, so that the potatoes simmer until just tender, but NOT mushy or ready to crumble. Let the potatoes cool a bit, if you want to peel them, but I prefer to leave the skins on. In a large skillet, heat the oil over medium heat. Add the onion and saute for two or three minutes before adding the turmeric and cayenne pepper (or chili paste), stir well. Cook for just one minute. Turn the heat to low and add the evaporated milk. Let the milk heat briefly (do not boil!) and add the cheese. Stir to mix well and continue stirring slowly until the cheese melts. Now stir in the mustard, salt and pepper. The sauce should be yellowish. You can put the sauce into a blender or use a stick blender to make the sauce very smooth. Place a lettuce leaf on each plate and serve some potato slices on the lettuce. Spoon some of the sauce over the potatoes, then top the potatoes with a few cured black olives, hard boiled egg halves and a couple of yellow bell pepper rings.

* Queso blanco is literally "white cheese," which it is, but it can vary somewhat in texture and taste from country to country. It is a mild fresh cheese with a salty and slightly tangy kind of taste and it generally crumbles pretty easily, and that is the type most used in Peru, where it is extremely common. Queso blanco is easily available in many supermarkets and Latino grocery stores, and some likely even have Peruvian queso blanco, if you seek authenticity.

 

** Amarillo chili paste is often available in Latino grocery stores, or in Latino food sections of some supermarkets, as well as from online sources.

WORD HISTORY:
Prompt-This compound word is formed with the fairly common Latin prefix "pro," meaning "in front, before, forward," which is related, through Indo European, to English "fore" and the prefix "for-," which are original English terms from its Germanic roots. The second part goes back to Indo European "em," which had the notion, "to take, to take on." This gave Latin "emere," meaning, "to take by acquisition;" thus also, "to buy." The two parts gave Latin "promere," meaning, "to take or bring forth, to bring into the open." Its participle form was "promptus," which meant, "evident, visible," and this gave Latin-based French the adjective "prompt," but with the meaning, "ready, quick" (from the idea of "brought forth, made visible"). English borrowed the word in verb form as "prompten" from Latin in the mid 1300s, and meaning, "to lead (bring) someone to do something." By the 1400s, the additional meaning of, "to help someone recall words in a play" ("to help them bring forth words") was added. The adjective form seems to have been borrowed from French (perhaps with Latin reinforcement?) in the first half of the 1400s, with the meaning, "quick, ready to do something," which then also provided the meaning, "on time," as in, "Please be prompt for work."