Recipes from Bolivia

Papas Rellenas (Stuffed Potatoes)

6 medium-size potatoes

1/2 cup flour

1 egg

1 medium-size onion

3/4 pound ground beef

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon pepper

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon oregano

2 tablespoons water

2 hard-boiled eggs

Raisins and olives, if desired

Peel and cook potatoes in salted water and then drain well. Mash potatoes and then add flour and egg. Mix well until blended. Set aside while doing next step.

Chop onion and place with ground beef in a frying pan. Brown onion and ground beef slowly. Add salt, pepper, paprika, oregano, and water, and simmer mixture for fifteen minutes.

Cover both hands with flour. Pat a ball of potato mixture flat until it is a 1/4-inch-thick cake. Place one tablespoon of meat mixture on the potato cake. Add a slice of hard-boiled egg to top of meat mixture. (You may also want to add raisins and sliced olives at this time.) Carefully roll up the potato cake and seal on both ends. Then roll cake in flour. Fry rolled cakes in deep hot fat. Serve with powered sugar sprinkled on cakes.

Cheese filling: You may want to add a one-square-inch piece of nippy cheese to the inside of the potato mixture.

Humitas

1 dozen ears of corn

1 medium-size onion

2 tablespoons margarine

1/2 teaspoon sweet basil

3 hot green peppers

2 tablespoons sugar

corn cob leaves (large)

Grate kernels of corn off the ears. Cook chopped onion in margarine until tender and add sweet basil. Add cooked onion to grated kernels of corn.

Divide the corn mixture into two parts, and add chopped hot green peppers to one part and sugar to the other.

Soften the large corn leaves (husks) in boiling water. When softened, place a tablespoon of corn on each leaf. Fold leaf over and tie with string.

Cover bottom of a large pot with corn cobs. Barely cover the cobs with boiling salted water. Place humitas on top of cobs and cover the pot tightly. Steam the humitas for forty minutes. Serve immediately.

(Note: If you have humitas left over, they may be used the following day. Serve them with a tomato sauce.)