Daring Cooks: Cevieche and Papas Rellenas

On to our 2nd Daring Cooks’ challenge! On to March’s challenge! This month was two classic Peruvian dishes, Ceviche and a Papas Rellenas.

Kathlyn of Bake Like a Ninja was our Daring Cooks’ March 2011 hostess. Kathlyn challenges us to make two classic Peruvian dishes: Ceviche de Pescado from “Peruvian Cooking – Basic Recipes” by Annik Franco Barreau. And Papas Rellenas adapted from a home recipe by Kathlyn’s Spanish teacher, Mayra.

D and I have always wanted to try Ceviche but both of us were completely scared! We aren’t the biggest fish eaters in the first place and for it to only be cooked with lime juice is scary. We went on a hunt to find some decent looking fish at the grocery store so that we would feel more comfortable not cooking it with heat. We luckily found some Cod to use. For the ceviche we sliced the fish up small and placed it into a food saver bag with some onions, the juice of some limes mixed with some chili paste.

We left this sealed up in the fridge until we finished making our Papas, I think it was about 30-45 minutes?? D made me try it first before he’d try it. The fish tasted ok… well it tasted just like lime; however, neither of us could get over the texture. So unfortunately we threw it down the drain. Luckily, we suspected we would do this so we only used one small piece of fish.

Now on to the Papas Rellenas... First, you pretty much make mashed potatoes and add an egg.

Now, for the filling, the original recipe included raisins and hard boiled egg in with the ground beef. Well, D and I have had a bad dinner experience with ground meat and a sweet element… so we wanted to stay away from raisins in our meat. Also, D is not a huge boiled egg fan. With the meat being the filling in a potato dish, Shepherd’s Pie popped into my head and wouldn't go away. We took some onion, celery, carrot, peas and mixed that in with our ground beef along with some spices.

Next you take your potato mixture and stuff it with the meat and form the potato shapes.

These are then breaded using flour, egg, and then Panko bread crumbs.

Finally, they are fried to a golden brown.

Now its time to eat!

These Papas were delish! These are something I’d like to try to make again with different fillings and probably baking them instead of frying them to make them healthier.

If you'd like to try either recipe go here!  You can also see what the other Daring Cooks accomplished!