Latin American

Sausage and Potato Mini-Turnovers The dough for these little turnovers may be pressed either by hand or with a tortilla press.

This Argentinian sauce is served with both grilled meats and fish. Its spice and herbal flavors go well with the smokiness imparted by the grill, and the vinegar’s bite cuts through the richness of steak. This recipe can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Sofrito is a sautéed vegetable mixture used as a seasoning in much of Latin America and the Caribbean. It typically contains garlic, onion, bell pepper, coriander, and sometimes tomatoes or ham, although the recipe varies among countries. In our version, we've omitted the oil normally used to cook the ingredients and instead simply puréed the vegetables. This recipe was created to accompany Grilled Citrus Salmon. Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

We adapted this gorgeous salad, full of intriguing flavors and textures and so colorful it looks like a fireworks display, from a recipe that Mexican chef María Dolores Torres Yzábal contributed to México, The Beautiful Cookbook.

Beef Stew Editor's Note: This recipe and introductory text are excerpted from The Exotic Kitchens of Peru, by Copeland Marks. We've also added some tips of our own below. For a complete guide to Peruvian cuisine, click here. This is a special dish that is only prepared on Mondays. My teacher told me that everyone she knew cooked Espesado on Mondays, a ritual that is universally accepted. In the clean and complete Central Market of Chiclayo, a number of the small eating shops were dispensing this to diners who knew what they wanted and expected it on Mondays.

This dish is a perfect example of Villaran Novoandina ("New Andean") style of cooking. Ingredients native to Peru, such as escolar, aji, and tropical fruit, are combined in whimsical, creative ways. The presentation is very contemporary, yet the bright, satisfying contrast of crisp fish, sweet fruit, and spicy sauce is true to Peruvian flavors.

These tiny tamales can be made a day or two ahead with no compromise. Corn is the essential flavor here, so be sure yours is sweet and fresh by tasting each ear. In the absence of fresh corn you can use frozen, but you should taste that, too.

Ground almonds create texture and thicken the sauce of pollo almendrado—our homage to New York's large Mexican and Central American population.

Try Komal’s pan de elote recipe with fresh corn and rice flour; a Mexican sweet corn cake topped with silky corn whipped cream.

This Puerto Rican sancocho recipe is hearty, flavorful, and loaded with falling-off-the-bone beef, tender carrots, potatoes, squash, corn, plantain, and yuca.

Chicken thighs cooked inside parchment packets alongside onions and oranges makes for a flavorful dinner that’s almost entirely hands off.

Part silky flan, part decadent chocolate cake, chocoflan, or impossible cake, as it is sometimes called, feels like a magic trick, inverting in the oven as it bakes.

This smoky, chile-laden salsa works both as a marinade and glaze for grilled chicken thighs.

This refried-bean-slathered gordita with all the fixings is a Mazatlán specialty.