
This delicious recipe for Peruvian Green Sauce or “Ají de Huacatay” comes from the Real Seeds website.
Peruvian Green Sauce is made using Huacatay (also known as Peruvian Black Mint), a herb used in Peru which the Real Seeds website describes as having a flavour somewhere between coriander and mint.
When I first grew it, I knew from the scent that I’d come across it before, but not having been to Peru, I couldn’t work out where. Its Latin name – Tagetes minuta – gave the game away. My mother used to grow it to keep nematodes away from tomatoes and help in the eternal fight against couch grass. It’s pretty good at both, but better as this green sauce.
Ingredients
- 1 rocoto chilli pepper – seeds removed
- 1 hot yellow Aji chilli pepper – also with the seeds removed!
- 1 cup of Huacatay leaves
- a small sprig of mint leaves
- lime juice
- lots of garlic
- olive oil
- salt
Method
- put everything except the oil in a blender
- blend the peppers, garlic and leaves together, adding oil until you get a smooth puree
- add salt to taste
- put in a squirty bottle and drizzle liberally like a green and spicy tomato ketchup. It’s great stirred through rice
If you haven’t got the right chillies growing, then you can substitute any medium-hot chillies and it is still delicious. And, I’ll be honest, I leave the seeds in!