Papas Arrugadas and Mojo Verde
Papas arrugadas, alongside mojo verde, is a unique dish that originated with sailors in the Canary Islands. These salty potatoes pair well with the bright, slightly acidic sauce to create an excellent appetizer.

I would say that most of the savory dishes I share with you are in the snack, side dish or main dish categories.

This week’s is firmly in the realm of appetizers.

Papas arrugadas, or wrinkled potatoes, is a recipe that originated in the Canary Islands, when sailors would boil potatoes in seawater.

Traditionally, they are served with a red sauce, but the one I’m sharing with you has a green sauce instead. It comes from Chef Michael Voltaggio, who explained the history of the dish in a great video I watched.

The amount of salt on these potatoes is…well…intense. It’s a lot. I would say they are absolutely delicious for about four or five potatoes, and then the saltiness really hits, and it’s tough to want to eat any more of them—hence the appetizer category.

I certainly wouldn’t recommend these to anyone with a heart condition, but especially paired with the brightness of the sauce, they are worth a try otherwise.

You can find the original recipe on the Food Network site at https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/papas-arrugadas-with-mojo-verde-24877362. I added extra garlic in my version.

Papas Arrugadas and Mojo Verde
Print Recipe

Papas Arrugadas and Mojo Verde

Papas arrugadas, alongside mojo verde, is a unique dish that originated with sailors in the Canary Islands. These salty potatoes pair well with the bright, slightly acidic sauce to create an excellent appetizer.
Course: Appetizer
Cuisine: Spanish
Keyword: fresh cilantro, fresh garlic, fresh Italian parsley, Italian parsley, red wine vinegar, salt, salt potatoes, yellow potatoes, Yukon gold potatoes

Ingredients

Potatoes Ingredients

  • 1 pound small Yukon gold potatoes (think ping-pong ball size)
  • 4 cups water
  • 4 tablespoons salt

Mojo Verde Ingredients

  • 1 bunch fresh Italian parsley leaves about 2 cups
  • 1 bunch fresh cilantro leaves about 2 cups
  • 1 bunch green onions sliced (about 1 cup)
  • 6 to 8 cloves garlic
  • 1 cup olive oil
  • 1/3 cup red wine vinegar

Instructions

Potatoes Directions

  • Add the potatoes to a large pot. The more they can move around while the cook, the better. Add the water and salt (if you need more water or less, the ratio should be one tablespoon salt to each cup of water). You want the water to just cover the potatoes.
  • Place the pot on the stove on high heat, and just let the potatoes come to a boil, and keep boiling until the water is boiled out.
  • Swirl the potatoes in the pan to get a good crust of salt on them, and remove them to your serving dish.

Mojo Verde Directions

  • Add the parsley, cilantro, green onions, garlic and olive oil to a blender and blend until the mixture is smooth. Once it is all incorporated, blend in the red wine vinegar, and pour the sauce into your serving bowl.
  • Serve the potatoes alongside the mojo verde as a dipping sauce. Refrigerate any leftovers.

We really liked these, and the sauce is worth making, even if you don’t do the potatoes. It is delicious.

Actually, because it’s just the two of us and we obviously had a ton of leftover salted potatoes, Joey had the brilliant idea of mashing them, adding some sauteed onion and garlic confit and mixing the leftover sauce into them to create a great mashed potato that we ate alongside some steaks.

And for those very rare people who actually need a little more sodium in their diets, I can’t recommend these enough. For the rest of us, though, a few bites are just enough.

This first appeared in print Oct. 22, 2026.

Spice Up Your Life is a weekly newspaper column written by Lindsey Young in south central Kansas. If you are interested in sponsoring this column, please contact us through the “Contact Lindsey” link at the top of the page.