Colombia
33 recipes to explore
Huevos Pericos (Colombian Scrambled Eggs)
Colombia's everyday breakfast: soft scrambled eggs cooked with sweet tomato and long green onion until creamy and flecked with colour. Ready in 15 minutes and perfect with an arepa and hot chocolate.
Calentado Paisa (Colombian Breakfast Rice and Beans)
Yesterday's rice and beans fried together with hogao until warm and slightly crisp, crowned with a fried egg and served with chorizo, arepa and avocado. The hearty breakfast of Antioquia.
Caldo de Costilla (Beef Short Rib Broth)
A restorative, clear beef broth slowly simmered with short ribs, potatoes and long green onion, finished with plenty of fresh coriander. A Bogotá breakfast classic — and Colombia's favourite cure after a long night.
Arepa Boyacense (Sweet Cheese-Stuffed Arepas)
Thin, slightly sweet yellow corn arepas from Boyacá, sandwiched around melting fresh cheese and cooked slowly in butter on a griddle until golden. Soft, buttery and gently sweet-and-salty.
Pandebono (Colombian Cheese Bread)
Golden, puffy cheese breads made with cassava starch, corn flour and fresh cheese — crisp outside, soft and stretchy inside. Naturally gluten-free and best eaten warm from the oven with hot chocolate.
Patacones (Twice-Fried Green Plantains)
Green plantain rounds fried until tender, smashed flat and fried again until golden and crackling at the edges. Salted while hot and served with hogao or guacamole — the essential Colombian side.
Colombian Empanadas with Ají
Crisp, golden corn-dough turnovers filled with a savoury mix of shredded beef, potato and hogao, fried until crackling and served with a squeeze of lime and fresh, spicy ají sauce.
Aborrajados (Cheese-Stuffed Sweet Plantain Fritters)
Ripe, sweet plantain flattened around melting cheese and guava paste, dipped in a light batter and fried until golden. A sweet-and-salty snack from the Valle del Cauca.
Buñuelos Colombianos (Cheese Fritters)
Perfectly round, golden cheese fritters made with fresh cheese, cassava starch and cornflour. They puff up and turn themselves in the oil, staying airy inside — the essential Christmas partner for natilla.
Ajiaco Santafereño (Bogotá Chicken and Potato Soup)
Bogotá's beloved soup: chicken simmered with three kinds of potato and corn on the cob until the papa criolla melts into a thick, golden broth, perfumed with the herb guascas. Served with cream, capers, avocado and rice.
Sancocho de Gallina (Colombian Chicken Sancocho)
Colombia's great Sunday soup: chicken simmered with green plantain, yuca, potato and corn on the cob in a broth scented with cumin, garlic and coriander. Served in big bowls with rice, avocado and ají.
Sancocho de Pescado con Coco (Coconut Fish Sancocho)
A coastal sancocho of firm white fish poached in a creamy coconut broth with green plantain, yuca and corn, brightened with peppers, coriander and lime. A taste of Colombia's Caribbean and Pacific shores.
Frijoles Antioqueños (Paisa Red Beans)
Creamy red cargamanto beans slowly simmered with pork hock, green plantain and carrot, then finished with a rich tomato-and-onion hogao. The heart of the bandeja paisa and of every Medellín lunch table.
Arroz con Pollo Colombiano
A colourful one-pot of golden rice cooked in chicken broth with shredded chicken, peas, carrots, peppers and green beans, tinted with achiote and finished with coriander. Colombia's favourite birthday and family-party dish.
Arroz con Coco Titoté (Caribbean Coconut Rice)
Cartagena's famous coconut rice: coconut milk reduced until it caramelises into toasty brown titoté, then cooked with rice, a little sugar and raisins. Sweet, savoury and nutty — the classic partner for fried fish.
Pescado Frito (Caribbean Fried Whole Fish)
Whole fish scored and marinated in lime, garlic and salt, then fried until the skin is golden and crackling and the flesh is moist. Served the Cartagena way with coconut rice, patacones and a fresh salad.
Tamales Tolimenses
Generous parcels of seasoned corn dough layered with pork belly, chicken, egg, potato, carrot and peas, wrapped in banana leaves and steamed for hours. A weekend and Christmas tradition, eaten with hot chocolate and arepa.
Lechona al Horno (Home-Style Stuffed Pork Roast)
A home-oven version of Tolima's festive lechona: seasoned pork, rice and yellow peas rolled inside crackling pork belly skin and roasted slowly until the meat is tender and the skin shatters. Served with arepa and lime.
Natilla Colombiana (Christmas Panela Custard)
A firm, sliceable Christmas custard of milk thickened with cornflour and sweetened with panela, scented with cinnamon and cloves and studded with coconut. Served with buñuelos during the December novenas.
Chocolate Santafereño (Hot Chocolate with Cheese)
Bogotá's famous hot chocolate: spiced Colombian chocolate whisked into frothy milk with a traditional molinillo, served with cubes of fresh cheese that you drop into the cup to melt, plus almojábanas or buttered bread on the side.
Paisa Platter (Bandeja Paisa)
The legendary platter from Antioquia: red beans simmered with pork and plantain, fluffy rice, seasoned ground beef, crisp chicharrón, grilled chorizo, a fried egg, avocado and arepa, all on one plate. Enormous, generous and deeply satisfying.
Milk and Egg Soup (Changua)
A gentle, warming breakfast soup from the cold highlands of Bogotá: milk and water simmered with scallions, poached eggs slipped in whole, and fresh cilantro, ladled over pieces of day-old bread.
Braised Flank Steak (Sobrebarriga)
Flank steak simmered low and slow until it falls apart, then seared until the edges turn crisp and golden, served under a tangy criollo tomato sauce. The quintessential Colombian Sunday lunch.
Santander Hominy Stew (Mute Santandereano)
A deeply comforting Santander stew where dried hominy and red beans simmer for hours with pork, beef and chicken until everything turns soft and the broth goes thick and golden. Potatoes melt in at the end to round it out — a bowlful of this is a full Sunday meal.
Panela Water with Cheese (Aguapanela con Queso)
Raw cane sugar melted slowly into hot water until it turns into a fragrant amber syrup, then poured over cubes of fresh cheese that soften into warm, salty-sweet bites. A beloved Andean comfort drink, perfect for cold mornings.
Spiced Aguardiente Cocktail (Canelazo)
A steaming mug of panela simmered with cinnamon and cloves, spiked with Colombian aguardiente. The classic drink that warms you from the inside on cold Andean nights.
Yam and Cheese Soup (Mote de Queso)
A creamy, golden soup from Colombia's Caribbean coast, made by simmering yam until it falls apart, mashing it right in the pot, then folding in cubes of salty costeño cheese that soften into pockets of melt. Comforting, rich and deeply savoury.
Fresh Curd with Syrup (Cuajada con Melao)
Warm milk set into soft, delicate curds with a touch of rennet, then bathed in dark, spiced panela syrup. A simple, rustic Andean dessert that Colombian grandmothers have made for generations.
Colombian Mixed Grill Platter (Fritanga)
A big, generous platter of crackling pork chicharrón, juicy chorizo and morcilla, golden little potatoes and warm arepas, finished with lime and ají. The kind of feast Colombians share on a Sunday with friends and cold beer.
Sweet Corn Arepa (Arepa de Choclo)
A griddled fresh-corn arepa with a touch of natural sweetness, caramelized at the edges and oozing with melted cheese. A beloved Colombian breakfast, best eaten hot off the pan with butter.
Mini Cheese Arepas
Little golden corn cakes with melted cheese mixed into the dough, crisp outside and soft inside. Naturally gluten-free and just the right size for small hands and lunchboxes.
Baked Mini Chicken Empanadas
Little golden pastries filled with shredded chicken, sweetcorn and vegetables so finely cooked down they disappear into the filling. Baked, not fried, so they're perfect for small hands and lunchboxes.
Mini Lentil Veggie Empanada Bites
Little baked empanadas with a soft, savoury filling of lentils, carrot, zucchini and bell pepper tucked inside a flaky homemade dough. A fun finger-food snack that's secretly packed with vegetables.