My dad is a meat and potatoes person. And as such, you can almost always count on potatoes as part of the dinner meal at our home, most often boiled. Usually I skip them (more for dad) in favor of something green. The other day though, my mother made a cheesy boiled potato dish that I couldn’t stop eating. The star ingredient? Jalapeño pepperjack cheese. Melty, stringy, spicy, peppery cheese. Melt the cheese over russet or Yukon gold boiled potatoes and then douse with a little cream. Fabulous!
The only issue is that with russets especially, it’s pretty easy to overcook the potatoes, making it harder for them to continue to hold their shape while they sit in their own heat waiting for the cheese to melt. The first time I tried these following my mom’s instructions, I took my eye off the pot and sure enough, the potatoes were falling apart. I made the recipe anyway, just mashed all the ingredients together and the potatoes were stunning that way too. Since then I’ve made them with Yukon Golds which hold their shape better and are a little more forgiving on cook time.
Pepperjack Potatoes Recipe
You can use either russets or Yukon gold for this dish. The russets are trickier to keep from overcooking, the Yukons hold their shape easier. If you end up overcooking the potatoes, you can mash them for pepperjack mashed potatoes.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 pounds potatoes, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
- Salt
- 4 ounces pepperjack cheese, thinly sliced and cut into strips (or you can use shredded)
- 1/2 cup cream
Method
1 Place peeled, cut potatoes into a 2 quart-sized pot. Cover with an inch of cold water. Add a tablespoon of salt to the water. Cover and bring to a boil. (Keep your eye on the potatoes, it's easy to overcook them.) As soon as the water is boiling, uncover and boil for 6 minutes, or until the potatoes are just tender enough so that you can insert a fork into them. The potatoes should be on the slightly underdone side.
2 Drain the potatoes and put them immediately into a serving bowl. Layer the cheese slices over them and put a plate over the bowl to cover, so that the steam from the potatoes melts the cheese. Let sit for several minutes, then gently fold over with a spoon to spread the melted cheese around. Pour cream over and cover again until served.
If the potatoes are on the over-cooked side and fall apart as you toss them in the cheese, you can add the cream anyway and mash them for spicy, cheesy mashed potatoes. If the potatoes are still not quite cooked enough and the cheese is not quite melted enough, you can put them in a microwave for 20 seconds or so.
Yield: Serves 4.








Oooh looks so good, I wish I had some now! Reminds me also of raclette. Fond memories of scraping melting cheese onto a plate of potatoes in Europe as a bright-eyed college student.
These look like an awesome way to serve potatoes and such simple ingredients!
I love recipes like this. Pepperjack cheese has so much great flavor and it’s a good melty cheese, too. Making this soon!
We are a meat and potatoes family. One meat, one vegetable, one starch for pretty much every meal. I can’t wait to try this and add it to our “rotation.” My mouth is watering already…
There is no way these COULDN’T be good!!! It’s early in the morning and I would love to have some for breakfast right NOW!!!
Made something close to this 2 nights ago. All we had on hand was fingerling potatoes. Looks really cool with all the different colored potatoes. YUM YUM
Yummy!! And I have all the ingredients right here! Guess what I’ll be serving with dinner tonight? Thank you so much for sharing!
Ohhhhh my gosh, yes. Those could live in my mouth for FREE.
This dish looks amazing! I can’t wait to try it!!
ah 3 ingredients and comfort in a bowl! yes!
Oh my WORD! I LOVE pepper jack cheese but never thought to put it on potatoes. I need to try this. Tonight!
Oh my that looks comforting and good.
Mmmmmm…Sounds fab. I make something similar to the mashed potato version – I add cream and about a tablespoon of pepper to the mashed potatoes, and then put some shredded sharp cheddar cheese over the top and let it melt.
Looks really good!
Sorry if this is a stupid question, but what kind of cream do you use?
Heavy whipping cream. ~Elise
I mixed in some crumbled bacon. WOW!
Looks like potatoes!
Yum! I just bought a block of pepperjack cheese and now I have another use for it besides quesadillas.
Your Dad and my husband are on the same page when it comes to having meat and potatoes for most every meal. I am always looking for new ways to serve potatoes, thanks for this recipe!! I look forward to trying it.
Happy New Year! Just wanted to send greetings and let you know how much I appreciate your site. You are the “go to” site for any questions I have about something I want to try. My family likes you, too. ;-)
Made these tonight. WOW…what a hit! Used Yukon Gold…worked perfectly.
I make a version of this with herbed goats cheese and add a few pimentoes for colour…. also yummy!
Here’s a crazy (but crazy-good) potato and pepperjack dish that this post reminded me of: potatoes, butter, garlic salt and pepper, BBQ sauce (I use Bullseye), with the pepper jack on top of it all. It’s easy and very tasty.
Thanks for this site, by the way. You’ve given me some real winners over the past couple of years.
These sound great! Is there any reason it would be a bad idea to leave the potato skins on?
You can try leaving the skins on if you want, especially with Yukon golds which have pretty thin skins to begin with. ~Elise
LOVE Jalapeño pepperjack cheese. Unfortunately it’s proved near impossible to find any good quality pepperjack up in Canada. Luckily we live near the border so it’s always at the top of our shopping list :)
Why did I never think of this? (Is my sentence grammatically correct? Any English teachers out there? I’ve side-tracked my mind from POTATOES WITH PEPPERJACK CHEESE to English grammar, how clever.)
Yum! But — big sigh — this is exactly what I’m working hard to *not* be eating right now. Alas.
I have never eaten potato with cheese. But as the saying is it is never too late!
More of a question than a comment….what about using baked potatoes? We all need a little more fiber.
You mean adding pepperjack to baked potatoes? Sounds great! ~Elise
We’ve often made “cheesy potatoes” for the kids, but usually mashed. My hubby likes country fried potatoes (just chunked, boiled spuds, cooled off and then browned in butter in a skillet) and pepperjack cheese, so I think I’ll try your cheese/cream topping on those. Either way, sounds wonderful! Thanks for the idea!
Simple but tasty.
Oh my goodness. I must go out and buy pepperjack cheese *now*.
Cheesy, spicy…now that is a topping worthy of some potato indulgence. Thank you to your mum!
My momma always put pepperjack cheese on broccoli. I can’t wait to try this, YUM!
Veggies taste better with cheese.
My meat & potato man would love this (me too!) It’ll be on my “to make” list. Thank you, thank Mom.
That is so funny, I have recently been thinking about your cauliflower (or was it broccoli) cheddar cheesy gratin. But at the same time I’ve been thinking about new potato dishes because I get tired of rice. We don’t have pepper jack here, but I keep Organic Valley mozzarella (and cheddar) stocked in my fridge at all times. And cream. I have hot peppers in my freezer, so I can do this. Thanks. Looking forward.
I love this idea. When I’m feeling skinny again, I’ll be giving this a try.
These were interesting to make. I think I will shred my cheese next time, because my cheese clumped a lot and was hard to spread to all the potatoes. Really yummy idea!
I made these last night to go with meatloaf and salad. The potatoes turned out perfectly and were the highlight of the meal!
Tip on the potatoes – add a little vinegar to the boiling water and they won’t fall apart, ever.
I loved these potatoes when I made them the other night! The first night they were my only course and the next night I had some shredded beef with them. Cooking 6 mins. exactly worked perfect! We used the yukon but I want to use russets to compare. The yukons we’re very creamy. Great recipe, thanks!