"Cheating?" I originally got my chile verde recipe from my Mexican neighbor and it and every other chile verde, salsa verde etc., recipe includes tomatillos. They make a pickled sauce using just chiles, but it is a flavoring condiment, not the dish itself. I don't think that tomatillos "dilute" the flavor, they enhance it in its many variations throughout Mexico where the seasonings change, from region to region, but the base is always chiles (often poblano with other, hotter peppers), tomatillos and onions. The local produce market has Hatch chiles and they showed up at three different vendors at the farmers' market yesterday. As I said in a later post hyperbole! I love tomatillos, but for me, the perfect chili verde doesn't need them "authentic" or not. I would expect the the rendition of chili verde I make is more of a Southwestern variation than one found in a region of Mexico. Care to share a link to your recipe? Maybe I can be converted. I agree, verde is only chilis...We get em here and they usually have the thing they roast em with,and so we get em roasted as well(in Denver)Bud Good distinction. In NM generally chile verde is nothing but hatch chile, meat and spices etc, but I think it can in include tomatillos in Mexico. In NM generally anything with tomatillos would be called salsa and not chile.