Making Green Chili for the First Time

[birder53]

There is a bushel of roasted green chili in the freezer. Some of it is peeled, stemmed and chopped. Most of it is whole peppers in small freezer bags because we didn't realize how much work it was going to be to clean and chop all that pepper!

I pulled out Cafe Pasqual's Cookbook and made the Green Chili recipe. It doesn't call for browning the onions and garlic before adding the rest of the ingredients. Everthing just goes into the pot and cooks down. You do add a roux for thickening near the end. The chili is used for the Posole Stew, which I made yesterday. Again, no "building" of flavors by browning the onions and garlic to start. We'll try the stew tonight, but even as I tasted it while cooking it didn't seem to have a lot of flavor, in spite of all the ingredients and seasonings in the pot.

Is this unusual for a recipe? Would would start by browning your onions and garlic before adding the rest? The Posole Stew also has pork in it which was just added to the pot with everything else. It might turn out to be great, but it seems as though more flavor could be coaxed out this with a little browning and building at the beginning of the recipe.

Any other green chili/ green chili stew recipes out there that you really like?

[andiesenji]

If you wil click here and scroll down to post # 35

you will see my description and photos of the green sauce, which is made with tomatillos, chiles, in this case Caloro, but I also use Anaheim, New Mexico, Big Jim, Sandia, etc.

I have tried various ways of preparing it but I have found that roasting the vegetables this way will bring out more flavor from all the ingredients.

My Mexican neighbors make a hotter variety, in big pans in their outdoor barbecue because the fumes from the roasting peppers in large quantities can sear the eyeballs.

Unless I have a very large batch, I simply freeze it in Cambro containers. For large batches I jar it up and process it in a pressure canner.

[Jensen]

I've made two types of green chile in my life (one of them last night! what a coincidence!) and both times I browned the aromatics first. Not only that, I sauteed the herbs a wee bit too!

Here are my versions of green chile:

New Mexico-style Green Chile

Braised Pork Shanks with Chiles (Chile Verde)

[birder53]

We just finished eating the Posole Stew made with the green chili. The liquid was thin and not very flavorful. On the other hand, it was chock full of posole, pork, onions and red chilies. I tried adding more salt, then a little more cumin, but what really helped it was fresh lime.

My lower lip is burning right now, though the stew wasn't too hot to eat and enjoy. I think I'll start the next stew by browning the pork, onions and garlic to see if that helps the liquid with the flavor issue. As far as how thin it was, what would you do about that? I let it simmer about 4 hours and then refrigerated it overnight hoping that it would be thicker today, but no luck.

[Jensen]

I wouldn't worry about the thin broth; the "authentic" chiles I've had have all had thin broths. Just serve it with something to sop it all up!

[andiesenji]

Whenever I want to thicken a stew like this, I add a little corn flour - and I mean a little. I ladle a little of the liquid into a cup, cool it a bit and stir in a heaping tablespoon of corn flour, blending it well.

I add this slurry back into the stew and bring the temp up so it is actively simmering and keep stirring it. Just this little bit of corn flour will thicken three to four quarts of stew.

[birder53]

Thanks Jensen and Andie. I considered making a "slurry" as I did for the green chili, but figured the recipe would have included that for the stew if needed. Since both recipes came from the same chef that seemed logical. I think I will add something when I make the next batch. I'll start by braising my pork and sweating the onions and garlic next time as well as adding some chicken stock to the mix. The final stew was tasty, but not the "wow" flavors I was hoping for.

[pounce]

I've been adding powdered green chili (hatch) to my green chili near the end of cooking. Gives it a nice body and cool green look. I have hot powder so I use it to dial up individual portions as needed.

[ludja]

chile!!!

I'll look up my favorite green chile stew recipe and compare it with Cafe Pasqual's and the one's that others have shared hear before I comment.