Are there other green chile addicts out there?

[Passadumkeg]

I am powerless. I'd rather have a root canal than shop at Walmart. But... in small town Maine, they are my source of fresh Anaheim (New Mexico) green chiles. I buy out their entire stock of green chiles each weekend. I roast and peel them and uses them in my cooking. Green chile fish tacos for dinner tonight. Does anyone else share my addiction?

[badvegan]

I think it is awesome that green chile is available that far north. My family might be moving up to yankee country and i have dreaded being without my favorite New Mexican staple.

[tatamagouche]

Not to bum you out, but it ain't the same (I lived in Boston for 10 years), culturally. I mean, you're not going to find roasters lining the streets in season.

[Passadumkeg]

Amen! I've moved back to Nm and even Wally World had chile roasters in the parking lot. I had 90lbs of roasted green chilesin the freezer in Sept. and now they are half gone!
I adjusted a middle-eastern garbonzo bean stew recipe this week and substituted greenchiles for harrissa.
Badvegan. You can always get your chile supplies on-line and shipped to you. What you need to know is that the reastaurants in the northeast will not be the same as you are used to, but there are some good Old Mexico Mexican restos from recent immigrants. Beware of eastern bean stew "Chili". Where ya movin' to?

[spril]

For anyone driving on I-95 through Maryland, the Columbia Harris Teeter between Baltimore and Washington DC stocks Bueno Hot green chile in the freezer aisle at the end of the store. Tubs are 13oz and cost $3.49 (or $2.99 when they go on sale). The store is about 10 minutes from I-95: http://maps.google.com/maps/place?cid...

Frozen isn't as good as fresh, but it's dramatically better than canned!

[Passadumkeg]

Bueno!

[BBQKit]

No doubt that stripping and freezing the Hatch chiles is far superior, but as many are, I'm already out of my batch. Luckily my grandkids from Santa Fe brought me the grandaddy of all times Christmas basket to fill the gap. Among the delicacies was a package of green chiles from 505chile.com, comprising of 6 2 oz packages of green chiles, no refrigeration needed. Wow! I've already ordered a case from the company. That will teach me to undercut my order in LaPuente from the Hatch Chile people. Of course, they also included a care package of their own stripped and frozen ones to remind me that one freezer was not enough, lol.

[Passadumkeg]

I bought 90 lbs. and I'm 3/4 finished w/ my green chiles!!!!

[andrewtree]

Just used a bag of roasted and frozen to make a Green Chile Split Pea Daal for some vegan friends, turned out really well. But it hurt to use some of my precious supply for a dish without pork and lard!

[Sherri]

Green chile-fried egg-Jack cheese McMuffin this AM straight off my griddle.

[Passadumkeg]

Scrambled egg, BBQ'd beef, cheese and green chile buritto for breakfast. See what I mean????

[Perilagu Khan]

I think we get the picture. ;)

[Passadumkeg]

You're not addicted?

[Perilagu Khan]

Of course I'm addicted! Tomorrow for lunch I'm making a batch of chili featuring, among other things, the powders of red Bell, pulla and bhut jolokia peppers, epazote and chicory coffee.

[Passadumkeg]

Yum, what time is lunch. Getting 20 lbs of steamer clams today. No green chiles.

[c oliver]

Did the same with the last bit of chile verde a couple of mornings ago.

[alanbarnes]

Dang, Mark, you'd go through my whole year's stash in a month!

As the Temptations might say, "ain't no freezer big enough."

[Passadumkeg]

Funny at least 6 different check out women at Wally World didn't know what Annehiems were. I had to go to the chart behind the cash register and find them for them. Yankees ain't got no taste buds.

[Perilagu Khan]

Hate to say it, but it's not just Yankees. In the store where I shop I inevitably have to spell out c-h-i-l-a-c-a for them.

[paulj]

I'm not surprised. They're not a regular part of Tex-mex cooking, are they? I've see chilacas only twice. Last time it was in a multi-ethnic Indian owned produce stand. They might be a bit more common in Texas than Seattle, but unless the clerk was a recent immigrant from Mexico she probably never tasted them.

[paulj]

By the way, what do you mean by chilaca? I know them as long narrow, dark chiles, that are called pasilla in the dried form. But DeWitt also writes that the name is applied to 'New Mexico pod types grown in Durango and Chihuahua, Mexico.'

[c oliver]

Your reply prompted me to google and I discovered that I'd been correct in assuming that what my grocery calls pasilla is actually a poblano. Thanks.

[alanbarnes]

You're talking about the green chile? That's just wrong. It seems like people in California deliberately misuse terminology. A dried poblano is an ancho. A dried chilaca is a pasilla. What's so hard about that?

[Passadumkeg]

Californication???

[paulj]

Using the name pasilla for the fresh green poblano has been around for a long time (the first Bayless book mentions it). Some attribute it to the California produce 'industry', though some also trace it to a regional name in Baja. There's nothing new, novel or wrong about regional variations in chile names.

It just something a chile addict learns to live with. The addict can even use to prove how knowledgeable he is: 'That chile really should be labeled ...'!

[c oliver]

Cute. Yeah, the checker usually asks "is that a pasilla" and I get to answer "well, that's what Safeway calls it but it's really a poblano." At which point the chat is over. But I get to feel superior very briefly which doesn't happen nearly often enough.

[alanbarnes]

>>"There's nothing new, novel or wrong about regional variations in chile names. "<<

True, but it sure can be confusing. For example, the Chow staff "reverse engineered" the recipe for the salsa made by Papalote restaurant in San Francisco's Mission District. They posted the recipe online, calling for ground pasilla chiles. http://www.chow.com/recipes/10646

Reading the comments, it is clear that people in the rest of the country are blissfully unaware of this little regional variation. And although the salsa might be quite good made with pasilla peppers, the stuff in the restaurant - which the recipe is supposed to duplicate - uses anchos.

Effective communication requires that the parties share an understanding of a word's meaning. Just imagine how difficult it would be to follow a recipe if tomatoes were known as "eggplants" in New York and New England, onions were called "shallots" in the deep South, and a "teaspoon" meant half a fluid ounce (aka a tablespoon) in the Midwest.

Is it "incorrect" usage for California grocers to call poblano / ancho chiles "pasillas"? I'm not much of a prescriptivist, but given that that terminology is not used anywhere else in the world (including, if I recall correctly, Baja), I'd say yes. At the very least, anybody who (mis)uses the term on a forum intended for national consumption should note the regional usage.

[paulj]

Using pasilla for the fresh chiles is common in Washington groceries. That's probably how they are labeled when shipped from distributors to the south. I suspect that most of the people who buy these peppers do so by sight, and don't really care how they are labeled.

[c oliver]

I agree. If I hadn't known that it was in fact a poblano rather than a pasilla, I wouldn't have bought it. Do you think you and I can change the whole CA grocery business? I'm in if you are :)

[alanbarnes]

I was thrilled when, shortly after we moved here, a grocery store ran an ad for chateaubriand at $1.99 a pound. Imagine my disappointment when I found out that in California, a chateaubriand is a thick-cut top sirloin steak, not the center of the tenderloin.

At least you can see what you're buying at the grocery store. Unless you're working with an ingredient for the first time, paulj's correct - it doesn't really matter what the label says. But when writing or following a recipe, having a variety of ingredients that share the same name just guarantees confusion.

[DiveFan]

As has been pointed out in other topics, the usage of the word 'pasilla' varies greatly between regions of Mexico. The produce growing and importing businesses are not heavily populated with well travelled or college educated botanists, so we'll just have to live with the confusing terminology for now.

BTW the dried spice vendors around SoCal have started to recognize this confusion and sometimes label dried chiles 'pasilla-ancho' (from fresh poblanos) and 'pasilla-negro' (from fresh chilacas).

pdk, you are darn lucky to have actual 'New Mexico' chiles in a Walmart. Chiles labelled 'Anaheim' are usually one of the low heat, thin skinned cultivars in the New Mexico family. Are yours noticeably better?

[paulj]

I asked a produce guy at a medium size Mexican grocery in NC Oregon about the name of pasilla/poblanos:
'En Mexico se llaman poblanos, aqui pasilla'

And yes, in the dried section I noticed the 2 types of 'pasilla' (or was it three?)

Which reminds me, I've small green chiles labeled 'cerano'.

[Perilagu Khan]

Yes, I mean the fresh passila. And I've only noticed them in my grocery store within the last couple of months or so. They are absolutely delicious stuffed, and I put one in some goulash tonight, which worked just fine.

[Passadumkeg]

A fresh cod and green chile burrito last night for supper. East meats west?

[Passadumkeg]

Green chile and BBQ'd pork tacos last night for sup.

[Passadumkeg]

Last night for supper: sea scallops fried w/ diced green chiles.
Lunch today: a BBQ'd top round, roast beef, green chile and mayo sandwich.
Tonight for supper: beef BBQ, green chile and cheese burritos.

[Sherri]

I took SaltyRaisins suggestion for pan-roasting a couple of green chiles. Great idea. Mixed these with pan-fried potatoes and made huevos con papas y chiles for our breakfast burrito.
Chipotle mayo on our lunch lamb sandwiches yesterday. They would have benefitted from a healthy sprinkle of cilantro but I didn't have any on hand.

I have no idea how you survived in Norway, Finland & USSR for all that time without a regular chile fix. Are there innoculations for this condition? For as long as I can remember, unless geography renders it an impossibility, I've been a regular chile-eater-chile-cooker. Initially this dismayed my NY-born husband but he's come around nicely.

[Passadumkeg]

That's why I'm so proud of my "related to half the Mayflower" wife. She inhales hotter chiles than my Northern New Mexico, Hispanic SIL. But ever now and then she requests a bowl of chowdah. This week's soup is a green chile, tomato, chorizo, corn and pinto bean mix. She raved about it and wanted to know what I put in it. I confessed, the last of the BBQ'd corned beef. I top the soup w/ grated Jack, onion, sour cream and give her a small baggie of Fritos for a crunchy "tortilla" style topping. Gotta go make the green chile burritos. The 6-7 lbs. I bought on Sat. afternoon is nearly gone!

[Sherri]

Breakfast this morning = corn & green chile eggs. We've just finished Sonoran hot dogs with roasted green chiles for our lunch. I have withdrawal if I go too long without a chile fix. Native California, now living in AZ, the worst was living in rural Maryland 35 years ago when nothing more Old El Paso was available. I scrounged some seeds from a friend in the west and bribed an Amish farmer to grow chiles for me. Life was good; would have been better if I could have grown avocados as well but one mustn't be greedy.

[Passadumkeg]

When in Maryland, eat crab (green chile) cakes! You then can empathize on the green chile difficultiies of green chiles for 11 years in Norway, Finland, and the USSR. I went from Albuquerque to Stavanger, Norway! Maine is bad enough.

[Passadumkeg]

Green chile & lobster tacos; wicked good!

[SaltyRaisins]

Hot dogs from El Guero Canelo by any chance? And for chile verde, I go to Ranch Market whenever I'm in Phoenix for work and basically live off their steam-table guisados the whole time. I'll even order it when it's working its magic on chicharron just to get to the tangy, green goodness. A potable sauce....wish I could order it in a mug without looking like a weirdo.

For great home-roasting: get a chunk of beef fat off your next raw ribeye, grease up a cast-iron pan with it, and throw as many fresh chiles as will fit in a layer. Roast on med-hi heat until done with a nice blistered char on the flat areas, sprinkle with kosher salt and a squirt of lime. Take them neat.

[Passadumkeg]

Yum on the chiles. Tequilla shots?

[Passadumkeg]

I just made green chile BBQ'd corned beef hash w/ fried eggs for breakfast. Yum.

[c oliver]

I have two CBs hanging out in the fridge. Could you elaborate on this dish please? Dang, that sounds beyond perfect.

[Passadumkeg]

Soak the hell out of the corned beef, on smoker w/ apple wood for 12 hours. Fry up onions, the driest diced hunks of the corned beef (I boiled the diced pieces to tenderize and reduce salt.) and diced spuds. Top w/ juevos fritos.

[c oliver]

I think a smoker is the next thing on my need-to-have list.

[alanbarnes]

Green chile huevos rancheros, here. Refried beans and homemade flour tortillas on the side.

[tatamagouche]

C'mon, Passa, you know half the Southwest are addicts!

If you want me to send you some from a roaster in season so you can skip Walmart, let me know.

[Passadumkeg]

I hope to be buying them from the roaster myself, but thanks. I got my Ma from UNM on 4 bushels of Corrales chiles (2 red& 2 green) and a hundred pounds of pintos. Them war the daze.

[tatamagouche]

100 lbs. of pintos!! With which you do what?

[Passadumkeg]

Hey, I was a poor student, chile & beans, tosdadas, Frito pies, green chile (or red) soup, green chile bean burritos and .........bean dip de dip, dip, de dip.

[Veggo]

Small wonder you were a poor student, failing courses. With that diet, you must have spent more time riding the porcelain pony than in the library...:)

[Passadumkeg]

3.98 cum., funny how one does better in school when parents aren't footing the bill. What I can't believe is that Sam was living 3 blocks from me at the same time period!
I just returned from the evil W w/ 6 lbs of the finest green. Lamb chops w/ green chile sauce for sup, huevos rancheros or green chile & egg burritos for brekkie. A batch of pork green chile and smoking a top round roast tomorrow for green chile burritos or fajitas for supper next week. I will also also make green chile pinot been soup for lunches to take to work.

[tatamagouche]

So: what cut of pork do you use for your green chile? My sweetie has a long-standing debate with a friend of ours about shoulder vs. loin. Tomatoes or no tomatoes? If former, fresh or canned?

[Perilagu Khan]

"pinot been"

I take it you can convert beans to wine.

You've obviously been working on your Savior Starter Kit. ;)

[Passadumkeg]

I did 2 radio shows on WERU (www.weru.org) on Sat.from 11 to 3 (the reggae show guy didn't show. I normally do a bilingual Latin dance music show), got home, 2 glasses of wine, and presto zammo, he turns beans into wine! I'm multitalented, but can't make mountains in Lubbock!

I'm about to make BBQ'd corned beef, green chile and scrambled egg burritos for breakfast. Sunny, but very cold this morning.

[c oliver]

Remind me please re the brand of smoker you have? Supposed to snow here today/tomorrow. Only about an inch though.

[Passadumkeg]

It's a Brinkman electric. I found it for free by the side of the road. Easy to use, but charcoal, many say is better. About 70 bucks at Box Land.
My gas grill was by the side of the road and my kettle, I inherited. I'm a relative newby to Q'ing.

[c oliver]

Thanks, P. I'm inclined towards electric because I don't want to have to tend something for all those hours. Our kettle was $10 at a yard sale and I just had to replace one grate. When I was ready to upsize my gas grille, I put the old one out by the road with a sign that said "Like me, it's old but still works great." It was gone in a flash.

[alanbarnes]

Every Labor Day weekend the question is "how many boxes"? Last year it was two, but that felt too much like rationing as the summer wore on. This year it was three. 75 pounds of Deming's finest, roasted on the grill, peeled, seeded, and put in the freezer. And it still may require some restraint to keep from polishing them off before next year's crop comes in.

Tonight - chicken enchiladas w/ green chile. Fried egg optional. Shredded lettuce and sliced radish over the top of things, pinto beans on the side. Some sliced avocado, too - they're in season and three for a buck. It just doesn't get any better.

[Mattkn]

Ah man. Fried Egg MANDATORY for me. SIgh...7 days countdown!

[Passadumkeg]

Even if not making enchies, if I hear a fried egg hitting the hot grease with a loud sizzle, I think my enchiladas must be almost ready.

[Mattkn]

You are making my mouth water. What can I say? I'm a Pavlov dog for green chile!

[Perilagu Khan]

I believe that makes you a chile dawg.

[c oliver]

I tell my pups that it's better to be a chile dawg than just a hot dog.

[Mattkn]

Right on.

[c oliver]

It would be highly unusual for my fridge to be without at least three or four kinds, the usual culprits being jalapenos, poblanos, Anaheims(!). Our groceries usually have around six or more different ones. Breakfast this morning will likely be an egg, chorizo (fresh), pepper(s) scramble.

[Gio]

Well not to one-up you my dear, but in My fridge as I type there are jalapeños, poblanos, serranos and habeneros, oh my...! Oh and Thai bird chilies.
I don't know where I can find those elusive Hatch chilies near Boston, tho. Does anyone?

[Perilagu Khan]

Since we're tacking stock...

1. Two long, gnarled green peppers, perhaps Thais, but not the bird types.
2. One chilaca pepper.
3. Bottle of Arizona Gunslinger chipotle sauce.
4. Bottle of Rhino Peri-Peri sauce.
5. Bottle of CaJohn's Select Fatalli Puree.
6. Bottle of Tabasco (of course).

[c oliver]

Oh, no. I am NOT going to inventory all the pepper SAUCES!

[Gio]

What? No Sriracha...no Cholula?? What about Sambal olek...garlic chili paste and all that ilk? I'm with CO. Not cataloging all the bottled stuff that makes life worth living.

[Perilagu Khan]

None of that stuff, I'm afraid. But I do have a jar of Mazetta Yellow Hot Peppers, which I mince and put on hot dawgs, and open cans of chipotle en adobo, Hatch green chile, and jalapeno rings.

[Perilagu Khan]

I don't think anybody's got it as bad as you, Pass. That said, if you expand the rubric to include all hot chiles I'll stack up my addiction to anybody's. Rarely does a day pass in which I don't eat chips and salsa or an entree that includes hot chiles or hot pepper sauce. Case in point was last night: I made chicken methi, which included three minced serranos and half a T. of cayenne. It was just about right for me, but was a bit too intense for the Khantessa. Next time I'm afraid I'll have to cut it down to only two serranos.

[swamp]

As a general rule in my book most things are better with green chiles added. I grew up in Texas which usually favors red sauces etc. but I prefer the New Mexican style with green. Nothing like a green chile cheeseburger. Once a year our local grocery story brings in fresh Hatch green chiles and roasts them at the store. I always buy several bags to have on hand.

[gordeaux]

I'm an addict. The Mrs is coming back from Denver today on a week long business trip. Guess what her prime directive was? Fresh or pre-roasted/ peeled, as many that she could fit. Hopefully the latter.

[Veggo]

I used to buy 20-30 pounds of Hatch from a roaster who sets up in La Veta, CO in season, and stash the still-hot bags in my car for the 10 mile ride up the hill to Cuchara. The aroma was so fantastic I should have had a bib and a supply of Depens. I used them in smothers, stewed pork shoulders, and obscenely good quesadillas.

[LauraGrace]

The farmers' market in my tiny hometown in CO (in the Walmart parking lot, no less) has a vendor with a massive tumbler in which he roasts green chiles. It looks like an oil drum, but made of wire mesh. You can smell the chiles all over town! :)

[Veggo]

That's it! It looks like a giant squirrel cage that could wear out a half dozen basset hounds. Those fresh roasted Hatches are intoxicating. We've about 4 months to go.

[Passadumkeg]

Hatch, shrimp & feta casserole?

[LauraGrace]

Oh my heck. YES. YES.

[Veggo]

I'll have what she's having.
I don't speak french, so we'll name the casserole the Hatch, shrimp, and feta complete.

[tullius]

hi veggo & lauragrace! i'm in Antonito, CO (on the other side of the valley from La Veta) . locals go down to Hatch, NM & bring back big sacks of chiles & roast them across the street from me & several other corners on the main drag. every one of them turns into a party & the town smells Mmmm!

I always thought the roaster cage looked like the thing they pick winning raffle tickets out of, the way it turns.

[LauraGrace]

I was trying to figure out how to describe that lottery/raffle tumbler thing, but that's exactly what it looks like! Except everybody's a winner. ;)

[gordeaux]

I soo miss the days of Denver when we used to go to the big flea mkt and there would be several stalls with the big old hand crank roasters set up.

[Mattkn]

Okay Passadumkeg--

I'm actually on my 3 week countdown before I head to Santa Fe. Heeelllloooo Green Chile!

Last year on a long weekend trip to Dallas we popped into Whole Foods since we are sorely lacking decent grocery stores in the OKC. I came across fresh Hatch green chile. I bought 4 pounds and was begging my husband to cut our trip short. I was DYING to get home and roast 'em up. Just fabulous.

[Passadumkeg]

I was reading PK's post on fish tacos and it piqued my interest. Yesterday was the day before payday and the cupboard was bare, but I had left over cod and roasted green chiles in the fridge. I pulled 8 corn tortillas out of the freezer, dry fried them in my cast iron frying pan, put some garlic powder on the chiles, nuked the chile & fish, dice tomatoes and onion (we had no cabbage), mixed chipotle w/ mayo and viola S.H.I.T. (Sure Happy It's Thursday) tacos. Green chile, pintos, cheese and a fried on top for brekkie this a m.

[EWSflash]

Oh hells yeah, the good news is I'm in Tucson and don't have to go to the WalMart for chiles. Recently I'm more into the poblanos, with their thicker flesh and wonderful taste, but I feel so lucky in general to be in a place where we have fresh chiles year round.

There's nothing that smells better than chiles scorching on a charcoal grill. Right on the coals. Those little hot jets of capsaicin from the odd bursting chile hardly ever happen anyway.

When you've roasted the chiles right on the coals, you shouldn't put them in a plastic bag because they've had enough heat and will peel beautifully as long as they can rest for few minutes in ambient temperatures. Then p ut 'em in a bag.

I love my chiles. You're not to be condemned for buying out the WalMart if that's your only source. Period. You are absolved of any sin to the economy or whatever.

[Passadumkeg]

I love poblanos too. I just hope I don't get caught in a photo on one of those ubiquetious funny "people who shop at Walmart emails.

[paul balbin]

How about sharing your green chili fish taco receipt?