Tasty Tuesday: Chile Verde

By Barb • on April 13, 2010

Authentic Chile Verde

A bowl of Chile Verde has long been our litmus test for the quality of a Mexican restaurant.  Living in the east, we have been hard-pressed to find a good bowl;  a recent visit to San Juan Capistrano, inspired Dave to find or develop a recipe we could make at home that would be on par with what we grew up with in the southwest. Chile Verde recipes and ingredients vary from region to region in Mexico and the Southwest as much as barbecue or chili does in the US.

A good bowl of ’Verde’ is delicious, comforting, and satisfying. Typically, Chile Verde is served in a bowl with tortillas on the side. It is also frequently served as a filling in soft tacos or burritos.

Chile Verde Ingredients

  • 3 lbs. Tomatillos
  • 10 cloves roasted garlic
  • 2 T. minced garlic
  • 4 Poblano peppers
  • 4 Anaheim peppers
  • 4 Jalepeno peppers
  • 4 medium yellow onions
  • 8 lbs. trimmed pork shoulder/pork but
  • 2 bunches  cilantro
  • 5 c. chicken or pork stock
  • 1 lime, juiced
  • 2 T. Oregano
  • 1/4 t. ground cloves
  • Salt
  • Pepper
  • Olive oil


Sauce Preparation

  • Roast garlic cloves (I use a grill basket; under the broiler will work fine)
  • Roast peppers;  remove skin, stem, and seeds Wash cilantro; remove lower part of stems (see last week’s post on roasting peppers)
  • Husk, halve, and roast Tomatillos until they begin to blacken. Use a cookie sheet with sides under the broiler.

  • Blend all of the above and the lime juice to chop fine; add some stock if more liquid is needed for this step.

  • Set aside.

Pork

  • Trim fat and silver skin and remove bone.
  • Cut the pork into ¾” – 1” cubes; toss in salt and pepper; brown in olive oil in large skillet.

Onions – dice onions and sauté with minced garlic in the same skillet with additional olive oil as needed.

Final steps

  • Transfer onions to stock pot and add pork, oregano, sauce and enough stock to cover the meat. Add ground cloves, salt, pepper to taste.
  • Bring to a boil and then simmer for 1+ hour until meat is tender (do not overcook the pork!)

  • Serve in a bowl with tortillas on the side. Consider preparing rice and black beans or refried beans  and fresh Pico de Gallo to accompany it.

Yield: approximately 6 quarts; 16-20 servings.

Notes and thanks

  • Use bone and selected trimmings to make stock to use in your next batch of chile verde. We add the leavings from trimming the peppers so that we end up with spicy pork stock.
  • We  roast our peppers by starting with them under the broiler and finishing with a torch. In the summer, we use a grill basket.
  • This recipe is scalable. We’ve made double, triple, and half batches.
  • The flavors will continue to marry and develop for several days. This recipe freezes well but be careful not to overcook the meat when you reheat it.
  • Pork butt goes on sale often and can be found for $.85 to $1.29/lb on sale.
  • We get our tomatillos and chiles at a small local Mexican market and usually get better quality and a cheaper price than we can get in the local grocery store.
  • This recipe was adapted from an Elise Bauer  recipe at Simply Recipes: http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/chile_verde/. Elise has many other great recipes that I highly recommend.

Enjoy thoroughly!

Barb Kelley

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Comments

By Kelli Howell on April 14th, 2010 at 1:54 pm

I LOVE all of the pictures!! This is making me crave it for dinner!!