Green chili can refer to green chili sauce or green chili stew. They tend to be the same thing, but it can vary in consistency and content sometimes. Stew tends to have body by mixing in things like beans or pork chunks. This article will focus on green chili stew.
Green chili is a staple food in the American Southwest and a favorite in New Mexico. It is a chili that uses green peppers as the base instead of beans or red chiles. Green chili can be eaten as a main course or served as a topping on foods like burritos and enchiladas. When eaten as a main course, a bowl of green chili is typically dressed with sour cream and cheese with a toasted tortilla on the side. No matter how you eat it, green chili is delicious.
Ingredient variations
The base of any good green chili is either an Anaheim chile pepper or a Hatch chile pepper. They are both similar in size and texture, but the Hatch chile is much hotter than the Anaheim. A basic green chili recipe consists of green chiles, one can of tomatoes, one pound of pork, an onion and a bit of flour and seasonings. It is easy to find the majority of the ingredients at the local super market. It is possible to buy canned green chiles, but the best place to get chiles is at a local market where they are being roasted on site. However, if you do not live in the Southwest, it is possible to use green chiles that were frozen, canned or fresh.
Green chile recipes can vary based on the region they come from and author preferences. Some people like it hot and some do not. To tame down the heat, try using Anaheim chiles, skipping the jalapeño peppers or adding some sour cream. To amp up the heat, leave the seeds in the jalapeño peppers and use Hatch chiles.
Helen Dollaghan's green chili recipe from the Denver Post is one of the most requested recipes from their archives. Any recipe will do, and many are similar. Chili is easy and cheap to make so there are a lot of variations. A basic green chili recipe looks something like this:
Ingredients
1 pound of pork, diced (whatever cut you like best)
1 white onion, diced
1 16-ounce can stewed tomatoes, chopped but not strained
3 fresh roasted Hatch or Anaheim chile (2 4-oz cans of diced green chiles will work too, they are not as spicy as the fresh chiles.)
1 16-ounce can of black beans, drained and rinsed
1/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon cumin
1 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon crushed black pepper
1/2 teaspoon oregano
Directions
Cover the skillet in thin layer of oil. Brown pork over medium heat. Add onions. Cook until onions are clear.
Add tomatoes and juice, keep the can. Simmer down.
While tomatoes are simmering, put flour and spices into a pan and brown on low heat.
Add chiles and flour to pan. Cook one minute. Add two cans of water and beans. Simmer 30 minutes.
Article sources
Borwning-Blas, Kristen. "Denver Broncos Recipe: Denver Post Pork Green Chili" Colorado Table. Denver Post, 24 Jan. 2014. Web. 24 Jan. 2014.