It’s chile season in Denver and that means road side stands have popped up all over town offering bushels of fresh roasted chiles for a steal. Green chili is a Colorado winter staple and the true ‘Coloradoan’ way to make it is with fresh chiles that you cleaned and froze earlier in the year. In a pinch you can use canned but in my opinion it’s just not the same.
As a Colorado Native buying and cleaning roasted chiles is a fall tradition I love! Moving outside the state it never felt like fall because other areas of the country just don’t have the crops to support the big scale roasting stands we have here. They do sell fresh roasted chiles at Central Market in Texas, but I’m not sure where else you can get them. If you are somewhere else in the US, please comment if you know where to find Chilies in your area!
Shopping at a road side stand means the best deal will be on a full bushel. Sometimes you can buy less, but it’s not as good a value. If you have the space just go for an entire bushel and hand off whatever doesn’t fit in your freezer to neighbors and friends. The stand we went is located off 92nd and Federal (in Federal Heights) and bushels were $40 buy one get one free.
You start off by picking the level of hotness you want in your chile. Since these are fresh less is usually more, unless you really do love extra spicy. We went with one bushel of medium and one bushel of hot. Usually I would actually get a mild chile but at the time there were not any available.
The roaster tosses all your chilies into a propane powered roaster and spins the chilies until they have a nice crispy look. This is when they load them into a big trash bag for you to take home. Pro Tip: Bring a cooler for your car and toss the chilies in there to prevent filling the car with the smell of roasted chilies.
Once home, leave the chilies in the bags overnight to cool. This allows the chiles to ‘sweat’ and will make it easier to remove the skins. The bags will begin to drip so you can either keep them in the cooler or toss them into a sink.
Once you start cleaning you need a large sink, two plastic colanders and a pair of rubber gloves. Chilies are spicy and the capsicum will get into your skin and cuticles. If you don’t use gloves, definitely don’t plan to touch your eyes for a few days!
Turn the sink on low and run the chilies one at a time under the water. The skin will peel off quickly and you can toss it into the first colanders. I then place my clean chilies into the second colander.
If you like heat, leave the caps and seeds on your chiles. If you do not, remove the tops and wash out as many seeds as you can. The spiciness lies in the chile seeds.
Once you have finished the first cleaning round I like to go through the entire batch a second time as I place them into 1 qt freezer bags. I usually count out 20 chilies per bag.
A single bushel produces about 6-8 1 quart bags depending on the size of the chilies. Once everything is sorted and cleaned, lay them flat in the freezer and the chilies will keep for up to a year!
Frozen green chilies are perfect for making Pork Green Chili, breakfast casseroles, chili relleno and more. Do you have a favorite green chili recipe? Leave it in the comments!
No Comments