Southwest Green Chile Stew

I think New Mexico is one of the most beautiful states in America.

There is something different about the light there. The sunlight I mean. Objects in the New Mexico sunlight take on a sort of pastel hue. The whole state is like one big tie-dye t-shirt. No wonder artists like Georgia O’Keeffe find their way out there.

Now Santa Fe is one of the prettiest towns in the state, but to be honest, I prefer Albuquerque. There is something genuine and unpretentious about Albuquerque
and the people who dwell there.

The first time I visited Albuquerque I asked the hotel desk clerk how long of a drive it was to Santa Fe.* He frowned a little and said “oh those people?” “About an hour north” I was not sure what he meant by “those people” but it did not appear to me to be a term of endearment. It was almost as if he was confused as to why I would ever want to go there in the first place.

The cuisine of Albuquerque is as diverse as any city. You can get pretty much anything you want there in terms of ethnic food but I wanted to get to the soul of New Mexico cuisine, the signature foods that define the New Mexico culinary genre. What I discovered was that the soul of New Mexico cuisine consisted of pretty much only two things: Green Chiles and a fluffy fry bread drizzled with honey called Sopaipillas.

I first encountered that soul at a beautiful restaurant in Northwest Albuquerque called
El Pinto. My wife and I had a table in a gorgeous outdoor patio right next to a torch heater (it was springtime I think). It was there that we discovered the sublime heat of green chiles and the honey sweet sopaipilla – which we had to fight the local bees for.

Unfortunately we here in the stew cannot get the quality chiles that one can find in The Land of Enchantment unless we buy them online from Amazon – which we’re not going to do – so we had to improvise with some poblanos and a couple of jalapenos for heat. But hey, our pork is cooked in beer so we think that more than makes up for the lack of authentic New Mexico chiles in this recipe.

We cook the pork in an electric crock pot set to medium heat for 3 to 4 hours. If you don’t have a crock pot (or slow cooker) you can cook the pork on the stove top but remember… low and slow is the way to go.

Need This
2 pounds of pork loin or chops – whichever is cheaper
2 large poblano peppers – rough chopped
2 jalapeno peppers – chopped fine
1 medium size onion – chopped
4 cups of chicken broth
1 – 29 ounce can of pozole (white hominy) – look in the Goya aisle
1 can Pabst Blue Ribbon beer (or whatever beer you have lying around)
olive oil
salt
ground black pepper

Do This
Chuck the pork into a slow cooker or crock pot. Pour the beer all over it then hit it with a dusting of salt and ground black pepper.

Set the pot to medium heat. Cover and cook for about 4 hours or until the internal temperature of the pork is near 160 degrees F.

When the pork is done remove it from the pot and let cool to room temperature. Reserve the liquid in the crock pot.

Drizzle a little olive oil into a large sauce pot. Throw in the peppers and onions and set a medium heat under it.

Sweat the peppers and onions until the onions just start to brown. Now add in the chicken broth and the reserved liquid from the pork. Heat until it just starts to boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer uncovered.

Rough chop the pork into bite sized pieces and add it to the simmering liquid.

Open the can of hominy.

Here you have a choice: you can rinse the white starch off the hominy or leave it on depending on how thick you want the stew to be. More starch = thicker stew.

Add the hominy to the stew. Simmer on low, uncovered, for 1/2 hour. Stir occasionally.

Serves 4. My cost approx $ 13.62 total – about $ 3.40 per serving.

Serve hot.

*This was waaay before GPS navigation. GMN