Blog Update!
For those of you not following me on Facebook, as of the Summer of 2019 I've moved to Central WA, to a tiny mountain town of less than 1,000 people.

I will be covering my exploits here in the Cascades, as I try to further reduce my impact on the environment. With the same attitude, just at a higher altitude!

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Roasting and freezing Hatch chiles

This year is the first time I've heard of Hatch chiles, the apparently notorious chile pepper that hails from Hatch, NM. Lovers of this smoky, spicy pepper wait with bated breath for these luscious green babies to come in and annual events in Texas and New Mexico herald their arrival.

I managed to score myself a batch of them over the weekend and got down to roasting them. While I ended up freezing some to have throughout the year, we are also planning on enjoying the freshly roasted peppers in such marvelous creations as:

Hatch burgers
Pineapple Hatch margaritas
Hatch brownies

and last, but not least, I'm planning on canning my new jam creation:
Hatch Chile Pepper and Anejo Tequila Blackberry Jam.

If there's any left, a lucky few will be getting some jam for Christmas.

How did I roast them? I just left them whole, roasting them about 5 minutes per side until they were good and charred but not necessarily cooked. I placed them in a bowl and covered with a cloth to let them cool down. As for freezing, I froze them in groups of 3. When they thaw the skins will peel off nicely. Just be warned - not removing the seeds and membranes results in a hotter pepper after freezing, so you'll need less. Which is a good thing since they'll last longer.

5 comments:

Crafty Farmer said...

OMG! We are from Hatch Chile land - the Southwest! I just finished canning 2 cases of Hatch Chiles last Sunday. We eat them with EVERYTHING! Last year we went through three cases and I might have to go get another case, but I was so tired after canning two. Today/tonight we hunted, cleaned, roasted, and froze over 100 lbs. of Lobster Mushrooms. I LOVE the SW even though I still miss all the NW has to offer... :)

Chile said...

I've got 40 pounds of roasted chiles on order, but they'll be coming from my old CSA farmer's fields in Phoenix, not Hatch. I clean them all before freezing because they take less space in the freezer that way.

And I get them already roasted because it's so much easier and, I suspect, actually more efficient to use the propane roaster to do 20 pounds at once than me using the natural gas to do a broiler full at a time.

If my DH ever gets a big patch of chiles growing here, I might invest in a small table-size propane chile roaster of my very own. It could also be used to roast any other vegetable, as well as peanuts.

Enjoy your chiles! (And thank you for spelling it correctly!)

Bee Girl said...

Hatch! We live in Santa Fe and are just getting ready to purchase our supply for the year. There are three of us and we usually go through about 100 pounds (3 burlap sacks) of it. We peel and chop up about half of it before bagging it all up and keeping it in the freezer. Yay for chile! Enjoy!

Humble wife said...

Living in NM Hatch chilis are a staple. We roast them and freeze them and use them in green chili, enchiladas well...everything.

Love Hatch chili's!

David said...

Thanks, helpful tips! Just grilled a Hatch Chile that was on sale, trying to figure out what to do with it. Thinking salsa! Smells great.