Chili Verde

We have a restaurant near us that rotates their soup of the day.  I love going there on Thursdays because that’s Chile Verde day.  As I’ve confessed before, I’m a soup girl.  I like it any time of year.  I’ll often make a pot of Chicken Noodle or Tomato Soup when Mark’s on travel.  One because I love soup and two, because I only have to cook dinner once.  The rest of the week is easy meal planning.

I never thought Mark would like Chile Verde so I never bothered to tell him about Chile Verde Thursdays.  Until that one time.  It had been a hectic week and neither of us wanted to be bothered with making dinner.  I casually offered up Keegan’s knowing full well what day of the week it was.  He jumped on it, I smiled all the way there knowing what I was having for dinner.  As we sat down at the table I told the hostess that I didn’t need a menu.  Mark looked at me a little confused so I told him how good their Chile Verde was.

He ordered it instead of french fries with his burger and loved it.  Loved it so much that he searched for recipes when we got home!  Little did he know I had 10 recipes saved already to my Pinterest board.  Turns out, I wouldn’t need any of them.

In a delightful twist of fate, my friend Gina posted a video while she was making Chile Verde.  It looked amazing and I knew I’d found THE recipe.  She’s such a dear, she emailed it to me.  This recipe comes straight from a Chile company, she told me how good it was and how easy it was to make.  I was sold.

This makes a lot, like feed a crowd a lot.  You know what that means, leftovers!  We freeze them in quart-sized containers which is the perfect dinner for two amount.  That quart-sized container makes a fabulous long drive day dinner.  All we have to do is heat it up.

Are you ready to make your house smell good?  Like, wowzer good?  Let’s get after it!

Begin with your pork.  The first two times we made it, we cubed it ourselves and it was a long messy job.  The next time, I asked the butcher at the grocery store to debone it and cube it for me.  I’ll never do it myself again.  If your knife skills and patience are stronger than mine, feel free to tackle this yourself.

The official recipe calls for browning the pork in a large skillet.  I’d rather wash one less dish so I do it in my big heavy pot.

Add olive oil and cubed pork to the skillet.  Sprinkle 1/2 bottle of Posole seasoning, turning to coat the meat really well.  Brown the pork on all sides, set aside.

First a little story about posole seasoning.  We ordered the green chilies from the Fresh Chile Company but not the posole seasoning thinking we could grab it at the grocery store when we bought the everything else for the recipe.  Wrong.  Five stores later, we bought a packet of seasoning from the little Latin section of the store that has rows of different seasonings in clear envelopes.  It was so hot we could barely eat it.  Still delicious but so very hot.  The next time we made it I widened my search, still no luck.  I did, however, find Mrs. Dash Chipotle Seasoning so we gave it a try.  This time it had heat, but good flavorful heat.  It was time to order more green chilies so I ordered their posole seasoning as well.  Using the posole seasoning takes it from great to amazing.

Add the chopped onions to the pan and cook until translucent.  Add the garlic and sauté for another 30 seconds.

If you used a skillet, this is where you’ll transfer the onion, garlic and meat to a cooking pot.  If you are doing it all in one pot, add the meat back into the pot.  Add two cups of chicken broth and two jars of green chilies.

Bring to a boil, scrape all the cooking bits off the bottom of the pan and simmer for 2 to 3 hours.  Just in case your nose goes immune to the awesome smell, go outside and come back in.  Trust me on this one.

Here’s what the recipe says about ways to eat it:  Can eat with tortillas, over rice or with grilled cubed potatoes.  Can also add potatoes in with the meat and posole seasoning and cook them as part of the mixture.  Another option is to add less chicken stock and a little less posole seasoning, making it more of a thick and chunky seasoned meat mixture that can be made into burritos.  Tastes delicious with sour cream, shredded cheese, radishes, cilantro, etc.

Click to print recipe.

Chile Verde

Adapted from The Fresh Chile Company

• Four pounds pork shoulder (also called pork butt), trimmed of excess fat and cut into 1 to 2-inch cubes
• Extra virgin olive oil
• 2 yellow onions, chopped
• 3 cloves minced garlic
• 1/2 bottle posole seasoning, more if desired
• 2 jars green chile
• 2 1/2 cups chicken stock
• 4 large cubed potatoes (optional)

1.  In a large skillet or heavy stock pot, add olive oil and cubed pork.  Sprinkle posole seasoning on meat, turning to coat.  Brown the pork on all sides using medium/medium high heat.  Once browned, set meat aside.
2. Add chopped onion to pan and cook until translucent.  Add garlic and cook 30 seconds.
3. If using skillet, transfer meat and onions to large cooking pot.  If using only the large cooking pot, add the meat back in.  Add chicken broth and green chilies.  If using the large pot, scrape the bits off the bottom of the pot.  Note from original recipe:  use some of the broth to deglaze the bits from the skillet and add to the pot.
4. Bring to boil and simmer for two to three hours.
5. Serve – see note below.
6. Freeze leftovers in quart-sized containers.

Note:  You can eat it just as it’s served from the pot.  We eat it over Spanish rice.  You can also eat it with tortillas, sour cream, shredded cheese, radishes and/or cilantro.