Roasting New Mexico’s Hatch Green Chiles

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New Mexico's Hatch Chile Season...

Each year we look forward to New Mexico’s Hatch Chili season. In August of each year, we often find someone manning a chili roaster and selling chili’s out of a local restaurant parking lot. The chili’s are roasted over an open fire, bagged up in plastic bags while still warm and you get to take them home to peel. The first couple times we got them, we spent hours picking off the skins before cutting them up and freezing. Fresh chili’s are also sold in the grocery store in bulk. I actually prefer to pick them up fresh and roast them at home. I find them much easier to peel this way. Below is a very easy way to roast, peel and preserve these wonderful chili’s.

Wash thoroughly...

Char under broiler...

Instructions:

  1. Place chili’s on a foil lined pan
  2. Place under the broiler and blacken on all sides. Flip them over with tongs. I suggest setting a timer for 5 minute intervals to remind yourself to keep an eye on them.
  3.  After they are blackened, place foil over the whole pan and let them steam for 20 minutes.
  4. Remove foil and make sure they are cool enough to handle.
  5. Pull off the stem, skins and seeds. I suggest wearing nitrile gloves so the capsicum doesn’t burn your hands. It can burn on your skin for a good 24 hours not to mention any other place you touch with your hands. Ouch!
  6. Once peeled, chop the green peppers into 1/4 inch pieces and place in a freezer bag. Flatten them out in the bag, pushing as much air out as possible. This will make it easy to break pieces off when needed.

Green Chilies for later...