Poblanos Coloradito

Inspired by a dish at Villa Creek Restaurant in Paso Robles and the Coloradito sauce in The Food and Life of Oaxaca : Traditional Recipes from Mexico's Heart.

Ingredients:

• Roasted Poblano Chiles


• Tri-tip (cut into large chunks)


• Bacon (1 strip, diced)


• Posole


• Canned "Poquito" beans (small red beans)


• Canned Tomatoes


• Ancho & mild new mex chiles (resuscitated & peeled)


• Veal stock


• Onion


• Garlic


• Cilantro


• Thyme, Oregano, Ground Clove, True Cinammon (and salt, pepper, & crystal sauce to taste, of course)


• Monterey Jack cheese (shredded)

Process:

1. Blenderize the chile flesh w/2 cups stock


2. Saute beef in pressure cooker with bacon (don't over-brown, do in batches if needed)


3. Add chile sauce, chopped tomatoes, posole, crystal sauce, and aromatics (onion, garlic, thyme, oregano) to pressure cooker


4. Pressure cook for 30+ mins (until meat is shreddable)


5. Remove meat & return sauce to blender and process until smooth


6. Return sauce to pan, add a small amount of cocoa powder & reduce to desired consistency


7. Place roasted peppers on plate, add a layer of beans, arrange meat over beans, cover with sauce and then sprinkle with diced onion and cheese.


8. Put in broiler to melt the cheese, garnish with cilantro & serve

Serving the dish in layers was a hack to get around the fact that I over-roasted the poblanos. Ideally, they should be blackened enough to peel, but not so cooked they lose their shape so they can still be stuffed. Although it didn't look as pretty as Villa Creek's stuffed version, layering the ingredients worked pretty well.

A few things to note:

1. No Cumin!


2. The posole added a lot of great flavor--30 mins was not enough time to thoroughly soften them, but the blender took care of that & the result was a nice, thick sauce


3. The milder chiles worked well--the sauce was intense, but not intensely hot & distinctly different from our standard jalapeno-laden chimayo chile sauce.


4. Ingredient amounts are conspicuously lacking because it's hard to document & cook at the same time. We prepared this to serve two and used maybe 3/4 lb of beef, about 5 oz of tomatoes, 8 or so dried chiles, a couple small handfuls of red beans, and maybe a handful of posole. Not totally low-carb, but the beans & posole were really just accents. We ended up with a fair bit of leftover sauce, but probably could have happily eaten more meat. All in all, though, we ended up with about the right amount of food--satisfied, but not stuffed.