Unpacking

The best way to organize a kitchen is to make a huge mess of it while making some yummy food. This technique allows you to rearrange things into a more useful configuration. It is a process. For example, that wine in the bottle by the window would be much more useful in the glass in that cupboard. Once that is accomplished it is more obvious that the wine would be more useable if poured into my mouth… and so on.

After a few spring-like days, Winter returned today. I spent the day inside, mostly, recovering from a whirlwind weekend of parties, slush bumps, hockey, and late nights. Something winterish sounded good to cook while organizing the kitchen. I dug through the freezer and pulled out chiles. The usual Green Chile enchiladas would be good but perhaps also something new…

Tomatoless red chile

Red Chile
1 med onion, chopped
6 cloves garlic, chopped
2 lb beef chuck roast, trimmed and cubed
Flour, salt, and pepper to dredge
2 qts roasted hot red chiles, cleaned and chopped
2 heaping tsp cumin pdw
2 tsp paprika
¼ t celery salt or 1 tsp celery seed
1 ½ tsp thyme
1 tsp oregano
½ t cinnamon or nutmeg
2 bay leaves
Chicken broth (about 1-2 cups)
1 lb shrimp (optional)

Saute onion and garlic until translucent. Dredge cubed beef in flour, salt, and pepper and brown with onion and garlic. Remove from pan and set aside.

Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Simmer approximately ½ hour. Remove ½ of chile mixture including both bay leaves. Puree chiles in pan with wand blender. Add removed chiles and meat. Simmer ½ - 1 hour. Add shrimp if desired and cook through, about 5 minutes.