Every Christmas, my husband gives me a big bag of different types of dried chilies to play with. Anchos, guajillos, pasillas, etc. Having dried peppers on hand means that I can just throw them in the mortar and pestle to combine with other spices for a quick add-in of flavor.
Who has two thumbs and loves dried chilies? This woman!
But today I came up with an idea, and to make the idea work – I needed chipotles in a tart and spicy adobo sauce. However, I realized I didn’t have any.
I’ve read the ingredient lists on the little can, so I was pretty sure I could pull it off. It’s really only about four ingredients.
So, that part was fine.
The testing, though, was hilarious. My first bite of the sauce out of the pan was simultaneously bland – and spicy beyond all reasonable measure. My poor tongue.
I doubled the tomato paste, added more salt and it was heaven.
Still crazy spicy heaven, but heaven nonetheless.
Now I have the bag nestled in the freezer next to frozen hot peppers and frozen herbs.
Between the dried peppers, chipotles in adobo, fresh hot peppers, and frozen ones – I’m ready for anything.
Homemade Chipotles in Adobo
Yields approximately 1 ½ cups.
Ingredients:
- 6 dried chipotle peppers
- Boiling water
- 2 ½ tablespoons tomato paste
- ¼ cup apple cider vinegar
- ½ of one small onion, diced
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
Instructions:
Place chipotles in a shallow bowl.
Cover them with boiling water, about 1 ¼ cups.
Place plastic wrap over bowl and tightly wrap it.
Let the peppers steam for 30 minutes.
Remove the plastic wrap, and reserve the water.
Cut the tops off of 3 of the peppers, and deseed them with a knife.
Place the peppers in a mini-food processer with tomato paste and ½ cup of the reserved water.
Process until smooth.
Pour the mixture into a small saucepan with vinegar, remaining peppers, another ½ cup of reserved water, the onion, and salt.
Simmer on low for 30 minutes, or until mixture is thickened.
Reserve the whole peppers, and pour adobe sauce back into the mini-processor.
Let cool for 5-10 minutes, and then process until smooth.
Pour the pureed sauce into a bowl, along with the whole chipotles.
Let cool completely.
Pour the peppers and sauce into a resealable bag and freeze. (I always keep leftover canned chipotles in adobo in the freezer in a bag. All you need is a sharp knife, and you can just cut off a bit of the frozen portion to add to stews, soups, salsas, etc. That way you always have them on hand.)
(Photos by Launie K.)
