Hatch Chile Tortillas
New Mexico Chiles are the dried form of the Red Anaheim Pepper. This chile has a thin flesh with an earthy chile flavor and undertones of wild cherries. This chile ranges from 2 – 4 on a heat scale of 1 to 10. The New Mexico Chile may be referred to as the California Chile or Chile Colorado. New Mexico Chiles are commonly used in Red Mexican or Southwestern sauces. This is a mildly hot chile. Scoville heat units 8,000 – 12,000.
Yields about 12 Tortillas
Ingredients:
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 heaping tsp salt
- 5 Tbsp softened butter, oil or shortening (I usually use olive oil)
- 4 roasted hatch chiles, seeds removed, or ~2 cans (1/2 cup) diced chiles, drained really well
- 1/3-1/2 cup warm water
Instructions:
- Pulse the flour, baking powder, and salt a few times in your food processor fitted with the dough blade.
- Add the fat and process until the mixture is uniformly-ish crumbly.
- Add the chiles and then slowly stream in the water, just until the dry ingredients form a ball and starts traveling around the bowl (you might not use all of the water or you might need a little more).
- Let the dough knead for ~30 seconds. The dough should clean the sides of the bowl, be soft and not overly sticky. (You can most certainly do this by hand with a pastry cutter, a wooden spoon, and your hands – but it will be easier to mince/puree the chiles first.)
- Turn out onto a flour-dusted surface and divide dough into golf-ball sized portions (I weighed mine out to 2 oz each).
- Cover with a kitchen towel and let rest for 10 minutes.
- Heat a large, dry saute pan over medium high heat.
- With a rolling pin, roll the dough balls into thin rounds, dusting the top with just enough flour to keep the tortilla from sticking to the rolling pin.
- (You may have a few larger pieces of hatch chiles in the dough that interfere with rolling – just press those back into the tortilla dough before cooking.)
- Lay tortilla flat in the heated pan and cook on each side for ~20 seconds, until the bubbled areas brown.
- Keep covered with a kitchen towel to keep warm and pliable. Eat warm.