In my last Blue Cayenne post, I introduced two Mexican sauces that I had enjoyed. My program only allows me to format one recipe at a time. So, here is part two of that post with the red sauce recipe.
This sauce recipe is from the cookbook Tamales 101 available at your local bookstore or on Amazon here. .
Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen.
Mexican Red Chile Sauce
January 26, 2024
Ingredients
- 10 ancho chiles (dried poblanos)
- 4 California chiles (dried)
- 4 onions (quartered)
- 8 garlic cloves
- 2 T. olive oil
- 3 t. ground cumin
- 2 to 4 C. vegetable broth
- 1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes or puree
- 2 T. sugar
- 1 T. salt (or to taste)
Directions
- Step 1 Remove the seeds from the dried chiles and rinse the chiles. Set aside.
- Step 2 Boil 4 C. water. Remove the water from the heat and put the dried chiles into the water, weighting the chiles down to submerge them so that they can fully soak. Cover the pot with the soaking chiles and set aside for 30 minutes.
- Step 3 While the dried chiles are soaking, boil onions for 25 minutes. You want the onions to soften.
- Step 4 Remove the dried chiles from the soaking water. Reserve 2 cups of the soaking water for use later in the recipe. Put the soaked chiles in a food processor or blender and puree the chiles, boiled onions and garlic.
- Step 5 Heat oil in a saucepan. Stir the ground cumin into the oil. Add the chile mixture to the pan and simmer for about 3 minutes. Add 1 C. stock, 1 C. reserved chile soaking liquid and tomatoes to the pan. Stir. Add additional stock and/or chile soaking water to your sauce to bring it to a thin saucy consistency. Add sugar and salt. Cook for 10 minutes more, stirring the mixture occasionally. You want your sauce to be smooth but to have a bit of texture.
- Step 6 Adjust salt and sugar seasoning o your taste. Cool and refrigerate.
- Step 7 This sauce is wonderful on enchiladas and tamales.
