Ah, I see. There can be ambiguous situations, but generally you look at whether the word is being used as a countable noun or not, and whether it’s plural or not. Using your example, “All my recipes are for New Mexico green chile” would be analogous to “all my pie recipes are for Macintosh apple” without the “s” at the end, which doesn’t really make sense.
But, anyhow, a rundown:
Hatch chiles: A group of New Mexico chili pepper cultivars grown in the Hatch Valley of New Mexico. They are often referred to generally as “Hatch chiles,” but there are a variety of them with a range of spice levels. Big Jims are probably the most common, but other varieties include Sandia, 1904, and Barker. They are typically marketed simply as “Hatch chiles,” at least around here, and sometimes with a spice level.
New Mexico chiles: A type of chili pepper related to Anaheims, which is a banana-pepper-shaped type of pepper, with a greener skin (whereas banana peppers tend to be a pale greeenish-yellow.)
New Mexico chili/chile: A pork stew made from these chili peppers. It can be spelled either way.
Chile verde: Literally, Spanish for “green chili pepper.” In English contexts, this usually means a stew made with green chilis, pork, and often tomatillos, cilantro, and other green goodness. In a Mexican grocery, it usually just means “green chili peppers.”
Colorado green chili/chile: Apparently some sort of pork chili stew that is similar to the above two stews. This does not refer a type of chili pepper.
Chile/chili colorado: A type of beef stew made with red chili peppers (“colorado” means “red” in this context.)
Looking into this a little bit more, there does seem to be a bit of a green chile rivalry between New Mexico and Colorado. So far as I can tell, perhaps the main difference is that New Mexico chili uses Hatches and Colorado green chile uses Pueblo chiles?
There is a bit of a discussion here on Reddit about New Mexico vs Colorado Green Chili, and I can’t find anything other than NM is proud of the Hatch and Colorado is proud of their Pueblo chilis. I don’t see any definitive distinction, and there are a number of other New Mexico vs Colorado green chili arguments on that board, none of which elucidate the matter for me.
(And to further confuse things, one New Mexican insists the stew be spelled “chile” as “chili” refers to the Texas dish, so the spelling of the stew isn’t agreed upon, either.)
It looks like from the research everyone has done that Colorado-style means no tomatillos and using some regular tomatoes. I think I’ll try that style with half Pueblo (it is Colorado style), half hatch and half Anaheim.
So with the “many exceptions” it seems like they’re not didactic about it.
For Colorado, it says:
This is from a Denver chili site, though, so they’re boostering their chili a bit. So it seems like New Mexico green chili has a wider varieties (may or may not have tomatoes, may or may not have tomatillos, may or may not have thickeners), while Colorado is thickened and uses tomatoes, but not tomatillos, so far as I can see. Like I said, I’m used to tomatillo-less New Mexico green chili that sometimes includes tomatoes. Here’s a recipe from a Santa Fe restaurant, the Pink Adobo, and theirs is flour-thickened, with tomatoes, and broth. This is the style that I learned to cook from my Santa Fe friend (though she didn’t use tomatoes herself.) So I expect something like that recipe would go fine a\s a Colorado green chili.
Thank you pulykamell. I realize another reason for my confusion is that I tend to use “chili,” meaning the fruit, as an indefinite noun - so I’ll say, “this dish has chili in it” rather than “this dish has chilis in it.” (Same as you might say, “This dish has lemon in it” rather than “lemons”). Makes it even more likely I won’t be sure of the meaning from context.
1 lb ground beef (at least 80% lean) Save
1 cup chopped onions
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped, or 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon chili powder
2 teaspoons chopped fresh or 1 teaspoon dried oregano leaves Save
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon red pepper sauce
1 can (14.5 oz) Muir Glen™ organic diced tomatoes, undrained
1 can (19 oz) Progresso™ red kidney beans, undrained
Steps
In 3-quart saucepan, cook beef, onions and garlic over medium heat 8 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until beef is thoroughly cooked; drain.
Stir in chili powder, oregano, cumin, salt, pepper sauce and tomatoes.
Heat to boiling over high heat. Reduce heat just enough so mixture bubbles gently. Cover; cook 1 hour, stirring occasionally.
Stir in kidney beans. Heat to boiling over high heat. Reduce heat just enough so mixture bubbles gently. Cook uncovered about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until desired thickness.
I’ve never made it, but I have this recipe bookmarked which looks good to me and which I’ve been meaning to try for awhile. It’s a Pueblo-style green chili intended for a dish called a “slopper”, which apparently consists of a plain hamburger assembled in a bowl, with shredded cheese heaped onto the top, and then smothered in the chili.
The recipes pulykamell posted are pretty much what I think of as Green Chile - pork shoulder, roasted green chiles, onions, potatoes, etc. Sometimes I throw a can of tomatoes in. Never tomatillos. The original recipe I used 30 years ago and have long since lost came from a hole-in-the-wall bar in northern New Mexico.
Hatch chiles are great if you can get them, but living in the far north I most often end up with Anaheims. Really, any hottish green chile will work. Maybe not authentic and the chile purists would scoff, but when you don’t live in a place where Hatch chiles are common you use what you can.
I lived for years on black bean burritos covered with green chile. Have not thought about that in a long time - so easy & so good. Now I want green chile.
To tell you the truth, I don’t typically use the word “chile” to refer to hot peppers. In my dialect (Great Lakes), it is most typical to simply say “peppers” or “hot peppers.” So, it would be a jalapeño pepper, a habanero pepper, and Anaheim pepper, etc. Oddly, though, Hatch peppers I instinctively call “Hatch chiles,” I assume because they are marketed that way. (When you buy them, either fresh, frozen, or in cans, they are typically labeled as “Hatch chiles.”)
And another interesting thing I noticed is that in the example sentence you gave, I would use the singular, “this dish has hot pepper in it” if I were using dried pepper powder in it, and “this dish has hot peppers in it” if I were using fresh or maybe whole dried hot peppers in it. (Much in the same way you might say “this dish has lemon” in it vs “this dish has lemons in it.”)
The one usage where it can be especially problematic and confusing if you don’t know your culinary terms and how they are used in American cookbooks is “chili powder.” Typically, in US cookbooks, this refers to a spice mix of dried hot pepper powder(s), cumin, garlic, and perhaps some other ingredients. It usually does not refer to plain powdered chiles. In other English language cookbooks, I’ve found that it typically refers to plain powdered chiles.
Yeah, it’s a location thing. If you are in a predominately Hispanic area, you’ll see “chile” as in chiles rellenos, whereas in whitebread America, it’s generally “chili” or even “chilli” to refer to both the peppers and the dish.
I’ve only seen “chilli” used to mean a chile (a pepper) in British books. Or really old American books.
My take is that a chile is a pepper and that chili is a bowl o’ red (finished dish).
I call chile verde that because it’s a dish of meat with chiles. “Chili” is reserved for the red chile dish. And I’ve never put tomatillo in chile verde, and my attempts have all been New Mexico style.
Sure, I live in a 75-80% Hispanic area. I would expect chiles rellenos to be spelled as such, since that’s a Spanish name of a dish, not an English one, just as “chile verde” or “chiles en nogada,” etc., are. But the hot peppers, when labeled in English, are still generally labeled as “peppers” here.
