Being from New Mexico comes with a different connotation of the word Mexican. There are differences in culture and food. The way we make traditional Mexican recipes is specific to us due to two key factors: the use of red and green chili. Red chili is just green chili that has ripened. The theory I was taught suggests that chili arrived in New Mexico before the Spanish arrived via trade routes between pueblos and the Toltecs. Despite the chili's origins, it began to be farmed in New Mexico around the 17th century by both the Pueblos and the Spanish. New Mexico's climate made growing and cultivating green chili easy, and the plant adapted well to the environment in the southern region, particularly in Hatch, New Mexico. Hatch chili became the gold standard in our state and defines what separates it from its roots in Mexico. It's sold in almost every grocery store and Mexican restaurant, and, of course, is in nearly every home. However, chili is grown all over New Mexico.
Red is my favorite, and it's what I grew up eating the most. My favorite dish that uses red chili is red chili beef enchiladas. Beef and red chili are mutually exclusive, just like chicken and green, don't ask me why. The chili my mom has used for nearly my whole life comes from a farmer who sells it out of the back of their car in Roswell, New Mexico. This makes the best red beef enchiladas that can be found in my childhood home. In a kitchen radiating a pungent, smoky, spicy smell of the chili boiling in a pot, the door is opened to let the air in. When the chili is done cooking, the seeds are removed, and the red chili is blended into a sauce. The sauce is then mixed into a Roux and left in the pot while the other ingredients are prepared. My brothers and I help my mom prepare ingredients. One of us finely chops onions, the other starts making sweet tea. And the other grates cheddar cheese, or we all fight over who has to do the cheese. My mom prepares ground beef just seasoned with salt and pepper, and she fries corn tortillas in oil. After about the first 10, she gets one of us to take her place so she can start assembling them. First, she dips the fried corn tortillas into the red chili sauce, then places them flat on a plate. She places ground beef, red chili, cheese, and onions in that order on top, then repeats the process, stacking a tortilla between each layer. She typically makes five layers per plate. It's then placed in the oven to melt the cheese and is served alongside a fresh pot of pinto beans, accompanied by an egg on top, cooked to your liking. That's a New Mexican enchilada. And in my house, it is always served with a glass of iced sweet tea. It sounds like I'm leaving ingredients or steps out, but I promise I'm not. It's that simple; it just has to be hatch chili or any New Mexican chili.
My mom's is the best. I know this for a fact because I've visited numerous Mexican food restaurants throughout the state, and all the ones in Albuquerque. Some do it differently. Some do it to my liking, but most don't. For me, it's when they try to add things like cumin or other spices other than salt and pepper that it starts to become a bad enchilada. More spices might mean more flavor to most, but the natural taste of the chili is perfect on its own. That's the secret. My word might sound biased, and you wouldn't be the first to think that. This bold claim has provoked people to challenge me but I'm not shy about proving it. I invite every person who questions this to our family enchilada night, if they're worthy, where they will leave with the same opinion as mine, or they will never stop talking about that time they sat at my dinner table. Or ask the people who get me to try my mom's enchiladas as her dish for a party, who sing her praises and beg her to cook it for other events, or ask for the recipes. Which they never do right because they think she's holding out on them. So trust me, they're the best. She should open a restaurant.
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