Chiles en Nogada

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Gas burner or hot broiler for charring chiles
• •Paper bag or large covered bowl for sweating the chiles
• •Wide cazuela or heavy 12-inch skillet for the picadillo
• •High-powered blender
• •Sheet pan for cooling the picadillo
• •Wide Talavera poblana ceramic plates for serving

Instructions

1. 1

   Peel the walnuts

   This is the work that scares people away from chiles en nogada. Do it first and do it without complaining. Crack the fresh walnuts and pull out the meats whole if you can. Cover them with hot water for ten minutes, then peel off the thin brown skin with your fingers and a paring knife. Every walnut, by hand. The skin is bitter and it stains the nogada brown. White nogada is the goal. White walnuts, peeled clean. Set aside in a bowl of cold milk to keep them pale.

   If you cannot find fresh walnuts (nueces de Castilla), do not make this dish out of season. Dried walnuts give you a beige sauce, gritty texture, and the wrong flavor entirely. Wait until next August. No me vengas con atajos.
2. 2

   Char the poblanos

   Set the chiles directly over an open gas flame, or under a hot broiler. Turn them with tongs until the skin blisters and blackens on all sides, about six to eight minutes total. The flesh underneath should remain firm. You are burning the skin, not cooking the chile through. Drop them into a paper bag or a covered bowl and let them sweat for ten minutes.

3. 3

   Peel and clean the chiles

   Rub the blackened skin off with your fingers and a kitchen towel. Do not run them under water. Water rinses away the smoky flavor that the char gave you. With a small paring knife, cut a single vertical slit from just below the stem down to about an inch above the tip. Reach in with the tip of the knife and carefully cut out the seed pod and veins, leaving the stem attached. The chile should stay whole, with one clean opening for stuffing. Set aside.

   Taste a tiny piece of the chile flesh. If it is fiery hot, soak the cleaned chiles in salted water for twenty minutes to tame the heat. Poblanos vary wildly by season and farm. A traditional chile en nogada is mild, not searing.
4. 4

   Build the picadillo base

   In a wide cazuela or heavy skillet, melt the lard over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for five minutes until translucent. Add the garlic and cook one minute more. Add the ground pork and beef, breaking it up with a wooden spoon. Cook until the meat releases its fat and starts to brown at the edges, about ten minutes. Do not drain the fat. La manteca es el sabor and the fat from the meat carries the spices.

5. 5

   Add tomato, fruit, and spice

   Stir in the chopped tomato and cook for five minutes until the tomato breaks down and the mixture darkens. Add the pear, peach, plantain, apple, raisins, almonds, pine nuts, and acitron. Stir gently so the fruit does not break apart. Add the canela, cloves, black pepper, and salt. Cook over medium-low for twenty minutes, stirring every few minutes. The fruit should soften but still hold its shape. The picadillo is ready when the liquid has cooked off and a wooden spoon dragged across the bottom of the pan leaves a clean line. Taste for salt. It should be sweet and savory in the same bite, the contradiction that makes this dish what it is.

6. 6

   Cool the picadillo

   Spread the picadillo on a sheet pan and let it cool to room temperature. Warm picadillo will melt the cold nogada when you serve and ruin the whole architecture of the plate. This dish is built on temperature contrast: cold sauce, room-temperature filling, room-temperature chile. Respect it.

7. 7

   Make the nogada

   Drain the peeled walnuts from their milk soak. In a blender, combine the walnuts, fresh milk, crema, queso fresco, the milk-soaked bread, sugar, salt, and sherry if using. Blend on high until the sauce is completely smooth and the color of fresh cream. If it is too thick, add milk a tablespoon at a time. The texture should coat the back of a spoon and pour like heavy cream. Taste it. The nogada is the soul of this dish. It should be faintly sweet, faintly salty, and taste cleanly of fresh walnut. Refrigerate for at least one hour before serving.

   Every Poblana family argues about the nogada. Some add a splash of sherry. Some refuse it. Some use only walnuts and milk. Some add a piece of goat cheese. My notebook has four versions from four different cooks in Puebla and none of them agree. Pick one and commit.
8. 8

   Stuff the chiles

   Working with one chile at a time, hold it gently in your palm and spoon the cooled picadillo into the opening until the chile is plump and full but not splitting. The filling should mound slightly at the slit. Close the opening with your fingers and set the stuffed chile seam-side down on a platter. Repeat with the remaining chiles.

9. 9

   Plate and dress

   Place each stuffed chile in the center of a wide ceramic plate, ideally Talavera poblana. The chile should be at room temperature. Pour the cold nogada generously over the chile so it covers the green completely, pooling at the edges. Scatter pomegranate seeds across the top in a generous handful. Tuck parsley leaves around. The three colors, green chile, white sauce, red pomegranate, are the flag of Mexico. That is the dish. That is the point. Serve immediately. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

Chef Tips

• •The season is short and absolute. Late July through September, when fresh walnuts and pomegranates are both in the market at the same time. Outside those weeks, do not attempt this dish. A version made with dried walnuts and out-of-season fruit is not chiles en nogada. It is a costume of chiles en nogada.
• •Find a real Mexican market for the chiles poblanos. The ones in supermarkets outside Mexico are often too thin-walled to stuff properly and split during charring. You want thick-walled, firm chiles with deep green color. The vendor in Mercado de Sanchez in Puebla taught me to press the chile gently near the stem. It should give a little but spring back. That is a chile with body.
• •Acitron is made from biznaga, a slow-growing endangered cactus. Many traditional cooks in Puebla have moved to diced candied pineapple or candied chayote out of conservation. Use what you have access to. The dish survives the substitution. The biznaga may not, if everyone keeps demanding it.
• •Some Poblana cooks batter and fry the stuffed chiles in egg white before saucing them (capeados). Others serve them naked (sin capear). The naked version is older and now considered more elegant. Pick a side and commit. Do not try to do both.

Advance Preparation

• •The picadillo can be made one day ahead and refrigerated. The flavor deepens overnight. Bring to room temperature before stuffing the chiles.
• •The chiles can be charred, peeled, and cleaned one day ahead and refrigerated, lightly covered.
• •The nogada must be made the same day. It does not hold well overnight. The walnut oils oxidize and the sauce turns gray and bitter within twenty-four hours. Make the nogada the morning of serving.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 580g)