Thursday, September 13, 2012

CSA Adventures: Tomatillo chicken stew

Tomatillos

There has been a distinct dearth of cooking posts on this blog lately (and by lately, I mean...months). I've also been really bad at keeping up with the stuff I've been doing with the veggies I've gotten from my CSA this season; heck, I haven't even really been taking pictures of the last few shares or the food I've made from them. But this week I got tomatillos*! Aren't they pretty? I don't think I've ever eaten tomatillos before (at least, that I know of) and definitely had never cooked with them, so started off with suggestions on Flickr to make salsa. Of course, that would have left me with a lot of salsa and no chips....so I did a little digging around the internet and came across several recipes for chili verde in all its variations. Sounds good to me!

Tomatillos

Tomatillos are easy to prepare--just take off the papery husks and give them a rinse (the tomatillos themselves turn out to be strangely sticky!) You can make salsa verde with raw tomatillos, but most recipes that I came across suggested roasting them first, so I did the same.

Roasted tomatillos

I also added a jalapeno and a couple of cloves of garlic (yes, all from the CSA) and left them under the broiler for about 10 minutes. Timing will vary based on your broiler, so check after 5 minutes and see if it needs some more time. Let cool off for a couple of minutes (mostly so you don't burn yourself!) and then transfer the tomatillos, de-skinned garlic, and jalapenos to a blender or food processor. If you are a cilantro lover, you can also add a couple of handfuls of cilantro. Pulse until everything is uniform.

Tomatillo sauce

Isn't it pretty? Season with a little salt and some lime juice. You could just use this as a dip for chips, or you can use this as the basis for a stew, which is what I went with, and it's just a couple of extra steps. I followed this recipe from Simply Recipes, except that I left out the ground coriander (don't have any) and added additional cilantro.

Tomatillo chicken stew

And here it is, just before I demolished it. The jalapeno turned out to be SUPER spicy, so I added a bit of sour cream to help tame the heat. This would be great over rice or with tortillas...but I just ate it as is. I'm saving room for the barbecue that I'm about to go eat! Woohoo! Until next time! In the meantime, maybe you're interested in seeing some of my other CSA Adventures.

 *Heh, my spellchecker doesn't recognize "tomatillos" and keeps suggesting "automatism" instead.

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