Recipe: Speedy Chicken Posole
I am a faux vegetarian. Well, I am often a faux meat eater too I suppose. Since I started sourcing more and more of my food myself and focus on using as much of the animal as possible I am in this funny in between space. A lot of my vegetarian dishes are “faux” because I often don’t include meat, but I tend to use meat by products in my cooking. I have way more chicken, beef, or fish stock in my pantry than vege. I almost always have duck, bacon, or chicken fat available and sometimes that, typically, meat dish just needs the hint of meaty goodness. I love frying up my greens (curly kale, yum!) or the occasional brussel sprout in a little bacon fat to add that hint of salty, porkiness that seems to go so well.
This recipe perfectly fit the bill. I started with Sunset Magazines: Speedy Chicken Posole and made some adjustments. You could easily leave the chicken meat out of this one and increase the amount of hominy or add other vegetables for a “faux” dish.
Yield: Serves 2
Ingredients
- 2 large poblano chiles (others have recommended canned peppers if you don’t want to spend the time to roast these.)
- 2 garlic cloves, chopped
- 1/2 large onion, chopped
- 1 can (14 1/2 oz.) white hominy
- 3/4 lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs. (I used 1 left over roasted chicken breast, skin removed)
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoons dried oregano, divided
- 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
- 3 cups low-salt homemade chicken stock
- 1.5 tablespoon ground red New Mexico chiles (I used a dash of dried red pepper flakes because I am still working on a jar I dried two years ago.)
- salt
- Garnishes: sliced avocado, lime wedges, cilantro sprigs, and sour cream
Preparation
1. Skip this step if using canned: Preheat broiler. When hot, broil poblanos on a baking sheet until blackened, turning as needed, about 15 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, in a food processor, whirl garlic to mince. Cut onion in chunks and pulse with garlic until chopped; set aside. (I chopped both ingredients by hand to avoid dirtying the food processor, depends on your motivation). Drain hominy; set aside.
3. Cut chicken into 1- to 1 1/2-in. chunks and sprinkle with salt and 1/2 tsp. oregano. Heat oil in a 5- to 6-qt. pan over high heat. Brown half the chicken lightly, stirring occasionally, about 5 minutes. With a slotted spoon, transfer meat to a plate. Repeat with remaining chicken. (Since I used previously cooked chicken I skipped this step, just adding the oil to the pan and heating for the next step.)
4. Reduce heat to medium-high. Add onion mixture and remaining 1/2 tsp. oregano to pan and sauté until onion is softened, 3 minutes. Add ground chiles to pan and cook, stirring, about 30 seconds.
5. Add broth, hominy, and chicken to pan. Cover and bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer to blend flavors, 10 minutes (or longer).
6. Remove stems, skins, and seeds from poblanos and discard; chop poblanos OR add canned chiles.
7. Stir poblanos into posole, salt to taste, and cook 1 minute. Ladle into bowls; top with garnishes.
Since I cut down on the fat used, my end result was less calorically dense, but no less hearty. I topped mine with a reduced fat sour cream (the only reduced fat dairy product I can stand), avocado, and fresh cilantro.
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Update: I’ve made this since using the requested Nuevo Mexico Chile powder and canned “green chiles” because I had some. It definitely brought a bit more heat to play.