Chiles en Nogada

Nogal means walnut in Spanish, and nogada is a sauce made with walnuts. This dish is some very old school ranch style Mexican fare, and there are many variations of this recipe. I didn't actually grow up eating this, but have always wanted to make it, so I did. This dish has quite a history and was also popularized (at least for me) by the movie "Como agua para chocolate." Do some internet research on this dish if you're interested, and I recommend the movie as well, definitely a Mexican classic. Seeing a hanging pomegranate and buying some long chiles at the coop place gave me the inspiration I needed to try out this dish. The concept is relatively simple (it's getting the flavors and spices to mesh that is the trick). Chiles stuffed with a picadillo of meat and fruits and spices, topped with the walnut sauce and sprinkled with pomegranate. Since I did not want to pick the pomegranate I saw and get caught stealing, I used paprika and some homemade habanero hot sauce to add the red to the dish. Obviously, I did not use meat, but using the right kinds of spices made this dish delicious nonetheless. This is definitely a recipe I will make again and again in many variations. It's quite dairy product heavy, so not very vegan friendly, sorry. One last note, the prep for this meal took about day, so read the recipe until its end to allow for prep time. There is just no substitute for time. Although I love cooking for the end product as it were, I am much more about the process as I use cooking to give me time to think and dream while making something creative as well. Always remember to enjoy and love what you cook, you and others will taste the difference, that I can guarantee :)

The "picadillo" before topping with cheese and the chiles:



Topped with the chiles:



Final Chiles en nogada :)



Makes enough picadillo for 2 dishes

Ingredients:

For the nogada (walnut) sauce, made the day before:

3/4 cup walnuts
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup soymilk or milk
Salt, 1 teaspoon
White pepper, 1 teaspoon
Ground cinnamon, 1 teaspoon
Oregano, a sprinkle
Basil, a sprinkle

12 long chiles, mild or spicy is fine

For the picadillo:

Olive oil, 2 tablespoons
Fresh diced ginger, 2 tablespoons worth
1 small to medium onion, diced
Chipotle powder, 2 teaspoons
Cardamon seeds, empty one pod of cardamon (don't use the pod case, just the seeds)
Raisins, 1/4 cup
1 carrot, diced
1 small apple, a crisp one (I used a yellow one), diced
Cooked whole kernel sweet corn, 1/4 cup
Butter, 1 tablespoon
Spinach, diced, 1/4 to 1/2 cup's worth
Cheese, to top the picadillo with before the chiles. I used camerbert

For garnish:

Fresh hot sauce, I used a habanero one I made, a few drizzles
Paprika, a few sprinkles
Dried green herbs, i.e. oregano, basil, parsley
Black sesame seeds, a few to sprinkle

The night or day before, make the nogada (walnut sauce). Cut up the walnuts into smaller pieces, and in a large non-stick fry pan, toast the walnuts for a few minutes. Don't burn them, just get them fragrant. Let them sit for a few minutes to cool off. Then in a blender, add the walnuts, the cream, the soy milk, salt, white pepper, cinnamon, oregano, and basil. Blend until smooth. Pour the sauce into a container, and let sit in the fridge overnight or for at least a few hours.

A few hours before you intend to serve the dish, roast the chiles. If you've never done this before, it might be a good idea to Youtube a video or two. Ideally, I would use the long stems of a chile to use my hands to turn the chiles over an open flame. But since the stems were so short on the chiles I had, and since I didn't want to burn my place down, I roasted them in a large non-stick fry pan as follows:

Wash the chiles and place them one layer thick in a large fry pan. Turn the heat to medium and cover the pan (covering is important to retain moisture). Let the skins blacken on one side, and then turn chiles over. Cook until skins blacken on the other side too. This will make your place smell ever so delicious, but open your windows anyway. Once the chiles have blackened skins on both sides, try to get all the sides of the chile skin blackened. This may take a while, but be sure to not burn the chiles. You just want the skins to be charred to peel them off later, not to burn the whole chile. Turn the heat down if need be.

Once the chile skins are pretty black and crispy, cover the pan and let the chiles sweat for about an hour. You can do the prep for the picadillo if you so desire while you wait, or listen to some jams or go eat lunch with your friends like I did.

After allowing them to sweat, deskin and deseed the chiles using a small knife. My chiles were too small to stuff, so I used them as a sort of layer over the picadillo instead. Deskinning and deseeding the roasted chiles will take patience and time, so allow both for this step. Peel the skins off gently, being sure that you just take the skin off, not the juicy fruit of the chile. If you have a few seeds left over, that is okay, but try to get as many out as possible. Again, watching a Youtube video will help greatly if you have never done this. You will get your hands dirty :) Set the chiles aside.

About 30 minutes before you intend to serve, make the picadillo. In a large fry pan, add the olive oil, the onion, and the cardamon seeds. Cook over medium heat until the onions are semi translucent. Lower the heat, add the chipotle powder and cook for about 3 minutes until it smells nice. Add the raisins and cook for another minute or so, being sure not to burn anything. Turn the heat off, cover the pan and let the onions sweat for a few minutes while you prepare the other ingredients.

Turn the heat back on to medium. In the same pan, add the diced carrot, the diced apple, and the corn. Cook for a few minutes, stirring frequently. Add the butter, mix until melted. Add the spinach, but don't mix. Lower the heat, and cover the pan. Let cook on low heat for about 5 minutes. Turn the heat off, then mix all the ingredients in the pan. Keep covered and warm until ready to serve.

Time to get layering. Reheat the chiles so they will be hot. Then place a cup's worth or so of the picadillo mixture onto a plate. Place slices of the cheese on top of this mixture. Top the whole thing with the roasted chiles, being sure to cover as much as possible (see second picture above). You will likely have to get your hands dirty again. Time for the sauce.

Mix the nogada sauce in the container to get the consistency even again. Then using a large spoon, or simply pouring it out of the container, gently and generously pour the nogada sauce all over the chiles evenly. It is okay that the sauce is cold right from the fridge since the rest of the dish should be piping hot. Then drizzle red hot sauce and sprinkle paprika on one side, and dried or fresh green herbs on the other side. I also topped the middle area with black sesame seeds. Serve immediately.

This is some good stuff!