Green Chile Stew

Erica requested this recipe and Matt asked for it too so I figured I'd post it on here.  Feel free to try it out if you want some AUTHENTIC New Mexican food.

Green Chile StewIngredients

• 2-3 Russet Potatoes or 4-6 red potatoes ,cubed

• Olive or vegetable oil

• Salt

• Pepper

• ~1-1.5 pounds ground beef or turkey, chicken breast, (tofu??) idk whatever you want

• 1-1.5 cups fresh, roasted, peeled, and chopped HATCH Green Chile depending on hotness (NOT CANNED, this is very important.  If you are unwilling/unable to obtain fresh green chiles use the Bueno frozen variety in the green tub.  The frozen kind is not very hot so feel free to use a lot of it.  For those of you that don't know Hatch is not a variety of chile, but rather a city in New Mexico where nearly ALL of the green chiles come from.  Green chiles also go by the name Anaheim peppers.  Green chiles and red chiles are actually the same species, but picked at different times of ripeness.  In case you didn't get the drift from the history lesson, THS IS THE KEY INGREDIENT.)

• 1 yellow onion

• 2 Roma tomatoes

• 1/8-1/4 teaspoon ground cumin, to taste

• 2-3 cloves garlic

• 1 Tablespoon oregano

• 6 cups (3 cans) chicken or beef broth

Directions

• Lightly coat potatoes with oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper, spread on a cookie sheet and bake at 400F for ~30 minutes.  Stir/flip potatoes halfway through cooking.  Alternatively, you can just throw the potatoes in with the soup and increase the simmer time until the potatoes are tender, but I don't think its as good that way.

• Brown the meat in a large skillet. Dice the onion and mince the garlic.  Add to the browned meat, reduce the heat to med-lo, and let the flavors meld.  After about 5 generous minutes (don't let the garlic burn, it should be fragrant but not brown), add the green chile.

• Add the broth to a large stock pot and bring to a near boil.  Dice the tomatoes (removing the skins is optional).  Add the potatoes at this point if you are not baking them.  Add the meat/chile mixture to the hot broth.  Add the tomatoes after about 5 minutes.  By this point the potatoes (if in the oven) should be about done, dump them in the pot.

• Reduce the heat, add the oregano and cumin and let it simmer for at least 10-20 minutes until the flavors meld (the longer you simmer the better it will taste).  You may need to add some salt or garlic salt to it at this point to taste, depending on how much salt is on the potatoes/in the broth.

• Serve with warm tortillas and top with cheese.