It's Hatch Time

It's Hatch Chile Festival time again! Google "Hatch Chiles" for a lesson in all things HATCH. Hatch, New Mexico is the home of the greatest chiles in the world and late August through mid-September is harvest time. There was a time when all chile-loving Texans had to make their annual pilgrimage to Hatch to bring back 50-100 pound sacks of peppers, rig a roaster, and spend cerveza-soaked weekends roasting peppers, cleaning them, and packing them up for the freezer to keep the coming winter warm and the chili pot fiery.

Now, produce markets across the great state buy from trucks that ship the peppers to the east of NM. Central Market proclaims the last two weekends in August as Hatch Chile Festival right here in Texas. Last year, they launched the "First No-Holds Barred Chile Recipe Contest" and published a cookbook of all submitted recipes from all over Texas. It is one classy read!

I have my thinking cap on and plan to submit something again this year. It was great fun last year to receive a call from CM and learn that my "Down The Hatch" was a runner-up contender for the Fort Worth store! There were five finalists and I was asked to be there along with another contestant in case there was a no-show among the finalists. The CM rep said that everyone got a big kick out of my recipe and really looked forward to seeing it, and trying it. It's on page 46 in the 2007 cookbook. It even won the "Spirit Award" designated for "recipes that fuel the adventurous spirit behind the contest."

"Down the Hatch"

Ingredients:

1 Corona beer

margarita salt

New Mexico Red ground chile powder (found at Pendery's)

garlic powder (optional)

1 lime

roasted Hatch chiles (green-hot or mild) seeded & chopped

crushed ice (optional)

1. Chill a beer mug or pilsner

2. Chill a Corona (the colder, the better)

3. Mix equal parts margarita salt & NM Red (for the glass rim)

4. Add a very small amount of garlic powder to salt/chile powder mixture if desired

5. Rub lime around rim of glass and coat rim in the salt/chile mixture

6. Put 1 tablespoon chopped Hatch green chiles in bottom of glass

7. Add about 1/2 cup crushed ice if you want this really cold

8. Pour Corona slowly over ice

9. Squeeze lime juice on beer

10. Sip beer til almost gone.....then

11. "DOWN THE HATCH"

Hope you try this beer. Chomping down on those diced chiles really adds some zing to the beer buzz. Let me know what you think.