The Relleno Ritual
Growing up on the West Texas desert where Tex-Mex food reflects the influence of the ranching states of northern Mexico and the chile fields of Hatch and Deming, my experience of fresh chile peppers was limited to jalapeños, serranos, and the occasional Big Jim. The long, skinny green peppers from the Hatch, N.M., area are the receptacle of choice for chile rellenos in that part of the Southwest. I’d never encountered a poblano pepper until 1975, when I enjoyed my first meal at a then new Austin restaurant called Fonda San Miguel. Poblanos are a deep, vibrant green, triangular-shaped chile with broad shoulders and curling tips. In the early days of the restaurant, they were still somewhat exotic, so chile rellenos made with them were a seasonal weekend specialty. What a luxurious treat: big, beautiful roasted poblano peppers stuffed with pork picadillo or jack cheese, encased in a delicate egg batter and fried. Once I started working at Fonda, the rellenos were one of the dishes I most wanted to master. The man who taught me was a cook from Zacatecas, Mexico, named Daniel Torres. I soon realized rellenos were the result of a careful and time-consuming ritual as much as a recipe. After making chile rellenos at home once or twice, I developed a much greater appreciation for cooks who prepare them regularly in restaurants.
Every Friday, Daniel arrived in the Fonda kitchen at noon, retrieved a crate of poblanos from the walk-in, and his relleno ritual commenced. Once the peppers were washed, Daniel placed sheet pans of them under the salamander (broiler), turning them regularly with tongs until they were scorched black all over. He repeated this step until all the peppers were roasted, and then began the painstaking process of peeling away the charred skins, slitting the peppers, and carefully cutting out the hearts full of seeds. Thousands of repetitions honed his skills for keeping the stems attached and the peppers relatively intact. While Daniel peeled peppers, one of the other cooks shaped elliptical balls of grated jack cheese or cooled pork picadillo and left them lined up on sheet pans, waiting to be wrapped in the piles of incredibly fragrant roasted chiles.
With the afternoon slipping way, Daniel dredged the filled chiles in flour and quickly separated a couple of flats of eggs. He beat the egg whites and some salt into fluffy snow drifts in the bowl of the 20-quart mixer and folded in a few yolks for richness. As the other cooks set up the line for dinner service, Daniel dipped the peppers in the egg mixture and gently slid puffy battered chiles into hot oil, frying each batch to a crisp, golden brown.
The rellenos drained on paper towels and waited to be bathed in piquant ranchero sauce and paired with rice and creamy refried black beans. Daniel joined the rest of the cooks serving hundreds of Friday night dinners, knowing the relleno ritual waited for him again on Saturday. If I was very lucky, one of his leftover weekend rellenos would be waiting for me in the walk-in on Monday morning when I came in to make desserts. They were my favorite breakfast indulgence. You can experience your own version of this relleno ritual this fall with the publication of Fonda San Miguel: 30 Years of Food and Art.
This article appears in August 26 • 2005.