Welcome To This Weeks Newsletter

Sorry we're a day late. We live in a cul-de-sac and last night was time for the semi-annual street party again.

By the way, the retail place we were looking at has not panned out into a worthwhile purchase, unfortunately. We'll keep looking.

As you may have noticed, we made a fairly major SNAFU in last weeks newsletter in the chilli variety section. The text and photo were about the the guajillo chilli and the title introduced the piquin. Our mistake, which we'll try and avoid in the future.

We Salute The Chipotle - Part 2 - Making Your Own

The Process

• Get your wood chunks soaking if that is what you are using
• De-stem your clean chillies and then slit them in half and de-seed. Most instructions tell you simply to put a slit in the chilli, however, once they are smoked they become quite leathery and it is a 'pain in the bum' to try and remove the seeds then.
• Fire up whatever type of smoker you are using. If it's a portable fish smoker you don't need much time as it heats up very quickly. If it's a hooded, pre-heat for 5 minutes, and if you are using a kettle, it will take 15 minutes for your charcoal to be properly burning.
• Put on your wood. In the portable fish smoker, scatter the saw-dust/shavings evenly across the bottom about 0.5-1cm thick. In the hooded bbq put the chunks over the open grill, and in the kettle, put them straight onto the coals.
• Put your chillies in. Whatever you are using, put them straight onto the rack or grill plate, or into wire baskets and then onto the rack/grill plate.
• Close the hood/lid and check them every hour. For the portable fish smoker, you may want to check them every half hour for the first couple of hours to get a feel for how they are going (it's a small unit and cooks a lot faster).
• Replenish wood if necessary.
• Cooking time is in the order of 5hrs for the portable fish smoker and 6-8 hours for the other two when using jalapenos Cooking times will decrease for thinner fleshed varieties.
• You may find that the chillies will not go totally dry. If so, you can finish them off in a dehydrator, oven, or outside. See our dehydrating page techniques.
• Fully dried smoked chillies can be stored for years in air-tight containers. Triple bagged, they can also be stored in the freezer, even if not totally dried out.

Woods

To make smoke you essentially need to apply heat to wood, without setting it alight.

We've discussed the heat sources above, so now it's time to look at the wood.

There are a number of options available that are not particularly hard to lay your hands on.

• apple
• mesquite
• pear
• hickory

Are generally available at the bigger hardware stores (Bunnings & Mitre 10 in Australia & New Zealand) and barbecue stores (Barbecues Galore, K-Mart, etc).

We know a small producer here in Western Australia who smokes their chillies using jarrah. The convention has always been to use non-resinous woods as they impart quite an antiseptic flavour, yet these jarrah smoked chillies, while unusual, are quite acceptable. Those readers in the eastern half of Australia may like to try redgum - we'd love to hear how you went if you do ! Also, if anybody else has a different type of wood they use we'd love to hear about that too.

Whatever you use, there are a couple of things you need to know;

• if you are using a fish smoker, the wood needs to be in the form of saw-dust or fine shavings,
• if you are using a hooded barbecue or a kettle, the chunks need to be soaked in water for at least an hour before.

OK, go to it. Jalapenos, and most other chillies are now in season, so there's no excuse to try it out.


If you have any questions on this article or anything else, just go to our Nigel Knows page and we'll get the answer to you.

Recipe Of The Week

This weeks recipe comes from subscriber Chris in Northampton, Western Australia and is his adaption of an award winning chilli recipe submitted to the International Chilli Society (Chilli as in Chilli Con Carne).

Please take note with the recipe that Chris is an absolute chilli fanatic and has built up an incredibly high tolerance for capsaicin.

Makes 4-6 servings

• 650-750 Grams of lean mince
• 1 onion finely chopped
• 1 red capsicum finely chopped
• fresh chillies finely chopped (This is optional and the amount you add is personal choice. I have used up to 30 orange Habaneros!)
• 1 teasp each of beef and chook stock powder or one cube of each
• 1 can of tomato puree
• 2 tablsp of Tabasco. I do not use Tabasco now as it is a bit too vinegary and alters the taste too much. I use a hot sauce called Louisana Gold RED which you can now get at Supavalu. Also, I tend to use 3 tablespoons of the hot sauce. Again its personal preference.

• 3 tablsp of ground cumin
• 1 teasp garlic powder
• 3 tablsp paprika
• 2 teasp of onion flakes
• 1 tablsp cayenne pepper (A teaspoon if you are less chilli tolerant. I use a full small Masterfoods jar)
• 1 teasp of oregano
• 1 teasp of MSG or salt to taste
• 1 teasp of black pepper

Thanks Chris !!

Chilli Close Up - The de-Arbol

The colour changes from a mid-green through to a bright red upon ripening, a colour it retains when dried.

It is a thin, smooth-skinned chilli with a slightly undulating surface, and tapers to a point.

They average 7-8 cm in length and a little less than a centimetre across. Thin fleshed and fairly hot, they have a sharp, distinctive flavour that develops further when the dried pods are lightly roasted in a frying pan for a few minutes.

The de-arbol is predominantly used for hot sauces, for frying whole with black beans, or roasted until crisp and ground to a powder. the powder is quite often sprinkled across slice fruit and cucumber.

The plants are take a little bit of care to keep alive when they are seedlings but will grow and thrive in the general conditions discussed in our Grow Your Own Chillies page.

We have never grown them ourselves, but everything we've read indicates they are easy to grow, once the plant has matured, are very hardy and prolific.