Red Chile Base

This red sauce base: a smooth, strained purée of rehydrated dried chiles with nothing extra but lime, and a little salt. Make a giant batch, freeze it into bricks, and drop them frozen into whatever wants a deep red-chile backbone — tacos, chile colorado, enchiladas, or my cherry roja chicken.

Picking chiles

Grab two big bags of dried chiles and mix and match — I buy a couple kinds, blend them, and work through the batch over the next few months. Treat every batch as an experiment and keep notes on what you liked. A quick guide to the common varieties:

• Ancho (dried poblano) — deep mahogany, almost black-red. Sweet and raisiny with notes of dried plum and cocoa. Barely any heat; the backbone of most blends.
• New Mexico — earthy brick red. Roasted, slightly acidic, classic "red chile" flavor. Medium heat.
• California (dried Anaheim) — the mild cousin of New Mexico. Clean, sweet, bright red, and low heat. Good for stretching a blend without adding fire.
• Guajillo — bright, translucent red. Tangy and berry-like with a green, tea-ish edge. Mild-to-medium heat and lots of clean brightness.
• Pasilla (dried chilaca) — dark, blackish brown. Raisiny and herbaceous with cocoa notes. Mild-to-medium heat and a lot of depth.

Preparation

Deseed

Tear or cut the stems off and shake out the seeds. Work over a big surface and go bag by bag.

As you go, inspect each pepper — look for mold and discard any that are fuzzy, or thinned out/rotten. Many hands make light work.

The seeds and stems get tossed.

Wash and rehydrate

Soak the deseeded chiles in a giant excess of cold water, agitating well. The extra water lets dirt and sand fall to the bottom while the chiles rehydrate.

You'll be surprised how much sand settles out.

Blend and strain

Blend the rehydrated chiles with just enough water to get everything moving into a purée — an immersion blender or a Vitamix-style both work.

Run the purée through a sauce strainer, I have a Victorio #200. This leaves the skins and any stray seeds behind. Set up your catch bowls as needed and crank it all through.

Smooth chile base comes out the side while the dry skins extrude out the end.

Season

Stir in the juice of 1–2 limes and 1 tsp salt, mixing until the salt dissolves.

Freezing

Freeze the base in Souper Cubes, silicone muffin trays, or anything that gives you portioned bricks. Bag and label them once solid.

Using it

The bricks go straight into the pan frozen — no need to thaw — whenever you're making tacos, chile colorado, enchiladas, and the like.

A couple of quick ways to use it:

Sweat the onion, tomato, and garlic, stir in the chile base, and simmer a few minutes to loosen and warm through. Finish with lime and salt.

Bloom the cumin and oregano in the oil, add the chile base and stock, and simmer until it coats a spoon. Season with garlic powder and salt.