Hey, Alton Brown has never made that... But I did

Today's tale is about what I've always enjoyed about Alton Brown's philosophy on Good Eats--learn culinary techniques so when you find yourself sans recipe you'll know what to do. My example, the tempting and delicious chile relleno. Now AB has never made this specific item on Good Eats, nor in any of his cookbooks for that matter, but thanks to what I know and one application from an episode I had all I needed to complete said dish with marvelous results.

I love Tex-Mex food and there is certainly no shortage of this cuisine here locally; however, there are days when I just don't want to shell out the bucks or drive to the restaurant and wait or I'm just overtaken to bring on a new challenge to myself. That's when my brain starts plotting, planning and scheming... no good can come from that. Well, sometimes it does.

Since I'm a chile relleno fiend, I've had a fair share of them over the years. Some with a cheese only filling. Some with beef and cheese filling. They all, however, share a commonality,a roasted chile stuff with something and battered then fried. So what's so hard about making some of my own?

Nothing really.

Where to start? I asked myself knowing that Alton had never taken on the item. Well, Bobby Flay certainly came to mind. The Food Network's king of Southwestern cuisine. I had watched him make them enough on Iron Chef America alone to know the process. And I'll give AB the credit there as well because the only reason I started watching ICA was that Alton is the commentator. I also consulted some recipes online just to get feel for the dish, not that I didn't know about from merely consuming it.

It started with large, green chiles, poblano to be exact. Now, the important part of prepping the pepper (ok, it is a chile but my alliteration wouldn't work otherwise-sue me) is charring the waxy skin. This is needed for the batter to adhere to the chile's flesh.

First up in the technique portion, fire roasting. This simple technique was covered in "Chile's Angles" when AB roasted jalapenos and more recently when he roasted a red bell pepper in the bouillabaisse episode. Simply place the chile over the burner, I used a medium-high flame, and char the skin completely. Keep the chile rotating very few minutes so it doesn't burn too much. After the chile was completely chared, place it on the cutting board with an inverted metal bowl to allow steam to loosen the skin for about 5 minutes.

While the chiles steamed, I turned to the filling. I wanted the beef/cheese combo since those are always my favorites rather than just cheese. This gave me an opportunity to give one of Alton's newer applications a try. The Taco seasoning from "American Classics: VIII." My only change to the mix was using mild smoked paprika. That is all I have and finding any kind of smoked paprika in my area is difficult.

Taco Potion #19

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons chili powder


• 1 tablespoon ground cumin


• 2 teaspoons cornstarch


• 2 teaspoons kosher salt


• 1 1/2 teaspoons hot smoked paprika


• 1 teaspoon ground coriander 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Place in a jar and shake to combine.

After blending the powder, I turned to browning the meat and cooking the onions for the rest of the process of the seasoned beef.

Ingredients

• 1 medium onion, chopped


• 16 ounces ground sirloin


• 1 teaspoon Kosher salt


• 2 cloves garlic, minced


• 1 recipe Taco Potion #19


• 2/3 cup low-sodium beef broth

Add onion to skillet and cook until softened and lightly browned around the edges, about 3 to 4 minutes. Add the ground meat, 1 teaspoon salt, and garlic. Cook until browned, about 3 to 4 minutes, stirring occasionally, to break up the meat. Add Taco Potion and beef broth. Bring to a simmer and cook, uncovered, until sauce is slightly thickened, 2 to 3 minutes.

The taco seaconing has wonderful smoky flavor unlike any premade, store bought mix around. Also since there's not much salt added to the mix, it is far less salty than packaged mixes. With seasoned beef made, I cut Monterrey Jack into sticks (had to use Jack because getting real Mexican cheeses are another thing I have problems with).

Working with the roasted chiles is a delicate matter. The skins can tear if you are not careful. To prep them for the filling, cut a small slit from top to almost bottom. Then pull out the seeds, or as much as you can. I put a couple of cheese strips in then the beef mixture then some more cheese to close up the hole.

The batter came next. Here's where I flew by the seat of my pants. I mixed some masa flour with white flour and added buttermilk until the consistency looked right to me. I know, that tells you absolutely nothing! I wish I had measured it all out to recount it properly but sometimes in the heat of cooking retelling the story isn't my first thought. I know, hard to fathom but true. Each stuff chile got dipped into the masa batter and allowed to sit a few mintues. I opted to pan fry them instead of deep fry. That was a little tricky around the opening. Overall, they stayed closed and the cheese didn't run out. Some of the batter did slide off and onto my tongs though!

Now I have chile rellenos to add to my culinary arsenal. Without a real recipe to boot. Okay, AB's taco seasoning but the overall making of was sheer technique and application of knowledge. If I ever get the chance to sit down and talk with AB this is something I'd love to share with him. One of so many things he's helped teach me.