Chili Verde and Pinto Beans

I've had a hankering for Mexican food the past week or so. I've got a nice recipe for chili verde that beats anything I've had at a restaurant and I've been working on perfecting my pinto bean recipe. My notes on the chili say it takes a long time but is worth the effort. Well, I've got all day.

I guess I buried the headline: I finally got my pinto bean recipe right. I've been playing off and on with this recipe for 5 years and haven't ever gotten to where I want. But I hit it today.

• You can find the pinto bean recipe here.
• The chili verde recipe is here.

The list of ingredients is pretty simple

Beans have soaked overnight in salt water. Another 3 cups of water will go in the pot.

What could be easier. Put everything in a pot and simmer for 3 hours

After 3 hours you have this

After the beans started it was time to get busy with the chili verde.

Lots of prep on these items 

The time consuming prep part of this recipe is getting the poblanos ready for use. First we roast them on the stove.

Roasting the peppers

 After roasting they go in a large tightly covered bowl for a few minutes so the steam gets the skins nice and loose. Then rinse them under running water, open them up to remove the stems and seeds. Finally dice them all up.

Roasted, steamed, rinsed, seeds and stems removed

Chilis go in the pot with the tomatillas, green enchilada sauce, and salsa verde goes in the chili pot

Brown the pork in batches while the chili pot simmers next to the beans

 Let it all simmer for about 2 hours until the pork is fall apart tender.

After a couple of hours we get this yumminess

Warm up a couple of tortillas and serve with cerveza

Dinner is served

My next challenge is to make a red pork chili that will come close to that made by Bob Newlon's mom back in the 60's. I've been on the quest off and on for years; time to get serious.