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And now I’m finally sharing the secrets for the perfect authentic red chili sauce, great for enchiladas or other Mexican food classics.

One of the secrets I found is that my mom starts with this basic sauce, and then adds various ingredients to the sauce after it is made to fit the style of Mexican food she was making, from enchiladas to a sauce over a burrito. And she never really told us the secrets to that technique until now.

Ingredients

• Dried New Mexican Red Chile or Guajillo Peppers
• Cold Water – Which will be boiled to hydrate the pepper and then some used to make the sauce
• Garlic Cloves – Crushed
• Kosher Salt – This will be important after you make the sauce

About Dried Chile Pods

Many authentic Mexican recipes start with dried chiles, whether a red sauce or a green sauce. The most important ingredient for this recipe is the dried red chiles. It is the base of all the flavor. By changing the type of chile pods you can make this a mild heat or even into a spicy red sauce. But for your first time we recommend starting with one of two red chiles.

To start out use dried Mexican Chile, which is also know as red chile or hatch red chile. This style of chile tends to be slightly bitter but a bright flavor and color which is appealing. There are ways to offset the bitter flavor with other ingredients. See below for more details. They may also be called California chile pods.

The other most common is the dried guajillo pepper, which will be more earthy and give a darker color to the chile. Guajillo typically make a low heat red chile sauce with a little more sweetness.

If you want more heat then you can combine more dried chile, like chile de arbol or even sweet pasilla chiles. The goal is to experiment with various types of dried chiles to find the combination you like.

You can get chili pods online if you can’t find them at your local store. They come in multiple sizes, but the typical package will be 3-ounces. If you mix peppers use the full 3-ounces of the underlying pepper for flavor and then add 2 or 3 other peppers to enhance the flavor.

Tools

• Large Stock Pot (At least 3 quarts)
• Good Blender – A food processor can work too but you will have better success using a good blender.

Instructions

First: Start with removing the stems and seeds from the chile pods.

Second: Bring cold water to a boil in large stock pot.

Third: Add the dried chile pods and garlic to the boiling water and reduce to a simmer. Simmer for 30 minutes.

Fourth: Remove the chile pods (now rehydrated) and place them and garlic in the blender. Take one cup of the water it was simmering in and place in the blender. Pulse until the chile sauce is smooth and any skin and seeds are completely pulverized (pulse for about 3 minutes).

Fifth: Add salt. If the sauce is bitter then add more salt to offset the flavor.

Optional – If there is still skin and seeds in the red chile sauce then pour the red chile sauce through a mesh strainer to separate.

Flavoring Red Chili Sauce

Once the simple sauce is done you can flavor or enhance as you see fit. For a classic enchilada sauce recipe we like to add onion powder and more salt to balance the potential for a bitter sauce. For burritos we will start by browning some chuck meat and then add the red chili sauce with some Mexican Oregano for a take on chile Colorado.

Frequently Asked Questions

Variations

If you want to spice it up and not play with various chili pods use your favorite hot sauce for heat. You can add chicken broth (or stock) versus water to the blender for a little more richness.

Storage

This can be used immediately or you can store in a mason jar for up to 10 days in the refrigerator. Otherwise freeze in quart sized baggies to make it last up to one year.

Recipe Inspirations

This sauce is great on our pork enchiladas, which is a great way to use leftover pulled pork. We also use this sauce as a base for our beef enchiladas, a great use of chuck roast. You can easily drizzle this over brisket nachos too.

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This post was originally published in May of 2014 and updated July of 2022 with more specific recipe steps, storage details, and new process photos.

About Vindulge

Mary (a certified sommelier and recipe developer) and Sean (backyard pitmaster) are co-authors of the critically acclaimed cookbook, Fire + Wine, and have been creating content for the IACP nominated website Vindulge since 2009. They live in Oregon on a farm just outside Portland.

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