For dinner

Posole!

Yes, it’s actually that red. Actually, it’s redder than that even. No, it’s not food coloring, that’s red chil-aaaay!

John and I were finally able to find organic hominy, at both Sprouts and Albertsons. The key turned out to be to look for it in dried form rather than canned. The dried is more time consuming to use – it needs soaked overnight prior to cooking. In New Mexico hominy is often called posole when it’s in dried form, the same as the name of the dish that’s commonly made from it. Posole is also spelled Pozole, such as in Mexico.

Both canned hominy and dried posole are made by treating the corn with lime to remove the outer shell of the kernel. The lime is then rinsed off and the posole is air dried and packaged for sale. Or it can be ground coarsely to make grits or ground fine for masa.

Here’s a rough recipe for what I made tonight, sorry I wasn’t following a recipe and I didn’t measure anything, so amounts are just a guess:

• 12 oz dried white corn posole, soaked overnight, drained, rinsed
• 1 onion, coarsely chopped
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 whole bay leaf
• Red chile flakes (to taste). I only used about a teaspoon, but I have an unusually hot local batch of it.
• About a tablespoon of dried oregano
• About a quarter pound of chorizo
• Salt to taste (a fair amount)

Put in crock pot with water, cook all day, adding water as needed. You can substitute chicken or pork for the chorizo, or leave it out altogether. Vegetarian posole is also excellent. I also often put green chile in it (this being New Mexico) but I didn’t this time.

The last time I made it I used chicken and green chiles instead of chorizo and red chiles, so it was a boring beige color. It was just as good though! And even hotter.