When you’re in a hurry, buying a jar of roasted red peppers is quick and easy. The taste isn’t as exquisite as roasting your own, and what about when you’d like a roasted poblano or jalapeño? There are times when roasting peppers and chiles at home makes sense — when you want the freshest flavor because the pepper is a starring ingredient.
The best way, I think, to roast peppers is directly over fire, either from the outdoor grill, or on my gas stovetop. You can broil peppers to get the charred skin, too. I have a cool pepper roasting grate from The Santa Fe School Of Cooking. It sits atop my gas burner and has room to grill 3 or 4 bell peppers at a time.
Wash your pepper and poke a small slit anywhere on the pepper with the tip of a knife to prevent it from puffing up and bursting. Place the pepper on the grate and turn the heat to medium-high. Using tongs, turn the pepper after 2 or 3 minutes, or when the side facing the fire is blackened all over. The more blackening of the skin, the easier it will be to peel, but if you cook it too long, the flesh will burn, making it mushy.
As soon as the pepper is black all over, remove it to a bowl and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Allow the pepper to steam until cool enough to handle. My friend Phillip from New Mexico says if you’re going to freeze the peppers, pop them into a Ziploc freezer bag after they’ve cooled but before you remove the stem and skins. “You won’t believe how easy the skins slip off after they thaw,” he says.
To peel and chop them after they’ve steamed, cut the stem end off, and then split the pepper in half, lengthwise and remove the seeds. Turn the pepper so the blackened skin is facing up, and using a paring knife, scrape off the black skin and discard. Don’t rinse the peppers, as tempting as it might be, or you’ll wash all the lovely roasted flavor down the drain.
If you are roasting chile peppers, I recommend wearing kitchen gloves. Even the relatively mild poblano has enough capsaicin (the compound responsible for the chile’s heat ) to penetrate your fingers and cause them to burn.
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