Hatch Green Chile Salsa
My Hatch Green Chile Salsa (salsa verde) with tomatillos is so versatile… Roasted tomatillos, onion, and garlic join roasted Hatch green chile in a super flavorful and healthy salsa recipe. Try this salsa verde with chips, on your favorite taco, or as a finishing sauce on Mexican spice rubbed and grilled pork chops!
You know you are from New Mexico when you have an extra freezer just for chile.
~~ Local humor.
👩🏻🍳 Tamara Talks – About Homemade Salsa Recipes
There is nothing like the smoky, fruity heat of New Mexico’s “claim to fame” – Hatch green chile. Every New Mexican has a different “recipe” for salsa verde (green sauce). You’re likely to find both fresh and cooked versions, with and without lime juice, chunky or smooth, etc. After 22 years in Las Cruces – a mere 30 minute drive from Hatch, New Mexico – I definitely have my own opinions on how to use those beautiful green pods!
You can (successfully I might add!) substitute roasted poblanos, anaheims, jalapeños, etc., but my heart belongs to the earthy heat of Hatch green chile!
Let me explain what this sauce is NOT. This is not a green chile enchilada sauce recipe. If you are fortunate enough to have enjoyed a plate of traditional Hatch green chile enchiladas (with or without a fried runny egg), you are aware that the sauce truly highlights the green chile in its simplicity.
This thick, rich sauce bursts with the complex flavors achieved in the maillard reaction. The maillard reaction, simply put, is the chemical reaction that occurs between amino acids and reducing sugars that give browned foods their depth of flavor.
Some foods cry out for the bright acidity of a pico de gallo or salsa fresca (think fish tacos), while others pair better with the bold, earthy flavors of salsa verde (like smoked pork tacos). Consider serving this tomatillo red chili salsa with simple bison tacos.
📋 Hatch Green Chile Salsa Ingredients
Here is a quick look at the ingredients in the recipe – it’s handy to use at the grocery store or as a summary of what you need. Skip to the recipe for quantities.
- tomatillos – Choose firm tomatillos with the papery skins still attached. I choose tomatillos that are similar in size to make the roasting process more efficient.
- Hatch green chile – You can substitute roasted poblanos, anaheims, jalapeños, etc., but my heart belongs to the earthy heat of Hatch green chile! If you buy them fresh, rather than roasted, you will need to roast, peel and seed them first. You can also use commercially available chopped green chile. I like this Hatch green chile, but this green chile is more widely available.
- onion
- garlic – Yes, a whole bulb of roasted garlic is necessary!
- olive oil
- cilantro – You will need an entire bunch of cilantro. Cut it at the base of the leaves, and remove any remaining stems as they’re bitter.
- broth/stock/water
🎥 Video
🔪 Step by Step Instructions
- Roast the vegetables – Preheat oven to 425 degrees. I cook on “convection roast,” and my oven makes the adjustment to 400 degrees. Remove the husks from the tomatillos and rinse. They will be sticky, but it disappears in the roasting process. Place them on a baking sheet. Add the quartered onion, garlic halves, and green chile if it needs to be roasted. Drizzle with olive oil, and place in hot oven. Roast 20-30 minutes until well caramelized and some charring is present. Remove, and set aside to cool.
- Prepare the roasted ingredients – Once cool, pop garlic out of its skin, remove blackened skins, seeds, and stems from chile if necessary, add the roasted vegetables and cilantro to the bowl of your food processor.
- Note: I add chopped chile after pulsing the other vegetables and cilantro. Feel free to add them in at the same time.
- Finish the salsa verde – Pulse until desired consistency, adding liquid as needed. Season to taste.
👩🏻🍳 What Can I Serve This Salsa Verde With?
The day I made this batch of salsa, I “pulled out all the stops,” and made Mexican Spiced Pork Chops With Salsa Verde and Cotija. I grilled beautiful bone-in pork chops after applying a Mexican spice rub. The grilled chops were topped with the salsa verde, then garnished with crumbled cotija and chopped cilantro. The main dish was accompanied by cilantro rice and roasted delicata squash finished with a honey, lime juice, and chipotle glaze. Picante pero deliciosa!
A few more delicious options…
- chips (I spray tortillas with cooking spray and bake 10-15 minutes until golden brown)
- smoked pork tacos
- tacos (especially made with my pulled pork)
- in my salmon in mole verde sauce
- in my mole verde bowls
- on these pork belly tacos
💭 Tips
Helpful hint: Green chile gets hotter as it sits in your freezer. I received medium, medium hot, and hot, and elected to use the hot chile up first! 🙂 Starting with roasted, peeled, and chopped chile means less work when you make the salsa.
Substitutions: I crave this salsa, and if I can’t get Hatch chile, I will roast poblanos or even jalapenos. Anaheims are fine if you don’t need the heat (I do). Roasted green chile is important to balance the acidity of the tomatillos. Be sure to roast green chiles with the other vegetables, then peel, seed, and chop them.
This recipe makes about 4 cups; much of it will be frozen for later use.
❓ FAQ
Does the salsa verde keep well?
Can I double the recipe?
What if I can’t get Hatch green chile?
🌡️ Useful Stuff
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Do you have a favorite salsa? How do you like to serve it? Inquiring minds want to know!
Hatch Green Chile Salsa Verde
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Ingredients
- 8-10 tomatillos - about a pound
- 1 pound Hatch green chile - (see notes)
- 1 onion - quartered
- 1 bulb garlic - halved horizontally (see photo in post)
- olive oil - to drizzle
- 1 bunch cilantro/coriander - cut at the base of the leaves
- broth/stock/water to thin
- sea salt and ground pepper to taste.
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees. I cook on “convection roast,” and my oven makes the adjustment to 400 degrees.
- Remove the husks from the tomatillos and rinse. They will be sticky, but it disappears in the roasting process. Place them on a baking sheet.
- Add the quartered onion, garlic halves, and green chile if it needs to be roasted.
- Drizzle with olive oil, and place in hot oven.
- Roast 20-30 minutes until well caramelized and some charring is present.
- Remove, and set aside to cool.
- Once cool, pop garlic out of its skin, remove blackened skins, seeds, and stems from chile if necessary, add the roasted vegetables and cilantro to the bowl of your food processor.
- Note: I add chopped chile after pulsing the other vegetables and cilantro. Feel free to add them in at the same time.
- Pulse until desired consistency, adding liquid as needed.
- Season to taste.
Notes
Nutrition
NOTE: Macronutrients are an approximation only using unbranded ingredients and MyFitnessPal.com. Please do your own research with the products you’re using if you have a serious health issue or are following a specific diet.
I recently heard that you can use green tomatoes in place tomatillos (just because I have a lot of gr tomatoes in my garden and want to use them). Any thoughts about this? Also, would you recommend canning this? or freezing it or have any thoughts on that. Once I make it, I’ll have too much just to eat fresh. Thanks!!
Hi Laura! I have not tried green tomatoes in this salsa, but I’m confident they’d be great. I remember the only year I had a good crop of tomatoes in my garden, and the late ones weren’t going to ripen. I was looking for ways to use them… I’d give it a try! I always freeze about half of the salsa (the two of us eat a lot of it when I make it!) in a freezer bag. It’s super easy, and works great! BTW, the year I had tons of green tomatoes, I came up with these Mexican fried green tomatoes. You might take a look! Thanks for stopping by!
I have been making salsa Verde for years but recently I was in Arizona and bought some salsa Verde. It was very spicy and my husband and I loved it. I usually use jalapenos in mine. But I am going to try your version with Hatch chiles. Hopefully it will add some extra spice to my recipe.
I hope it works out well for you Sharon! Hatch chiles do vary widely in their heat level, so hopefully you have some hot ones. Good luck!
Made this for the boys and it was inhaled with a bowl of tortilla chips in a nanosecond. Recipe is a keeper!
Could you give a weight for the tomatillos as I have a lot of variety in sizes on my plants. First time growing them.
Hi Christine! This is a great question. Tomatillos vary a lot in size. I use roughly a pound of tomatillos, and that can be 6-12 depending on size. I typically choose medium sized ones that feel heavy for their size with the papery skin mostly intact. I hope this helps. Yay for growing your own!
Fellow New Mexican (and from Las Cruces!) here. I bought about 3lbs to Hatch chiles today, and will roast and freeze them tomorrow. I was trying to figure out how to share them with my parents in Alabama and Chicago since they’ve never even seen a Hatch pepper much less roasted and skinned one, but of course the chiles would get gross if I just sent them in the mail. I think sending them this salsa in mason jars would be the perfect way to share our good fortune and amazing chiles. Thank you so much! It’s refreshing to get a green chile recipe online from an ACTUAL New Mexican, especially one that lived 30 mins away from Hatch.
Yay! I miss New Mexico so much… one of our 4 sons still lives there, and we hope to visit for Christmas! I have to laugh at your comment. I see so many recipes posted by people that don’t really “get” the chile culture in Las Cruces. I’m looking forward to getting a few pounds delivered soon from the Hatch Chile Store. I wish the fragrance of chiles roasting came with them! Thanks for taking time to write Caitlin!
Just finished making a large double batch to share at a mountain get together with friends tomorrow (and so we can freeze some for use later 😋). Our nearby Sprouts had Hatch chilies for a short time and I jumped at the chance.
Really a wonderful salsa, quite straight forward to prepare and will absolutely give credit where credit is due … thank you very much!
We were lucky enough for a very short time to have Hatch chilis at our nearby Sprouts…. and with a group get together in the mountains tomorrow made a double batch, so we can freeze some of course. Turned out really quite wonderful. Thank you once again … will give credit where it is due as we celebrate with friends.
I’m so glad you like it! It really is the favorite at our house… Thanks for taking time to send feedback; it isn’t often that I get. Enjoy your celebration!
Some hatch green chilies showed up all the way in Maryland – so I grabbed a bunch. But then I had to go out of town unexpectedly so I froze them. Can I still roast them??
Hi Christina! I have not tried it, but I see no reason they won’t roast. Let me know!
Do you leave the skin on the tomatillos after roasting? They didnt blacken and blister like the peppers, hence the question. Love how my house smells right now!
Hi Laura! I’m sorry I’m just now seeing this… Yes, the skins should be blackened and blistered like the peppers. I’m guessing the peppers were further from the heat element? I haven’t done this recipe without peeling them, but it might be okay since the chiles are finely chopped? My friend has a blog post that goes into detail on roasting chiles in the oven. I prefer to use the gas grill, but sometimes I use my broiler with the sheet pan very close. I choose the flattest chiles I can find and turn them often. Hope this helps, and good luck!
After roasting the peppers, do they need to be peeled before putting into processor? You say to deseed and stem, but I have seen others peel the roasted pepper.
Hi Jeff! I apologize for not responding sooner. I am in Peru, and just now was able to login to my WordPress account. I typically respond same day…
I’m sorry the instructions in the recipe card aren’t clear. The post itself mentions peeling the chiles, but the recipe card does not. I will update the recipe card. Since leaving southern NM, I get my chiles frozen from Hatch, NM. and they have the seeds and stems but not the the blackened skins. I also often use Bueno chopped chile that comes already peeled, seeded, and stems removed. You definitely want to removed the skins.
Thank you for taking the time to contact me! Best, Tamara.
Love this green chile salsa! Hatch Chilis are amazin
Loved this recipe. it is quite hot and I eat chiles. Didn’t seed chiles, in stead boosted lime juice and added maybe 1/3 c honey. I bought green Hatch chiles already roasted at the grocery, so added reserved chiles water from roasting. Really made a difference. Trying to hide some from my friends.
Our local Wegman’s grocery story (best one on the planet!) is having Hatch pepper sort of festival and I bought a bushel. I looked through many recipes and finally decided on yours. AWESOME! I couldn’t find enough fresh tomatillas so I used canned – that was the only variation from your recipe. I will keep this recipe – no reason to use any other. The roasted onion, garlic and Hatch peppers gave the salsa a refined and mellow flavor, but the cilantro still gave it some brightness. Very nice. Thank you.
I stumbled upon some hatch chiles at the grocery store for $.88/lb and thought “hey, why not! I’ve heard good things about these so surely I can find something to do with them.” I just whipped this recipe up and WOW. It is by far the best salsa I’ve ever made and definitely some of the best salsa I’ve ever had. I may add a bit of lime juice in it. THANK YOU for this recipe. FANTASTIC! I’m off to buy more peppers 🙂
Love this green chile salsa! Hatch Chilis are amazin
Thank you Tisha! Since leaving Las Cruces, NM., and heading to south Texas, it’s gotten harder to get them! We do still manage a few pounds every year. 🙂
OK, I’ve had a bag of hatch chile peppers in the fridge for about a week. I’m gonna give your recipe a try because it sounds like how I’d make it even if I didn’t see a recipe. I think you have all the main ingredients (garlic lover here) and I’m going in the kitchen. I’ll let you know and the reaction of my guests. :))))
Yay! Thank you for taking the time to write! I hope you love it as much as we do… I’d love to hear back!
My husband is off getting the hatch chilies that are here being roasted from New Mexico. I am in California. I started looking for a Recipes and found yours which look spectacular. I love tomatillos. I was wondering about the Enchiladas recipe you referred to. I would love to have it and I didn’t find a link for it. You had mentioned that the salsa recipe was not to be confused with the Enchiladas sauce recipe.
Hi Martha! I haven’t done a recipe and probably should, but I left NM for south Texas 3 years ago… It’s so simple though. Make a roux with vegetable oil, cumin, garlic, and flour. I’d use about 2-3 tablespoons oil, 2 teaspoons cumin, 1 teaspoon minced garlic, and enough flour to make a thick paste. Whisk in chicken or vegetable stock and allow to come to a boil. You want a fairly thin gravy. Then add chopped green chile. I’d use about 2 cups. Add salt and pepper to taste. When making the enchiladas, I warm the tortillas in a tortilla warmer (rather than frying). I layer green chile sauce, cheese (we like sharp cheddar), chopped scallions. I usually do 3 tortillas per person. I finish with sauce and cheese, then add a soft fried egg on top! It’s so amazing and really simple… Enjoy those chiles, and the salsa freezes really well (if it doesn’t last that long)!
Hubby agrees I should do the enchiladas. I am not good at getting a newsletter out, but if you follow me on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/beyondmeresustenance/) my latest posts go out there on the day. I’ll try to get to it in August.
My favorite salsa ever! It’s perfect on all kinds of tacos, and I love it on my eggs in the morning…
I’m glad you love it!
My favorite salsa ever! It’s perfect on all kinds of tacos, and I love it on my eggs in the morning…
Our local Wegman’s grocery story (best one on the planet!) is having Hatch pepper sort of festival and I bought a bushel. I looked through many recipes and finally decided on yours. AWESOME! I couldn’t find enough fresh tomatillas so I used canned – that was the only variation from your recipe. I will keep this recipe – no reason to use any other. The roasted onion, garlic and Hatch peppers gave the salsa a refined and mellow flavor, but the cilantro still gave it some brightness. Very nice. Thank you.
Awesome Susan! I really appreciate feedback, and don’t get it all that often, so THANK YOU! I’m really glad you love the recipe, and that you are able to find Hatch green chiles! Happy cooking!
Loved this recipe. it is quite hot and I eat chiles. Didn’t seed chiles, in stead boosted lime juice and added maybe 1/3 c honey. I bought green Hatch chiles already roasted at the grocery, so added reserved chiles water from roasting. Really made a difference. Trying to hide some from my friends.
I am so glad you love the salsa recipe! Good luck hanging on to some of it 🙂 I typically freeze half so it lasts a little longer…
I stumbled upon some hatch chiles at the grocery store for $.88/lb and thought “hey, why not! I’ve heard good things about these so surely I can find something to do with them.” I just whipped this recipe up and WOW. It is by far the best salsa I’ve ever made and definitely some of the best salsa I’ve ever had. I may add a bit of lime juice in it. THANK YOU for this recipe. FANTASTIC! I’m off to buy more peppers 🙂
Thanks Maggie! I love to hear feedback after people make my recipes! We’ve gotten to where we always want to roast everything first… I think it just intensifies the flavors. Go get more chile!
Oh yum. After living in Northern New Mexico, we became totally addicted to Hatch Chiles, green and in the lovely ristras of dried red. I keep the roasted green ones in my freezer at all times. This year, I am growing some old varieties of tomatillos in our garden this year (from NativeSeed Search). Some of these are blooming now, so when I have a few, I am for certain going to put them to good use with this recipe. Thanks for sharing. Can’t wait!
Rosa Marie mentioned you had lived in northern New Mexico for about a year… We lived in Las Cruces for almost 22 years! My husband Mark was a professor in the Fisheries and Wildlife Department and Associate Dean of Honors at NMSU. Of course the Hatch green chile was a mainstay of our diet! I was so excited our first year in “the valley” to find fresh Hatch chile at the 10th and Trenton HEB, only to not be able to get it in the following year (2016). Apparently, our local market didn’t respond well to the product. WEIRD. I miss having a ristra hanging on my front porch as a welcome! Let me know how you do with those tomatillos!
Bet your house smelled wonderful with all of that roasting going on! One bulb of garlic, green chile and tomatillos…I’m in heaven! What a great salsa and great idea to use it with grilled pork chops. Need to give a try for sure!
Thanks MJ! Yes, there’s nothing like the smell of roasting vegetables 🙂 I did a simple spice rub of cumin, chipotle powder, lime zest, garlic, raw sugar, and sea salt on the pork chops, then grilled them. We topped with the salsa, some crumbled cotija, and chopped cilantro. Yum! I’m always looking for healthy ways to incorporate green chile 🙂
This looks fabulous Tamara!! I know I’d love this. Sadly we can’t get things like tomatillos and hatch chile’s here in Australia. As for how I’d eat it, to be honest, I can’t go past good corn chips and salsa. It’s an absolute weakness of mine.
Thanks! And my heart goes out to you Jennifer! Seriously, though, an amazing vegetarian cook like you needs to have those two ingredients… You’d love it with your chips for sure 🙂