Make chicken stock. For this particular soup, you can rehydrate some ancho chiles in the stock as it simmers. First slice in half and de-seed. This allows you to capture all that nice chile tea! Anchos are great, and with the lime are really the core flavor of this soup. “Ancho” means wide, and is the name they give the dried version of poblano chiles. AHA! Usually in the supermarket poblanos are dark green, but as they mature, they turn red (like bell peppers) and get sweeter. The dried version is not a particularly spicy chile, but is super fruity and flavorful. It sort of tastes like apricots.
Roast poblano peppers over open flame, turning them now and then. The goal is to char/blister the skin. Do this HOT. The cooler you do it, the more you cook the chile pepper before blistering the skin, and I happen to like my roasted chiles to still have a little resistance to them, especially if they’re going into a soup. Once they’re charred, place them in a plastic bag and let them rest. They’ll sweat in there like a little chile sauna, and by the time they’ve cooled, the skins will come off easily. Peel them, core them, remove the seeds, cut them into ribbons and reserve.
Juice some limes. Lots!
Slice onions. Slice the hydrated ancho chiles. Dice some garlic.
Put a nice big heavy soup pot on the stove, and warm it up over medium heat. Coat the bottom with oil. Drop in the garlic and the chiles. Let these simmer and infuse the oil for a moment, then add a good amount of ground cumin. The cumin is super absorbent, and may gum up the works if you haven’t got enough oil in the pot.. no problem! Add a little more. Eventually add the onions, and saute the whole mix. Once the onions are starting to go a little translucent and have taken on the red of the chiles, add the chicken, and stir to coat. Add chicken stock to cover. Allow this to sit over very low heat for half an hour or so. Just let it steep. When you’re ready to eat, add the roasted poblanos and lime juice.
Serve it however you like! I like to fill a bowl with torilla chips and cheese, and just ladle the soup over the top. A little cilantro and, TA DA!
If they’re in season, it is delicious to add slices of avocado at the last moment. Use one on the slightly firm side of ripe and it’ll hold up in there beautifully.
As described here, this isn’t a super spicy soup! Anchos and poblanos are both very mild. Feel free to spice it up with the addition of some hotter chiles, fresh or dried.
The quick version mentioned above is to skip the process of making stock. If you use decent store bought stock, and the meat from a rotisserie chicken, you can make this soup in about 20 minutes flat, and it’s still awfully good!
Originally Submitted
2/22/2011
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