Alfredo Garcia

Chile Relleno Tacos

Over an open flame on your stove, oven on broiler setting or air fryer, char up the poblano peppers. I used my ovens broiler setting on high for 8 minutes flipping them halfway through. Once charred, place them in a big bag or bowl and cover them to steam for about 10 minutes.

Once the poblano peppers have steamed, remove as much of the charred skin as possible, it gets very papery and unpleasant to eat when its been charred.

Cut a vertical slit down one side of the poblano peppers, making sure not to cut all the way through to the other side. Carefully with a small spoon or spatula, remove as many of the seeds as possible from all the peppers.

To stuff the poblano peppers, get the cheese of your choice, I used Muenster Cheese, but oaxaca & chihuaha cheese also works here, or even queso fresco. Once the peppers are stuffed, add flour to a large bowl and lightly coat the peppers with flour, this will help the egg mixture stick when frying. Once all the peppers are stuffed, place them on a baking tray and either refrigerate or freeze while we prepare the egg batter, making sure the peppers are cold will make them easier to handle when frying without falling apart on you.

To make the egg batter. This works better if the eggs are room temperature. Separate the egg whites from the egg yolks and place the egg whites in a large bowl. With either a hand mixer or stand mixer, whisk up the egg whites for 4-7 minutes. They should have doubled, or almost tripled in size. Slowly mix in the egg yolks into the egg whites to finish making the egg batter. Rule of thumb is to use 1 egg for every chile relleno you are making. 

Add enough oil to a large skillet to give you a least half an inch of oil. Set it to medium high heat.

One at a time, dip the stuffed pepper into the egg batter, holding it by the top by the stem, make sure most of the bottom of the pepper is coated that will be going into the oil. Once in the frying pan with oil, spoon over more of the egg batter on top of the pepper to cover any parts that have yet to be coated by the batter.

With a spoon, slowly spoon over oil onto the top of the pepper, this will help to start cooking the top of the batter to then make it easier to flip the pepper. Fry the peppers for a total of 3-4 minutes per side. Place them on paper towel lined baking sheets to soak up any excess oil. Continue frying all the peppers.

To serve, you can plate up with rice and beans and your favorite salsa OR make them into tacos, placing them on corn tortillas with your favorite salsa.