Preface: Ida Martinez Baldonado is my co-worker. Born and raised in the Northern New Mexico town of Chimayo, she is at least a 6th generation New Mexican. Ida constantly tolerates my questions concerning recipes of the area. She is a source of stories, old wives tales, superstitions, traditional healing techniques and quite frequently rescues me when I get lost in my Spanish translations.

Ida’s mother, Evangelina, passed away in May 2010. Her mother had recently celebrated her 90th birthday surrounded by family, friends and love.  I wanted Ida to share the legacy and the love of her mother through her stories. Although I never met her mother, I felt through Ida’s stories I knew her. The following interview and recipe will hopefully allow you to know her as well .

These are the stories of Ida Martinez Baldonado and her mother Evangelina that were inspired by her teaching me how to make a traditional Northern New Mexico dish she named Chile Especial (Pork with Red Chile).

CHILE ESPECIAL

Note: For the uninitiated in New Mexico chile, let me explain that this chile is completely different from what Texans call “chili.”  In New Mexico, chile refers mainly to the sauce prepared to go on dishes. In New Mexico this sauce can be either red or green.  For the purpose of this recipe, Ida is referring to red chile (sauce). My neighbor writes an excellent blog on her quest for the perfect New Mexican chile. It can be found at: http://chilenotchili.wordpress.com/2012/03/22/welcome/

Aine: Can you tell me the story behind this recipe? For example, how did you learn how to make this?

Ida: My mother Evangelina taught me how to make it. I am not sure who she learned to make it from, but I think it may have been her father. Her mother died when she was 14 years old. All her brothers and sisters had different chores. My mother’s chores included taking care of the horses and making dinner. Because they lived on a farm, the horses were very important because, without them, they could not plow the fields. My mother loved being outside more than she liked being in the house, so she always said she learned to make simple dishes for supper because she would rather be outside in the garden or with the animals.

This dish my mother always made for Christmas or special occasions. I do the same. I make it for holidays or when we have company coming. My mother usually made red chili but for everyday supper she would use ground beef. I think she used pork with the red chili on special occasions because the pork took longer to cook and maybe pork wasn’t as available. She would make it for a matanza (A traditional Matanza is a family and community-gathering event, with friends and neighbors helping in the labor-intensive job of processing a large pig, goat or sheep.)

Aine:  What else do you remember about your mom’s cooking?

Ida:  As children, we would do our chores before leaving for school. Our mother would be in the kitchen making bread. On the walk home from school as soon as we crossed the arroyo, we could smell her bread baking and oh it smelled wonderful. Even though we knew she was making it in the morning, we would still get excited at the smell of it. We would hurry home and ask for a slice. We would eat the slice with butter and it was so wonderful. We would want more and my mother would scold us that if we ate too much warm bread we would get empachada. This was her way of saying the old wives’ tale that if you ate too much warm bread it would turn to dough in your stomach and give you a stomach ache. Then we would eat her bread with our supper, her red chile and beef. We would dip the bread into the chile.

Now when I make this dish, well everyone tells me how wonderful it is. It is really simple but really special. If you make it right you can dip bread, or we dip bolillos (rolls) into it, and the pork will stick to the bread. It is so good.

Aine:  What else do you remember about your mom?

Ida:  I remember that it always seemed we would come home from school and she had built something. She would build closets and corner shelves or put in a window. She would do it all with her hand saw. My father was not the handyman. It was my mother. My father was out in his garden or his orchard. His apple orchard was so beautiful. They would pick the apples during the week to take una calga (a load) to Colorado to sell on the weekends. But it was my mother who fixed the broken things in the house.

Oh and remember how I told you that she liked to be outside? She loved her flowers in the garden. This is a photo of her putting in her rose bushes maybe in the 50s. Now they are huge.

But once, oh she was in her 70s when this happened, I was at work and my father called me to come home quick. It seems my mother was in the orchard climbing a tree to collect the apples. In her 70s! Well she fell and when she landed, her foot landed straight on a nail sticking up out of a board. I rushed home from work all panicking and my mother is sitting in the orchard under this apple tree all calm. The board is stuck to her foot with this nail. I didn’t dare remove it because I thought it might bleed. So I helped her to the car and took her to the emergency room with this board nailed to the bottom of her foot. They got a wheelchair and rolled her in. They took out the nail and gave her a tetanus shot. When they let me see her she said “I don’t know why everyone is making such a fuss over this. It’s not like I broke anything.”

Even after my father passed away, I would call her several times during the day to check on her. If she didn’t answer I would worry and call the neighbor. He would always say “oh Ida. I see your mom out my window. She’s in the orchard or in her garden.” She was always outside.  But this chile is one of the things I remember most. It’s so simple but so good. She got really good at making simple dishes because she would rather be outside.

Aine:  Do you have any tips for me or someone else who has never made this before?

Ida: When I tell you how to make this red chili with pork, I learned from my mother. I learned from watching her so I don’t really have measurements. And then there are steps that you can do to how you like the taste like with the garlic. It depends on how much garlic you like.

Ingredients (this recipe will feed approx 6-8 people):

Note: For this recipe when referring to the serving spoon as the method of measurement, Ida means a rounded serving spoonful. Her serving spoon is the black spoon pictured below next to a standard tablespoon.

2 to 2 1/2 lb pork roast with bone in

red chili powder (Note: I bought mine at my local farmer’s market but you can usually find packages in the “ethnic” section of grocery stores. My local grocery store sells mild, medium and hot in ziploc bags ~am)

garlic powder and fresh garlic

salt

Morrell lard (Ida insists this is the brand you should use)

1. Cook pork until you can shred it.  (Note:  Ida cooks her pork with salt and water in a pressure cooker for 45 min -1 hour. She said her mother would boil the pork for 3-4 hours. I put mine in the slow cooker overnight on low for 8-10 hours. ~am)

2. Let the pork cool and shred it from the bone. Discard the bone. Save the salt water you cooked the pork in. You will use this later.

3. In a stewpot put 1 1/2 rounded serving spoon amount of lard. Melt lard on low.

4. Add 1 1/2 rounded serving spoon amount of flour. Stir flour just enough to mix in. Do not let it get yellow or brown. Mix fast.

5. As soon as the flour is mixed in add 1 1/2 serving spoon of red chili. Stir fast to mix it in-do not let it burn. The photo below shows the color that the flour and lard mixture should be at this point.

6. Add 1 cup of water from the reserved pork water. Mix this in. You want this mixture to be the consistency of gravy. Add more water as needed.

7. Add approximately 1 clove of garlic. Ida uses fresh and powder but you can use either and you can add more or less depending on taste.

8. Add salt to taste. Then let simmer on low for 5-10 minutes.

9. Add an additional 1/2 cup of reserved water from pork.

10. Add the shredded pork meat and let that simmer 5-10 minutes. When it is ready it should look like the meat of a tamale in color but should be a little watery in consistency.

11. Put in a bowl and enjoy with bread, rolls or tortillas. Be sure to dip the bread into the pork. That is the best way to eat it.