Recipe - Pink Chile And Vodka Sauce

12 Dried Big Jim chiles (you
can substitute Anneheim or
New Mexico chiles)
1 small Onion; chopped
Extravirgin olive oil
Crushed garlic
Dried basil
Oregano
Salt to taste
Sugar; to taste
1/3 (up to)
One half cup Vodka

Take 12 dried Big Jim chiles. (You can substitute Anneheim or New Mexico
chiles. They shouldn't be the tiny hot ones, rather they should be as
sweet and meaty as possible, not too hot. The quality of the chile makes or
breaks this sauce.) Pull of tips and stems and dump out most of the seeds.
Curse those last few seeds you can't get. Debate whether to remove that
hardtoget vein. Decide not to. Reconstitute in enough hot water to cover
for 30 minutes. (Bring to boil, turn off heat, let sit covered.)

While the chiles are reconstituting, saute over mediumlow heat a chopped
small onion in some extravirgin olive oil. When the onion is getting
transluscent, turn down heat and add some crushed garlic and shake the pan.
Be careful not to brown it.

After the chiles are full, about half an hour, blend them with a little of
the soaking water, working up to the highest setting. The consistency
should be approximately like a tomato sauce, so adjust the water while
you're blending. Pour through a sieve directly into the sauted onion pan,
pushing through with the back of a large spoon.

Mix, add some dried basil and oregano. Add salt to taste. (It may take a
lot.) Add some sugar, a tiny bit at a time, to taste.

Add 1/3 to One half cup of vodka. Turn the heat to mediumlow and let the
alcohol gently boil away, about ten minutes. Be careful not to burn the
sauce.

Turn heat to low and add enough half and half to give the sauce a pinkish
color, about 1/3 One half cup. Adjust to taste. Adjust salt.

Serve over any combination of rice, penne, beans, scallops, tofu or tempeh.
(If you're a sinner you can serve it over any kind of meat.)

Jkandell@ccit.arizona.edu

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