A thousand words on chiles........

[Uncle Bob]

Folks have different styles of learning so taking a swing at the ol' riff on "a picture is worth a thousand words" here's a visual way to better understand chiles. Not a complete list, and I'm sure the subject has been discussed before, but I don't recall seeing a visual representation.

[barelfly]

That’s a great graphic. Thanks for posting.

[jfmorris]

Interesting chart!

Now, I know that chipotle peppers are jalapeños that are dried through smoking - they have a smoky flavor typically. I wonder if the others are dried in a similar way, or just dehydrated without smoke?

[Willy]

Sun dried or oven dried.

[barelfly]

I can’t speak to all of the red chiles above, but they are usually just left on the plant longer, then picked fresh and hung on a ristra to sun dry, or dried in a machine without the smoke. Cowboy Kent Rollins made posted a video last week and his guest owns a chile farm in the Hatch area. They were making red chile enchiladas and I think he said their red chile is dried for 200 days? I’ll have to go back and check that, but various ways to go about it.

[Mosca]

Dried smoked jalapeños are called either chipotles or moritas, depending on how ripe and how much smoke (moritas are riper and less smoked). As best I’ve ever found, dried unsmoked jalapeños are just called dried jalapeños, and sold as discs or flakes. 🤷🏻♂️

Supposedly jalapeños are too thick to dry without smoking, but I just read about it; I got no actual experience there.

[ofelles]

"Too thick" Hey I resemble that remark!

[texastweeter]

They dry fine, and your right. I think ancho are smoked poblanos too BTW. The king if all smoked dried chili's is the ghost though, imo

[Michael_in_TX]

Regional variations can makes things confusing, of course. The best example is that in some parts of Northern Mexico, the poblano is known as pasilla. This usage has even gotten into some parts of Southern California as Sam the Cooking Guy will often refer to a pasilla when there is clearly a green, fresh poblano in front of him, not a dried chile.

[Uncle Bob]

Sadly misuse of terminology is a human affliction. Too often we'll see pork loin and tenderloin used interchangeably without regard for them actually being different muscles, as an example.

[GolfGeezer]

Both Ralph’s (a Kroger chain) and Pavilions/Albertsons (a Vons chain) sell fresh poblano as pasilla chilis. It kind of threw me trying figure it out when I made my chili this last weekend. Had to look it up online.

[Michael_in_TX]

Uncle Bob I can only imagine the number of dishes ruined...or at least made suboptimal...by your example there.