Recipes that ask for Green and Red Chilies: What kind of chilies are they talking about!?

Question

I have a thai cookbook and it says several times throughout the cookbook to use green chilies (for a green curry) or it will ask for red chilies (in red curries or other recipes).

What chilies are they talking about? When I go to my local farmer's market they have fresh green peppers but none that are labeled "Green chilies". They have Pablano, Serrano, Jalapeno, Hot Long Finger Peppers ( all of these are green colored chilies).

I made a recipe for a green curry and I used "Pablano" chilies for the "green chilies" it was asking for. I know Pablanos are mild for peppers, I'm not sure if that's what the recipe wanted since it was implying that the dish would be hot. I've always been confused about this but didn't remember to ask anyone.

Your help is greatly appreciated!

Answer

I'm from India originally, and often have trouble finding real Indian chilies. What I've found is that the best substitute in terms of flavor for Indian/Thai green chilies is serrano or jalapeno, the smaller and darker colored, the better. They won't have quite the same stinging bite as Thai or Indian green chilies, but they'll add some serious heat and the same type of green spicy flavor. The hot long finger peppers you mention would be a pretty good substitution, too.

Finding a substitute for fresh red Thai chiles is harder. If you can find fresh hot cherry peppers, red jalapeno, or red peperoncini, they sometimes come close, but since those are hard to find in a lot places too, subbing about 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper powder for each red chili called for in the recipe will create a close approximation of heat, and you can add very thinly julienned red bell peppers for color and the more vegetabl-y part of the chili taste. (Since cayenne powders vary in intensity, I'd start with 1/8 tsp for ever 2 chilies the recipe calls for, and add more if necessary.)

As a general rule of thumb, the bigger and fleshier the chili, the less heat it will have. And, although some can get pretty hot, those big chilies (poblano, banana peppers, Hatch, Anaheim, etc) are more like spicy vegetables, and play a very different role in dishes than their tiny relatives.

Answer

Thanks for your replies. I have a local farmers market that has red and green (fresh too!)thai bird eye chilies. The only problem is that they give you like 50 of them in a package. I can't ever imagine using all of them by the time they go bad and get moldy. I'd probably end up making some sort of sauce out of it and jar it.

Good to know! I'm a bit scared of those chilies though. I like habaneros because to me they aren't just a heat explosion in your mouth, it actually has a unique fruity taste to it too. Some day I might have enough guts to try those thai chilies out. haha.

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Recipes that ask for Green and Red Chilies: What kind of chilies are they talking about!?

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