Illustration by Chris Philpot 

How to Mix Up Hatch Chile
“First Colorado, now Arizona?” asked a fuming Tamara Casias-Shope upon spying a curious web recipe. On the heels of New Mexico’s good-natured battle with Colorado over which state grows the best chile, the recipe relocated one of our favorite varieties. A cook identified only as “James” on Allrecipes.com crowed about his “Arizona Hatch Chili” recipe. “It never fails to please,” he wrote. And yes, beyond placing Hatch-grown chiles in Arizona, his recipe for a standard green-chile-and-pork stew spelled chile with an “i,” despite the absence of beans, tomatoes, or Texans. Just in case, these six essential green chile recipes should erase the memory of those Arizona chiles.

It’s Just a Jump to the Left …
After buying a cabin in Chama, Janet and Dave Clements went online to learn more about nearby Dulce and the Jicarilla Apache Nation. The AAA Native Arts site yielded good info but featured a map that misplaced not only New Mexico but also Colorado, Kansas, and Oklahoma, moving them all one spot west. Despite that, Janet says, “we found our way to Dulce and had an enchanting visit.”

I See by Your Outfit
Richard Panofsky of Ribera stumbled across an online T-shirt company that offered one with the slogan “New Mexico—Better than Old Mexico.” A graphic carried silhouettes of various icons, including a multi-armed saguaro cactus (a species that grows only in Arizona and Mexico), one of the two Mitten Buttes (a rock feature in Monument Valley, near the Arizona-Utah state line), and a cowboy with a horse gazing toward both of them. “I guess the cowboy with the horse can see long distances,” Panofsky said. He sure can, but he’ll have to ride hard to git thar. (We'll happily recommend Organ Mountain Outfitters to help you show off true New Mexico pride.) 

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