Chile rellenos with chicken

I roast these close to the broiler and turn them twice. Instead of a bag or a towel I just toss them into a bowl and cover with a plate then go off and do something else for awhile, say, twenty minutes or so, then peel off the blistered skin. At that point they are cooked.

This Sargento's sandwich cheese has more flavor than the queso fresco farmer's cheese, the Oaxacan that I have on hand plus it is conveniently sliced. It melts as a string cheese.

The chicken breast is already small, already thin, it was pounded flat anyway so that it spreads out and cooks in an instant. It is flavored with the usual suspects.

The chiles were already split for the seeds to be removed, already cooked under the broiler to blister the skin and remove it. The chicken is cooked as well. All the frying need accomplish is to brown the breading and melt the cheese inside. That takes only a minute. The chiles are not sealed. They are pinched shut and dusted with flour, while still pinching drenched in egg, then coated somewhat incompletely with panko bread crumbs. Surplus egg is poured over the tops of the chiles and more breadcrumb added and pushed in. The coating is casual, there is nothing precise or neurotic about covering every inch evenly. They are shallow fried somewhat as little closed books, so it does not matter if melted cheese leaks out into the pan. They are not made as egg rolls. In fact, the remaining egg can be poured over while they are frying and allowed to spill onto the pan as if making an egg omelet and more breadcrumb pushed onto them.

Leftover saffron rice.

Black beans from a tin. Drained, heated quickly with olive oil, minced garlic, diced onion, ground bay leaf turned to powder, generous cumin, black pepper, chile powder and chicken broth.