Red Wagon Farm

Instant Pot Chicken Chile Verde

Posted on October 1, 2025 by mo

Pretty much every Colorado Native, most Transplants and every Red Wagon CSA member and employee I know has Green Chile running through their veins. We eat it on, and with everything!

There is no wrong or right way to make or eat it. This is just one simple recipe I like that is adaptable and really fast because it uses an Instant Pot/Pressure cooker and only 4 ingredients if you don’t count salt and spices.

Chicken chile verde is a great base for lots of quick meals like burritos, nachos, tacos or tostadas.

You can substitute the tomatillos with fresh or canned tomatoes if you like, and you can substitute pork for the chicken.

Chicken Chile Verde

1-2 pounds chicken thighs or breasts. You can also use any cut of pork, though perhaps that might be a different blog post…?
1 pound of tomatillos or tomatoes, fresh or canned
1 pound, about 6 or 7 roasted green chilies
1 medium onion
garlic and spices are optional, I used 1 teaspoon each of cumin and oregano
salt and pepper to taste

I used a pressure cooker, the times and directions are pretty much the same for Instant pots.

Place the chicken in the instant pot or pressure cooker to brown the skin, you aren’t cooking it, just browning it. You will remove the skin and any bones after cooking but I like to leave it in now for more flavor. If you are using skinless/boneless just brown the meat.

2. Put the rest of the ingredients into a blender or food processor and whiz that up for a minute or so.

Hey look, you made salsa verde!

3. Dump the salsa verde in with the chicken and cook it under medium to high pressure for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes slowly release the pressure. Remove the meat and when it is cool enough to handle discard the bones and skin and shred the chicken.

In about a 1/2 hour you have some lovely chicken chile verde delicious as is or ready to make into any number of meals through the week.

This is easily doubled or tripled and freezes beautifully.

Posted in 2025, Peppers Roasted, Recipes, Tomatoes-Tomatillos | 1 Comment

Cauliflower with Béchamel Sauce

Posted on October 1, 2025 by mo

*this is an updated post by Mo. The original was posted 2014 by Amy.

This recipe is adaptable to using Romanesco and or cauliflower. Both are very similar in texture, flavor, cooking methods and time. Béchamel is a basic creamy sauce that is used in many classic dishes. When I worked in restaurants we called Bechamel sauce ‘Culinary Duct Tape’. It pulls textures and flavors together, and upgrades dishes from simple to special, like magic.

This is super simple and fast dish to make. Gather your (very white if not using Romanesco) ingredients.

Recipe

1-2 heads Romanesco and/or cauliflower cut into manageable sizes
2 Tbsp butter
1/4 cup flour any flour will do, even gluten free or corn flour
1 1/2 cups milk, any type of milk works
1/2 cup grated cheese, plus more to sprinkle on top. This is optional again, any cheese works here. This is where you can get really fancy, try Blue cheese or Brie or English Cheddar or whatever you love. It’s super fun to customize.
White pepper
Salt

Steam the Romanesco and cauliflower until almost tender for about 5 minutes in a covered pan. They will cook more in the oven, so you want to leave them a little bit firm. Romanesco takes a little longer to get tender so check after 5 minutes for cauliflower and 7 or 8 for Romanesco.

To make the Béchamel sauce. Melt the butter over medium-low heat then whisk in the flour to make a roux.

Add 1/2 cup milk, whisking constantly. Whisk until the lumps dissolve and you have a smooth, thick paste. Add the remaining cup of milk, 1/2 cup at a time. Each time you should whisk until the sauce thickens. When you can draw a line that stays on a spoon the sauce is the right consistency.

When the sauce has thickened (roughly the consistency of thin gravy), stir in the cheese, white pepper, and salt to taste. Remove sauce from heat.

Place half of the florets on the bottom of your baking dish and half of of the Béchamel sauce.

Put the remaining half of the florets on top of the first layer and cover with the remaining Béchamel sauce and sprinkle with cheese.

Bake in a pre-heated 375F degree oven until golden brown, about 30 minutes.

This is a great side dish for simple weeknight meals or a fancy holiday celebration.

Posted in 2025, Cauliflower, Recipes | Comments Off

Winter CSA 2025/2026

Posted on September 22, 2025 by Amy

We are excited to announce our 2025/2026 Winter CSA! Click here to join.

Details:

Two Pickup Locations:
- Wednesdays at Red Wagon Farm at 7694 N 63rd St, Longmont (near Niwot).
- Thursdays at Red Wagon at Thomas Open Space at 1640 W Baseline Rd, Lafayette.
Pickup times: 3 to 6 pm.
Pickups are from 10/29/25 – 1/29/26
Weekly Veggie Share $643.50 (13 pickups)
Biweekly Veggie Share $346.50 (7 pickups)
Mushroom and Coffee Shares also available.
Prices are prorated if you join after Oct 29.

Possible crops we will have (depending on weather and availability):