Pueblo Pepper Fame

Colorful Colorado attracts tourists for beautiful, flavorful, and breathtaking reasons. There are endless adventures and happiness to be found around the mountain range, and when I moved here, I found the pleasure of this atmosphere being my day-to-day life one that I never expected to feel. To say it has been glorious would be an understatement.

I have had visitors from my home area of Indiana who ask me what place to go to first. I never like to recommend just one restaurant, as there are so many that serve incredible food. We have a plethora of authentic Italian, authentic Mexican, and many of the commonly enjoyed major franchises as well. The key ingredient of eating in Pueblo isn't what local place to try out first, though.

It's all about the Pueblo Green Chile. The town, and perhaps even the state, is so focused on chile season that Pueblo, Colorado, hosts a yearly Pueblo Chile Festival.

Of course, purchasing the infamous peppers is the most important step, followed by having the entire batch roasted. From that point, chefs of all types can make Pueblo Green Chile Sauce.

I discovered, in no time, that this sauce is on everything.

It's not a bad thing, but I have yet to visit a locally owned restaurant that didn't offer chile sauce for something. The flavor is, admittedly, very enjoyable and I understand why locals push for tourists to try this above anything else. Certainly, they have recommendations like Pass Key or Do Drop Inn, but any locally owned restaurant is going to have the infamous chile that will round your culinary experience out in a beautifully complex and dynamic flavor.

Side note: I have tried both Pass Key and Do Drop Inn. When you're not interested in trying anything with Pueblo green chile, these two places offer fantastic options. Mini reviews below:

Pass Key: I tried the Pass Key Special sandwich and it was exactly as the menu described. The combination of the fresh lettuce, cold mustard, and provolone cheese against the warm, flat sausage patty on the sandwich was the most ideal collection of textures, temperatures, and flavors I could have expected. The fries were delightful as well. The option for chile is present but not required.

Do Drop Inn: I tried their pizza; the toppings come underneath the cheese, which is a pleasant surprise that I enjoyed. The dough has a unique sweetness to it, a flavor you just don't get anywhere else, and one would likely entirely love it or hate it. I loved it, personally. The dough, however, is very thick and filling, so only one slice typically covers anyone's hunger. I don't recommend ordering too much here! The option for chile is present but not required.

Pueblo Chile Online

The importance of the chile is so intense for some people online, a simple social media search finds you a great deal of amusing observations

However, the existence of the Pueblo Green Chile has sparked some peculiar ideas, notably from our Governor, Jared Polis.

It was one of the most scandalous, debatable, and nauseating debates to have in 2020, and created an unforgettable moment on Twitter for all of us who care, which isn't very many but there are at least a good amount of us, at best.

The History of the Pueblo Chile

According to their website,

"Pueblo has long been a hot spot for chile growers. The climate is almost perfect for them. The long, warm summers and low rainfall are ideal for growing peppers of all kind, and farmers have been doing just that since at least the late 1800s but most likely much earlier than that. Nobody knows when the first chiles were grown in the Arkansas River valley, but they may have been brought north by Mexican traders and settlers as early as the 1840s, when the region was first being settled by colonists of European descent.

After generations and generations of cultivation in the Pueblo area, a uniquely local variety began to develop, most likely through a combination of natural selection and basic horticulture by the farmers. This was the birth of the very first Pueblo green chiles."

From there, the popularity and adoration of the chile has grown into celebrations, competitions, recipe exchanges, and access to all types of personalized Pueblo chile sauces everywhere you go. It's a deep-rooted cultural quirk that can be appreciated by any local, traveler, or newcomer.

In Conclusion...

Certain restaurants may be personal favorites of mine, and of course every restaurant is going to be comparable to others across many other places in this diverse country. What I find most beautiful about local flavors here in Pueblo, Colorado, is that the power of the chile's presence over so many decades goes to show that it's what our Earth around us provides that means so much more to people than what we, ourselves, can create. While our own creations are unique and delightful, the Earth knows how to nourish us, and we can turn that pepper into a lifelong flavor fandom. To me, there's just something special about that. Coming to Pueblo for that alone is worth the trip. Safe travels!