You’ll Find at Least 3 of This $2 Canned Staple in My Pantry at All Times

For the seven years my husband Dave and I have lived together, he’s been the cook. He always had a passion for it, whereas I focused more on making our home spotless. Though I’ve acted as his sous-chef here and there, I’ve never delved deep enough into cooking to make it my forte. That is until Dave had a two-week work trip planned. 

With him traveling, I figured this would be a perfect time for me to try out some recipes and cook freely with zero judgment and plenty of time and space to make mistakes. 

A few months prior, he’d made a milanesa de pollo with a chipotle tomato sauce and queso fresco — essentially a Mexican version of chicken Parmesan. The sauce brought me back to my mom’s kitchen (who was and still is an excellent cook) and in a rare moment, I asked Dave to show me how to make the sauce so I could re-create it while he was away. I was already familiar with one of the ingredients: canned chipotles en adobo. 

Chipotles in adobo are smoked and dried jalapeños, rehydrated and canned in a puree or sauce that typically consists of vinegar, tomato, garlic, and a blend of spices that may vary by brand. My mom regularly has cans of Embasa- or La Costeña peppers stocked in her pantry (both are delicious and I use them interchangeably based on whichever I find first). The Embasa peppers have a slightly thicker sauce, which adds tanginess, acidity, and a bold color to the peppers’ pleasant heat level and rich smokiness.

These cans were always in the pantry when I was growing up — my mom used them for salsas, as a meat marinade, and to add a smokey heat to soups. When grocery shopping for Dave’s two-week absence, I grabbed three cans, and they quickly became a source of inspiration for me in the kitchen.

The first thing I made, although not necessarily cooked, was one of my mom’s quick chipotle recipes. I added a few spoonfuls of the chipotles in adobe to a tuna salad (along with diced cucumber and celery, and mayonnaise). I decided to take it one step further and make a tuna melt, a classic and comforting dish made better by the heat and smokiness of the chipotle sauce. 

And after a successful meal, I used these chipotles in a handful of recipes over the next couple of weeks: I re-created Dave’s chipotle tomato sauce to use as drizzle in a chicken quesadilla; I mixed the sauce from the can with mayo as a spread for a chicken avocado pita sandwich, and I used both the sauce and peppers as a marinade for shrimp to pair with rice and green beans. In each recipe, the sauce added a rich, bold, and smoky flavor while the peppers added a nice crunch and bite. 

I still had a bit leftover after five recipes, which worked out for the best; I was able to combine it with mayo and store it in a squeeze bottle — perfect as a dipping sauce for french fries or as a light spread on a sandwich. 

Despite being a seemingly ordinary canned good, these chipotles in adobo not only helped me to learn to cook when I needed to, they made me feel closer to both my husband and my mom, ultimately inspiring me to follow in their cooking footsteps. 

Buy: EMBASA Chipotle Peppers in Adobo, $1.64 for 7 ounces at Walmart

What canned goods are you stocking up on right now? Tell us about it in the comments below.