We already told you the festival was coming back. What nobody’s told you yet is what’s actually new on the shelves this year, and that’s the part worth planning a grocery trip around.
The short version: Central Market is running its Hatch celebration from August 5 through August 18, with two free in-store events bookending the season, and a genuinely different product lineup than last year’s. The chain has been doing this since a single pallet of peppers sold out in ten minutes at the Austin store back in August 1995, and thirty-one years in, they’ve apparently decided the answer to “what else can we do with a chile” still hasn’t run dry.
Start with produce, because this is where the actual news is. Hatch jalapeños are new to Central Market this year, grown in the same New Mexico soil as the classic pepper and, according to the chain, running hotter than usual this season. There’s also a Hatch guac and salsa combo, sold together, that leans on the smokiness Hatch is known for rather than trying to be a straight jalapeño substitute.
The prepared foods case is where things get more ambitious. Hatch rajas breakfast tacos pair roasted peppers and onions with the usual taco fillings for something closer to a Southwestern breakfast than a Tex-Mex one. A Roman-style Hatch rajas flatbread puts the peppers on a thin, crisp crust alongside Hatch chicken meatballs, tomatoes, and mozzarella, which is an odd enough combination on paper that it’s worth trying just to see if it works. Hatch butter chicken goes further still, running the velvety, mildly spiced Indian classic through a Hatch chile filter, and it’s available both as a standalone dish and as a casserole with lemon basmati rice for anyone who wants dinner solved for the week.
The meat case has its own version of the same idea. Tequila Hatch marinade comes ready to pour over chicken, beef, or pork, built with a hint of agave sweetness under the heat. A Hatch pepper bratwurst, made in-house, gets its kick from a beer, not just the pepper itself, brewed by Manhattan Project Beer Company specifically with Hatch chile in the mix.
Grocery aisles round it out with a few products worth stocking up on rather than eating this week. Burlap & Barrel Hatch chili powder is sun-dried and built for a spice rack rather than a single meal, with fruity, smoky notes that outlast the season. Pegasus Hatch jerky is made locally in Dallas, small-batch, and about as portable as Hatch season gets. On the wine side, Central Market is specifically pointing shoppers toward a Vermentino for kingfish ceviche and pesto pasta, and a Verdicchio for anything spicy, including Hatch tacos and Hatch chile shrimp, if you’d rather drink your way through the pairing homework than guess at it yourself.
For anyone who wants to taste before committing to a cart full of chile, there’s a free Hatch Tasting on Friday, August 7, from 4 to 7 p.m., and a Kids’ Sampling Stroll on Saturday, August 15, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., built around back-to-school lunchbox ideas rather than heat for heat’s sake. Both run at every Central Market location, including the Dallas stores on Lovers Lane, Midway, and Preston Royal, plus Fort Worth and Plano.
None of this lasts. Hatch peppers grow in one narrow valley in southern New Mexico, the season closes with the first frost, and Central Market’s own products disappear from shelves right along with the fresh pods. Whatever’s going in the freezer for the rest of the year needs to happen in the next two weeks.
Full product list and store details are at centralmarket.com.
