A chipotle is a smoke-dried jalapeno chili. Chipotles are a key ingredient that
impart a relatively mild but earthy spiciness to many dishes in Mexican cuisine.
The chiles are used to make various salsas. Chipotle chiles can also be ground
up and combined with other spices to make a meat marinade known as an adobo.
The word chipotle, which was also sometimes spelled chilpoctle and chilpotle,
comes to English originally from the Nahuatl word chilpoctli by way of Mexican
Spanish. The Nahuatl word chilpoctli means "smoked chile", formed from
chil ("chile pepper") + poctli ("smoke"). The original
Nahuatl word was spelled "pochilli" and has apparently become reversed.
Other early spellings from Mexico are tzilpoctil, tzonchilli and texochilli.
