Any of them should work fine. Each has a distinct flavor, so the recipe will come out differently, but you can generally substitute red pepper powders indiscriminately, and while you'll get a different flavor with each, it should work with the other ingredients.

Since there's also hot pepper sauce, I think the smokiness is probably a good part of the choice of chipotle. Why not use part ancho for the chili and part smoked paprika for the smokiness. It calls for a teaspoon, but if you do half and half, and you want to really taste it, I'd go for more like a heaping half teaspoon of each rather than perfectly measured. And if you usually like heaping, go for 3/4 tsp.

Chipotle has a smoky flavor, and so you would need to use your smoked paprikas for the smoky part of the flavor, and then you could add cayenne for the heat. Cayenne is a lot hotter than chipotle, and so you could add a bit of ancho to give it more chili flavor.

For the 1 tsp of ground chipotle chili in your recipe, I would use 1 tsp of Ancho chili powder plus 1/2 tsp smoked paprika, and 1/4 tsp of cayenne. I know that adds up to more than 1 tsp, but the chipotle powder has very concentrated flavor, and you need that much of the other powders to compensate for that.

I do not use much ground dried chili, as I grow chilies myself and then grill/smoke them over mesquite charcoal and preserve them with vinegar and salt. I do use dried whole chilies, however, which can be ground into a powder, if necessary.

Lars

Thank you! That is exactly the sort of advice I was hoping for!

I've never seen dried chipotle in the stores I shop. If the recipe I'm using has wet ingredients, as this one does, I just chop a chipotle chile in adobe sauce.

jasdip-I've always used canned also but then I always have the rest of the can to deal with! It's not the end of the world but I loved the idea of not messing with a part of a can, freezing the rest or figuring out another chipotle dish in the same week.

Penzey's does carry ground chipotle...

This may be too late, but to my taste, the smoked paprika has a lot more of the smoke flavor than the chipolte so you might try with just a quarter or half teaspoon of the smoked paprika plus a teaspoon of the aleppo or ancho.

Aleppo is around the same point on the Scoville scale as chipotle and ancho is fairly mild.

cloud_swift- Thanks! The more info the better since I don't know much about these particular spices. I haven't made the recipe yet :)

LOL Shannon, yes, the old freezing thing.
I open a can and right away freeze each chipotle with some sauce in waxed paper. I read once that it's handy to throw everything in a little blender and just use a couple tsp or whatever amount you want.

I rarely buy the canned chipotles anymore; instead I've been using Tabasco's chipotle hot sauce. It's a lot more convenient than dealing with the leftovers in the can, and I love the flavor. If you try it, add just a little at a time. It has a pretty intense flavor and has some heat!

Here is a link that might be useful: chipotle flavored hot sauce

Do you have a grocery store that carries a lot of Hispanic foods or a Hispanic grocery nearby? That's where we found ground chipotle powder.

I made this last night with 3/4 tsp ancho and 3/4 tsp smoked paprika along with the hot sauce. It was such an easy and delicious recipe. It could have been more smokey and it wasn't very spicy (we like to add spice at the table anyway so we can serve everything to the 1 and 6-year olds).

Anyway, I will definitely make this again and I will eventually try it with the ground chipotle it calls for. I won't hesitate to mix and match ground chile in the future.

Thanks so much!