Captain Caliente said:If you are marinading with a powder it certainly works. If you are cooking fresh food, chile powder is never as good as a fresh chile. Gordon Ramsay would agree with me. Im good with that.
I'd like to see you make a chipolte sauce from "fresh" peppers.
Fresh is not always best. Mexicans use lots of dried peppers in their salsas, dishes, and moles.
Texas chili is a mix pf powders and dried chilies, etc.
You are limiting yourself when you restrict yourself to fresh, with the mindset of "fresh is better."
Also when I like my Thai dish kicked up I prefer to spice up the curry paste that is used as the base, which is not from fresh peppers. I don't like too many fresh peppers in my dish. Sometimes here I ask for extra hot and they just load it with julienned peppers, sometimes jalapeno. I really find it hard to eat and would rather it be spicy with the correct ratio of peppers to other veg.
Indian is another cuisine that uses lots of dried chilies and powders.
Open you mind to the dried.