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Holey mole!
More ingredients than you can shake a sombrero at
Mole is a quintessential feature of Mexican cuisine, but its thick, rich and deeply savoury flavour is often overlooked outside of Mexico even though it is something every Mexican eats!
Full of unexpected tastes such as prunes and chocolate, the simplest mole has at least a dozen ingredients, with more complex sauces running into the hundreds. Along with all the ground nuts, seeds, spices and fruits tossed in, the standard count of chillies included in a mole includes a minimum of anchos, chipotles, guajillos and pasillas.
Its name has origins in the Aztec word ‘mulli’, which means sauce, stew, mixture and concoction. Although the three states of Puebla, Oaxaca and Tlaxcala claim to be the founders of the sauce, little is known about the first, authentic batches as the mole we recognise today didn’t start appearing until the early 1800s.
A common legend of its creation takes place during the colonial period in the Santa Rose Convent of Puebla, which is where the most well known version of the dish (mole poblano) comes from. The story says that upon hearing that the archbishop was going to visit, the convent nuns went into a panic because they were poor and had almost nothing to prepare. They brought together the little bits of what they did have, including chillies, spices, hardened bread, nuts, and a little chocolate. The nuns killed an old turkey, cooked it and put the sauce on top. The archbishop loved it and asked after the name of the unusual dish, to which one nun simply replied, “A mole”, and the national dish of Mexico was born.
The ambiguity of the dish lives on as there is no set recipe and each mole is as unique as the chef that makes it. Preparing a mole requires an intense session of picking ingredients, blending, tasting, adding and perfecting, but it will be such an aromatic adventure, that it is more than worth setting aside time to do it.
Mexican chillies constitute the base of the dish, along with ingredients such as (but certainly not limited to) peanuts, pine nuts, sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, squash seeds, tomatillos, tomatoes, onion, garlic, plantains, grapes, black pepper, cumin, cloves, anise, dried fruits and chocolate.
Chicken is most often the other half of the dish, but the unusual flavours of mole can also be used with countless more. From pork and other poultry such as duck and turkey to seafood produce and vegetarian dishes, mole is an all-round sauce that will spice a Mexican-inspired menu.
Uncover the flavourful potential of mole by making your own, although there are plenty of quality mole pastes available and need only a few additions to really bring to life this delicious sauce.
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