Molly's Cooking Blog
Turkey Mole Poblano de Guajolote
I really only make this dish for special occasions when company is coming. Gathering the various chiles requires a trip to your favorite Mexican market if you don’t keep your Mexican pantry stocked with ancho, pasilla or mulato chiles. If you live somewhere where you can find these chiles dried as a powder you can substitute the powder for the dried chiles.
This makes quite a bit of sauce and I freeze any of the leftover sauce and use it in enchiladas, or burritos. One of the most distinctive dishes in the Azten Kitchen are the Mollis. The Nahuatl work “molli” (Spanish “mole,” pronounce “molay”) means a sauce made with chile. There are endless variations on the mole them but the most famous one is the Mole Poblano. The cooking technique of the moles is very different from most Mexican recipes. It is closer to the techniques used for curries in India. The ingredients, chiles, tomatoes, nuts, herbs, spices, and seasonings are all ground to a coarse paste or puree, and then cooked while being stirred constantly, in hot lard for five minutes.
Chicken, turkey, or pork, or whatever, is cooked separately in a small amount of stock or water, which is used to thin the chile mixture. Meat and sauce are then heated gently together just long enough to blend the flavors. It is essential to cook the mole paste in fat, as otherwise the finished dish has a raw taste and the flavor of the chiles never blends successfully with the other ingredients. The splash and hiss of the chile mixture (and the splatters on your stove) when it hits the hot fat is a bit alarming. The trick is to lower the heat as soon as the mixture is in the skillet and to begin stirring it with a wooden spoon immediately. Depending on the juiciness of the tomatoes and the quality of the chiles, the past or puree will vary in dryness. Either way it makes no difference.
I serve this with a pot of refritos, rice and tortillas.
