Mole recipe
- ~10-15 dried chiles
- 1 big handful of pumpkin seeds/almonds
- 1 small handful of sesame seeds
- 1 big handful of raisins or similar
- 1 tbsp of tomato paste
- 1 small handful of animal crackers or similar
- ~1/2 onion
- ~6 garlic cloves
- 2-3 squares of chocolate: preferably very dark, sweet or not sweet is fine depending on how sweet you want the mole
- oregano
- cumin/kreuzkummel
- bay leaf
- chicken / vegetable stock (homemade is best, if its powdered less salt is good)
Take dried chiles, remove seeds and tear into smallish pieces (just small enough so that they lie flat in a pan). I use a mix of chipotle, guajillo, and ancho. You can get them from here or order them from amazon.
Toast the chilies in a pan with hot oil, until they get just a little browned/blackened/puffy. More toasted here is richer and more bitter, less toasted is more fruity - this should only take ~2-3 if the pan is already hot. Separate chiles, keep the oil.
Toast the pumpkin seeds, smashed up animal crackers, raisins together (if sesame, these toast fast so only throw in at the end). Separate these as well.
Chop 1/2 the onion and garlic cloves, cook until they are soft. If you have more time and don't want to babysit them, its easier and better to just roast these in the oven in foil for a while, until the garlic is super soft. Separate.
Combine all the toasted ingredients in a pot with ~1.5 cups of water. If using liquid stock, use this in place of water. Add spices, chocolate, stock, tomato paste, Leave these simmering for a good 30 minutes or more. When things are quite soft, throw everything in a blender and blend until it's smooth. If more liquid is needed for blending, you can add more water here and it will cook off later.
Add a little more oil to the pot and get it hot. Throw the liquified mole back in the hot pan to get a bit more browning out of it, and then keep it on very low and cover for basically as long as you want to (I often leave it going all day/overnight). If you're cooking meat, you can add it now and cook it slowly for a while. This is also good with baked tofu.
At this point, taste to see where it's at:
- If it needs more saltiness / umami, add stock (or a little fish sauce if you have some!)
- If it needs more sweetness, add chocolate / brown sugar
- If it needs more acidity, add a little more tomato paste.
- If you grab a can of huitlacoche from the mexican grocery, you can add this before blending for a more smoky profile also
This is all pretty flexible.... basically: lots of chiles, raisins, nuts, onions/garlic - toast everything, cook until it's soft enough to blend, blend, cook more with spices. You can do super basic versions, or much fancier versions of this if you're careful about combining more ingredients (the Rick Martinez recipes online are very helpful), but I'd say its most interesting to get used to the basic framework and then try improvising.
You can make JUST the chiles, and then make all the rest separately - this leaves you with raw chili paste (which can be saved for other uses) and everything-else. At that point, you can decide how much of each you use to modulate sweetness vs chili-ness etc. It freezes well, but tends to get moldy in the fridge beyond a week. I make versions pretty often, and it only tends to take maybe 30 minutes to make a lot of it. If I think ahead and make stock with one of those little soup chickens the night before, it turns out //really/// sick.